My knees went weak

Because Derek is quite the dare devil I often find him crying with some sort of injury. When we first got to Texas I did the perfect parenting thing. I would stay outside for hours supervising as my kids rode their bikes and played with the neighbor kids. I would water plants, wave at people walking their dogs or pull weeds. After they went outside for I don't know like the 100th day in a row I said this is for the birds and decided to hang out inside. I opened the blinds to the front window so I could look out on them but still do what I needed to do inside.(facebook)
I was cooking dinner yesterday and I peaked out the window and saw Derek covered in red. I went weak in the knees, my throat restricted, I wanted to throw up at the amount of (what I thought was) blood I saw. I fell to the ground and screamed as loud and strong as I could. Then I ran out to Derek and swooped him up in my arms. I rushed him inside chanting "Dear Lord give me strength" as I gritted my teeth and flexed my biceps. When we got inside it hit me that he was only crying cause I took him away from all the fun he was having. I don't know if he colored on himself with marker or a neighbor kid did (or why there were markers outside in the first place) but I spent the evening with a raspy horse voice and the WORST headache from screaming so loud. I hope this kid realizes what he does to me. I learned an important lesson though. Next time I will skip the hysterics before I go out to him. It felt like I had a hang over the next day.

Improvise

I grew up in the LDS church. My whole life we didn't skip sacrament meetings or general conference. I guess if I were a convert I would have more patience but I don't. I HATE!!! long prayers. I think its distasteful and egotistical. But thats just my opinion. Prayer is a very private conversation between two people so prayers that are said in public to start a meeting or bless food should be brief and get to the point. I am sure we have all heard the story of the prophet Brigham Young eating his food before the prayer was over. I will do the same thing and not bat an eye. I can't stand it when people pause and take a long deep breath during a prayer. Like they can't seem to handle one thought process leading into another one or they just want to seem that much more spiritual. Either way I think its rubbish. I guess it bothers me to the point where I refuse to bless the food if I have a long winded prayer giver in the room. Think what you want I am happy to chill in a lower kingdom before I will sit for what seems like hours and listen to a slow monotonous prayer. Olivia and Addie go to a Methodist preschool and they have this little song they sing before they eat their lunch. Its perfect!!! I love that its sweet simple to the point and super cute. I decided to give in a little and allow the kids to bless the food with their little song.

Update

Well I am kind of out of things to write about for the blog. I try to make it a point to blog often otherwise I hate that I forgot things and missed out on a chance to keep a memory. On the other hand when I try to blog too much I feel like I make up things to blog about. Lol. Like kids quick look cute so I can take a picture and make up a blog. Any way my only idea was to update about how the potty training is going. He is doing great. Its been a breeze compared to Livvy. I think boys have these giant tanks though. Cause he can hold his pee forever and then unload a gallon at a time. My girls do these tiny pees that trickle out every other min. The only mistakes he seems to have are when my mom is here. I find this so frustrating cause she is my biggest critic. So when I arrive home from the store and she tells me he had wet pants I feel like its all a conspiracy to drive me to the loony bin. I know her and my kids sit in secret and plot against me. The other day we were at the lake and every one was throwing rocks into the lake to make a big splash. The min I pick up a rock and pull back my arm to throw all four of my kids in perfect unison hit the deck. It was like they planned it or my parents payed them $20 bucks each just so they could watch and laugh. Why else would they duck? I am not paranoid!!

Potty Training

I am done!! DONE! DONE! DONE! Potty Training is the worst. I remember with Dallin I was at a loss and then a pediatricians wife recommended this book and its my golden ticket. I really feel like all I have to do is be done potty training and parenting is all smooth sailing from there. I know some people are worried about drugs and sex and teenagers but to me that would be a cake walk now that I have conquered this. The book says potty train in less than a day but for me its more like three. I do it right and we do it right the first time and then its over with. Kids get mixed messages. If parents give up and put a diaper back on. If they put a diaper on at bed time. If they don't practice with them every time they have a mistake then that just makes the learning process that much harder and potty training can go on for over a year. I consider my kids potty trained when they go to the bathroom all by themselves no help. Lots of parents are stressed out cause they follow their kids around all day asking them if they need to go. Then they never know how to do it on their own. For the first week we use loose underwear so its easier for them to get off and they dont wear pants till they get it down. This time with Derek I had him wear his sisters old underwear. But he was a quick learner and now he is potty trained. I am soooo happy and relieved. I love that I will never do diapers again. !!! He goes all by himself like a big boy. And he even tells me when he has to go at the store.

