I'll See You Next Year, Toes

It's happening. Yesterday I wore shoes--sneakers. Not flip flops, but real, covering all of my feet, total arch support sneakers. I was saddened, but I've known for a couple weeks now that this was coming. The wind. The rains. The drastic drop in temperature each night. Autumn has to arrive sometime, right?

While Fall is pretty and it means we can go to the orchards and pick apples, it also means winter is coming. I've never been a fan of winter. It's harsh, cold, cruel, and is always like the last guest (that wasn't even invited) to leave a party that lasts too long.



So, hello, long sleeves. Hello, corduroy pants. Hello hoodies. And goodbye, feet.

Sew Fun

Corny title, I know. Sorry.

But last Saturday I took Jeremy and Emma to a neighborhood garage sale and it was the best I've ever been to. I know lots of people hate garage sales, Nathan is one of them, but I think it's so fun to walk around and see what little treasures people have held on to and are now ready to part with.

I was able to find some great stuff.

*I got a beautiful sheet set for $3 Here's one of the pillowcases.
The sheets are for a twin, which is what we are always in need of.

However, this particular pillowcase didn't stay a pillowcase for long.

It now looks like this


I stayed up late that night to make skirts for the girls. Megan got the part that was already embroidered. Since the embroidery was about four inches long I figured it would swallow Emma. I used what was left of the pillowcase for Emma's skirt, adding a little trim around the bottom and flower which I can switch out to match whatever shirt I put her in.

*An Amish made baby doll bassinet for $5 which needs only a little TLC

This will be a Christmas present for a little girl who loves baby dolls.

*A game for the kids-Bed Bugs-for FREE

The game already has been a life saver with the kids. They love it and play it all the time, freeing me up to do stuff like shower.
Yes, my friends, my hygiene has improved because of a game called Bed Bugs.
Ironic.

*A cute sweater for Emma for $1

Here she is going for the camera. It's a little blurry, but I love it.

*A fun toy for Emma (she's a little old for it, but likes it anyway) for $1

*And a cool iron chair that is similar to one in Megan's room for $3.
The pillow needs recovering or replacing and the iron should probably be repainted, but those are easy fixes.

And because of my wonderful luck at three garage sales (and I've only been to three here), I will never knock Cleveland garage sales.

Book Review-Mary Poppins

Mary Poppins by Pamela L. Travers



I LOVED this book. I actually listened to it on CD with the kids this past week (only 3 CDs long) and I adored the woman who read it. If you've ever seen the movie Emma (the version with Gweneth Paltrow) the woman who reads it is the poor Miss Bates who drives everyone nuts and is hilarious. She does a superb job reading this. The book itself is so funny and clever and nothing at all like the Disney movie. I was excited to see that there are more books. I hadn't realized it was a series, so many some of the stuff Disney added in and changed are in the next books.

View all my reviews >>

Tame and Quiet Children

This is how I feel today.


"I confess," replied Elinor, "that while I am at Barton Park, I never think of tame and quiet children with any abhorrence."

Jane Austen
Sense and Sensibility

In Memoriam

It's gone. It was fine one minute and then I got off the phone and noticed the blank stare. I thought it was sleeping. Later, as I was finishing dinner, I thought I'd put on a little music. That's when I noticed. The death. Quiet. Unnoticed.

My dear friend is gone, along with everything on it. Though Nathan says he can get everything for me.


Ok, enough drama. My laptop died. Again. It just shut itself off and wouldn't come back on. Nathan already is laptop shopping for me. This means I have to save my money. This means I can't quit babysitting like I've been thinking about doing.

Probes are of the Devil and I Feel Lame

. . . and sore. So I went back to good ol' Case Dental School today. I was reminded why I hate going to the dentist. Seriously, I love you Nathan, and Ryan, you're cool, and all y'all dental students or dentists (hey Adam!) who may be reading this, you know I think you're great. But seriously, it takes one messed up person to want to be a dentist.

Probing my gums was not part of the dentist experience growing up and now all of a sudden they are sticking this thing up my gums and calmly calling out random numbers one through five, and I'm laying there on my head thinking, I'd rather be in labor without an epidural right now.

I actually cried. For a while. Nathan had to stop probing and ask someone in charge if he actually had to go on. He did. Now my gums are so sore that I don't want to eat anything. And I have cavities. Plenty of them. This isn't fair!! I brush. I floss, dang it! Almost every night I'm there pushing that stupid string between my teeth. Now I actually have to go back. And not just in six months, but within the next six days.

Anyone wanna babysit? Jeremy climbed all over me during the probing. Tell me that didn't make things hurt more. At least our friend Pete took Megan to class with him. She actually sat through an entire lecture with him and quietly played on his laptop.

Also, I actually fell asleep no less than 4 times while in that blasted dental chair. I am so tired that I can fall asleep during a painful cleaning. Get that? This was just a cleaning and I was in tears. It wasn't Nathan's fault, let me put that in. I just have awful teeth. So yeah, I actually fell asleep in the chair. Two of these times though was when Nathan was trying to decide which tool to use, trying to read the size of the scraper thingies. And this wasn't my first time falling asleep in a dental chair. I did it last time, too. (Hey Adam! Don't know if you noticed it or not.)

At one point I compared/contrasted the dentist experience to the hair cutting experience.