Legos

I love it when you go to download pictures and there are over a hundred random blurry lego pics taken by Dallin the 7 yr old. I am not a huge fan of legos. You need at least a billion of them to make a kid happy and then they are everywhere but in one spot. If the vacuum cleaner would pick up the pieces then it would be great cause I am the kind of mom that is inclined to just roll right over them. But alas I am miserable as they invade my life. With yet another little boy that will like them too. I guess Dallin feels a need to take pictures of his creations cause he knows how quickly his mom throws them in a bucket while he is at school. The funniest part is I will look back at these pics and bawl my eyes out at how cute and creative he was. The worst is when he adorns my fire place mantel and window ledges in the house with his lego ships and his creations like it adding to the decor of the house in some way.

Pray for me.

When the kids were out of school I decided to take them to Chick Fil A one afternoon to load up on root beer and chicken nuggets. There is a sort of unspoken agreement when my kids get to go to a play place and eat. The general idea is if I take you then when we get home you best play nice and quiet for at least two hours. I was tired and right when we got home Addie asked for a drink. I knew she had tons of root beer at Chick Fil A so I told her NO and to go play. (if my kids are real thirsty they can always grab a stool, climb up on the counter and put their mouth to a faucet)
Later that day I was running around cleaning house with a slight urge to go to the bathroom. The urge got worse.... bad enough that I had to get to the nearest bathroom fast. Only to find it was out of toilet paper. This was not a situation that could just drip dry if you know what I mean. I called for Addie in the next room and asked if she could grab me some paper towels from the kitchen. She looks me square in the eyes and says "What did you tell me when I asked for a drink?" You should have seen the look of triumph on her face. I am really worried about her teenage years. Pray for me!

Turch

We have a new church time and its killer. 9 am for a single lady to get 4 kids ready and my nursery lesson is not fun. The key is to do as much as you can the night before but that still leaves a bunch of grumpy people trying to interact in the morning. Lets just put it this way. We don't talk to each other with the kind of words you would use at church that early in the morning, which always makes me feel bad (for a milisecond) when we get there. And after I am done in nursery I am very tired. Today we had Sonic for lunch. You could say thats not keeping the sabbath day holy but I highly wouldn't recommend making that argument with me till Monday.

Its been a while...

I freaken HATE playdough. I mean with a passion. I don't remember playing with it as a kid and then Dallin came along. Like your average first time parent I had the patience to make a play dough pizza, empire state building, clown, giraffe, Elvis ect... Then more kids came along and I got sick of having them watch ME play play dough. I insisted they play with it themselves. Which only made the mess get bigger and more difficult to clean. I would let the stuff on the floor dry out for a day or two and then try to sweep it up only to find my kids had taken it to the next level one day and decided to soak the play dough in bowls of water making it wet and runny and slimy and it stained everything in a ten mile radius. I know when I have reached my limit so I took it all and put it very very high up in the corner of a closet. It has literally been over a year and a half since my kids have seen it or touched it. But the holiday break came and Andrew had time off of work so we gave it another go. I did have a slight anxiety attack as Derek tried to eat it and Addie got some in her Barbie's hair (the barbie was later thrown away after she went to bed), but I relaxed a bit and took some pics. Cause Lord knows when we will play with it again. Dallin stuffed Star wars figurines into a big wad of play dough. Addie and Olivia used cookie cutters. Andrew made words messages on my behalf (I included the only "G" rated message). And Derek just made a mess. I swear people that have the patience for kids crafts must be on some high doses of prozac.

Addie's Favorite Gift

Well I should say her two favorite gifts cause they kind of go hand in hand. She got a Hannah Montana guitar from Santa and a stereo to play her songs on from aunt net. They say it takes a village to raise kids and I agree. On of the village people (aunt Becka) got Addie into Hannah Montana, and its a good thing too cause I would not have been inclined to do so on my own. I think Hannah Montana fans are primarily white trashy. I have to admit though that Addie loves her music and loves everything about her. So as long as she is happy so am I.

The Best Of Both Worlds

Another little clip of her singing. I feel so bad because when she first got the guitar we corrected her on how she played it. It looked like it was all wrong. Addie is left handed and I keep on forgetting that, so almost everything she tires to do I correct her on it, only to realize (days later) that she does it that way cause she is left handed.