Dentist Experience: pain expected

Salon Experience: not usually painful unless your ear gets clipped by idiot hairdresser

Dentist Experience: painful all the way through

Salon Experience: usually only painful at the end when I look in the mirror and see the damage

Dentist Experience: I can fall asleep assuming they don't ask me questions about myself while their pain-inducing and of the devil tools are in my mouth

Salon Experience: I can fall asleep assuming they don't ask me questions about myself

Dentist Experience: I visit the dentist about twice a year (not counting visits for fillings)

Salon Experience: I visit the salon about twice a year (sad, but true)

Anyway, I thought it shocking that the two things were so similar. Still, I'd rather get my hair cut than go to the dentist. Like I said before, I'd rather be in labor without the epidural than go to the dentist.

Summer Reading Fun

Emma has discovered her love of reading. In fact, she will often (about 200 times a day) pick up a few books, bring them to me, and say, "Read!"

Often when I'm busy I'll have Megan read to Emma. It's good practice for Megan and she loves to help out and read to her siblings, so it's a win-win situation. Oftentimes Emma doesn't care who's reading to her as long as she's being read to.



Also, Megan participated in a program at Borders. She had to read 8 books and turn in a paper listing the books she read. Then she got to pick a book from a very poor selection. Luckily we were shown the wrong section of books and she got to pick a fairly cool version of Black Beauty that has a CD with it. She can listen to it and read it at the same time and it pretty excited about it.

New Blog!

I joined a group blog over at Pushing Past the Pounds. All the



and



had a few pounds of repercussions.

Come check us out sometime!

BTW, just looking at those pictures is killing me! I want some!!!

Great Balls of Fire!

Late night star gazing is usually just that. Gazing. Last night it was a bit more enthusiastic. But only a bit. With this meteor shower going on, and our terrible habit of going to bed late, Nathan and I were able to see some shooting stars last night!

I'd never seen one before, but Nathan has seen plenty. While Nathan was in the house looking for his green laser pointer (which we like to use to scare the neighbors, but that's another post), I saw 2 shooting stars. While he went back into the house to get batteries for the laser pointer, I saw a couple more. When he went back into the house because I told him where the batteries actually were I, once again, saw a couple more.

Then he went into the garage to get our camp chairs. We watched together for a while, catching a few more together and trying to show each other stars too fast to share.

When my eyes were too tired to keep open any longer we decided it was time to go inside. Slowly we stood, still keeping our heads turned up to the sky. While Nathan took our chairs back into the garage, that's when it happened. The biggest, longest lasting shooting star so far, and then . . . BANG! It exploded. It was awesome. Purely awesome. Nathan was excited that I'd gotten to see a fireball meteor, but disappointed that he hadn't seen it, too.

As we walked back to the house we held our heads back, trying to glance one last shooting star.

This picture is what it looked like before it exploded.(Photo courtesy of amsmeteors.org)

Then it looked more like this. The main differences was the sky
was darker and it was more green-looking.

(Photo courtesy of utahskies.org)

It was way cool.

Ward Camp Out

This last weekend we went with our ward (local Church group) to the John Johnson Farm in Hiram, Ohio for a ward camp out. It was a lot of fun. I only have a couple pictures because I kind of forgot to take the camera out of its bag most of the time. Oops.



Emma kept giving our friend, Kjirsti grass. She was awesome about it. Every time Emma gave Kjirsti grass, Kjirsti was excited and then at the end . . .

she threw it all up in the air and let it all fall down on Emma and Jeremy!
They thought it was great.

And of course what would a camp out at the farm be without the kids catching frog
after frog after frog?

The Trip Back

I'm a little late in posting this, but I just haven't felt much like blogging lately. Kind of in a slump still, I guess.

Anyway, on the way back to Cleveland we saw some fun stuff. Nathan was very thoughtful in his planning of this.

He took us to Abraham Lincoln's childhood home. We got to see part of the farm he grew up on and see a display about his life. This picture is of a well that was on their farm.

The cabin is in the building above.

Soon after leaving the Lincoln sites we saw this sign! I had to hurry to get a picture of it.

Fun times! Thanks Nathan!

Another Haircut for Megan

Before we left Texas we thought it would be a good idea to get Megan's hair cut. We really should have done it as soon as we got down there, but just never got around to it.

Before:

After:

A Quick House Update and an Anniversary Present

Yesterday we had a couple friends over for games and I asked Nathan to hang some family pictures before they arrived. Here he is with the last one and the final result.


The lighting is a little weird, so the walls look funny and I didn't feel like dealing with Photo Shop tonight. So due to my laziness, you get funny lighting. There ya go. But hey, I love how it turned out! A fun assortment of pictures and the house is finally starting to feel like mine instead of a place we are just staying.


For our anniversary Nathan decided to splurge a bit and (thank goodness for a sale) got us a couch/chair set! Thank you! The yellow in the pillows (which I really didn't care for at first) actually matches perfectly with our walls. Happy coincidence. Nathan's present hasn't arrived yet. I'll let you know what it is when it gets here.

Seven Years

Happy Anniversary

Seven years ago today Nathan and I entered the Salt Lake Temple and were married for time and eternity.


I am so grateful to have Nathan as my husband. He helps me be better, reminding me to be happy and calm; and he never fails to remind me I am a better wife, mother, and person than I give myself credit for.

Nathan reminds me to have fun. Sometimes I get trapped in the stresses of life and forget that life is meant to be enjoyed. Nathan is always there with a smile and something funny to help me laugh.


I am thankful I get to spend not only the rest of my life, but eternity with Nathan. We've had many adventures together and I am excited to see what adventures lay in store for us.

I love you, Nathan!