Cooking with Daddie

Many people know that my hobby at home is cooking and that I love to be in the kitchen. What makes it even more fun is to cook with the kids. Awhile back Adrienne and I started a dinner program at home where the kids will cook dinner on most nights. We do this about 4 nights per week and we rotate the nights between McKenzie, Halie and Sadie. They all love the 1 on 1 time with Mom or Dad (usually Mom because of my schedule) and you would be amazed at what they can do in the kitchen. They have learned many skills and cooking has built a lot of confidence within them selves.

Here is a picture of our 3 oldest after we made muffins and omellettes from scratch. They all had a hand in the process and truly did about 95% of the preparation and cooking. We used recipes out of the Ratatouille cookbok that Adrienne's mom sent them for Christmas. Bon Apetit!

Happy 10th Anniversary!!!!!

Oh what an amazingly happy day! Today (actually it's tomorrow but we are celebrating today), 10 years ago, I made the best decision of my life. Richard and I got married and I became the luckiest, most blessed woman in the world. It's crazy to look back through this past decade and see what we've been through. Look at how far we've come. I am so thankful that Richard is in my life. I can't find the words that adequately describe my love for him. I wanted everyone to know how much I love and how much I love the life we have created together. I know that I can make it through any trial with him by my side. I know how corny this sounds, but he is my true soul mate. Everyone thought we were crazy when we got married but I knew the first moment I spoke to him that he was the one I would spend eternity with. Here are the top 10 reasons why I love him (in no particular order)...

10. He puts up with how emotional I am (I get teary eyed over EVERYTHING)

9. He has given me a beautiful family

8. He is very sensitive to my needs

7. He always puts me first

6. He lets me put my cold feet on his warm legs to warm them up (and he HATES cold feet)

5. He makes me feel beautiful

4. He loves me no matter my size

3. He makes up funny songs that make me laugh

2. He is a romantic at heart

1. He makes me happy

He watches chick flicks with me

He is an extraordinary father

He has a testimony and loves the Lord

He cooks for me (I hate to cook)

He ooohhh's and aaahhh's over all my scrapbook page ( and I show him pages all the time)

I couldn't stop at just 1o.... Happy Anniversary Baby! I am so in love with you!

For his gift I made him a 10x20 time line of our blissful 10 years and framed it.

6 Week Update

6 Weeks ago I started the Slim in 6 diet and exercise program by beach body. I vowed to lose weight and was determined to stick by my goal. After 6 hard weeks I wanted to give an update...

I lost a total of 16 pounds and about 10 3/4 total inches.

4 3/4 in. from my waist
2 in. from my hips
2 1/4 in. from my bust
3/4 in. from my right bicep
1 in. from my thigh

I am so excited and this has given me enough motivation to continue on with my goal. My total weight loss goal is to lose 37 lbs. So I have 21 more pounds to go.

picture freak

That is totally what I am...a camera constantly up in my kids faces. In fact here is the proof. I was taking self portraits of myself and Natalie last sunday and when I reviewed the pictures, to my surprise she was smiling in ALL of them. Without anyone behind the camera trying to make her smile. I laughed. She is so used to the camera already and she is only 8 months old.

smarty pants

Today McKenzie was honored at her school for her excellent achievement in math. No surprise there. She is always at the top of her grade for everything. She was just nominated by her teacher to join the GATE (gifted and talented education) program. She scored in the 99% nationally in the standardized testing. She is so funny. We got her report card today and we were going over all her scores in each subject and we got to P.E. and she says

"Oh PE...that is my WORST subject."

It's so opposite of me in school. I always excelled at anything athletic and sucked in everything academic. Richard excelled in both (brat!) However McKenzie still got the highest score in PE since according to her "I still have to do good."

Halie's teacher chose to honor the kids who were at the bottom of the class and pulled themselves up higher. This is a good chance for those kids that are trying really hard, but sucky for Halie since she is always at the top of the class for every subject. Funny thing about Halie is that she got all 'O's for outstanding except in PE. She got an S for satisfactory. What is up with that? She is so athletic and always has been.

All in all they got amazing grades and are both having to get extra work all the time. I am so thankful that they excel in academics.

Brothers

Many of you know that both of my sisters had babies at the begining of November. They are two days apart. How cute! (and my brother and sister (in-law) are having a boy in march) I love that about having a big family....siblings having babies at the same time so that cousins are the same age. Well Andrea has a blog so I can see pictures of Porter (when she posts :) ) anytime but Aubrey doesn't. She sent me pictures of little Micheal and big brother James and they are so stinkin' cute!! I couldn't resist posting them.

I have several boxes of nice baby girl clothes that I am saving for anyone who has a girl. I think it's so funny that every single person, and I am not exagerating, that is having a baby around me is having or had a boy.

I'm thankful for...

Ahhhh thanksgiving week ~ I love it so much for several reasons!

1.) A time to reflect on all of my blessings

2.) Most years we spend time with family
3.) The girls are off of school for a week

Just to mention a few. But this week we are in Orange county visiting Richard's sister and brother-in-law, Jennifer and Omar, and his mom Marian. We are having a fabulous week so far and it's almost over. It's going to be so sad to leave. We have been to the Natural history museum in LA, the children's museum in Santa Ana, the USC campus, up to visit Uncle Omar at his job (he is a police officer for LA county), and to the beach.

Thanksgiving dinner was awesome today! Jennifer made everything so nice and wonderful. Tomorrow we are off to Knott's Berry Farm amusement park. We will be joined by Grandma Marian, GG (Grandma Gail or Great Grandma), Aunt Jennifer, Uncle Omar and possibly Crystal who is Omar's sister. Should be big fun.

The girls love being in big cities. Everytime we come here we want to move here! It's such an amazing area. We love it. But something tells me it wouldn't be the best thing for our family to pay $2000.00 a month to rent an apartment. Crazy!

So that sums up thanksgiving week so far!

oh how they grow

It's hard to believe that Natalie is already almost 8 months old. She is such a little cutie! She has the best smile and it just melts our hearts. (she rarely smiles for anyone outside her family) I love how anytime she does anything all 3 of the other girls go "OHHHHHHH" in a high voice. She has recently started saying "DaDa." It'sabsolutely adorable.

We celebrated Halie's 7th birthday a couple of weeks ago. She is such a beautiful girl and brings so much joy and many laughs into our home. We took her to Applebee's (of course we did, the girls love it when they get sung to), and then Richard took the girls to see High School Musical 3.

What a different birthday from last year. Last year she had a round of chemo a few days before her birthday and was totally fatiqued on her big day. This year we ran, laughed, played, and just enjoyed each other! What difference a year makes.

Oh and FYI...Halie had an appointment with her oncologist yesterday and she is doing GREAT! She is getting better at getting her blood drawn, that is to say that she isn't freaking out anymore. She still cries at first but she's trying! What a champ. She is growing perfectly and her remaining kidney looks great. It's such a relief after each appointment to get the phone call saying that everything looks good. We kind of hold our breath until we get it!

A Rosalie????

What's up with that? When I think of Rosalie I think of a spoiled brat who loves only herself. How is that me?

Oh girls, girls, girls

Last sunday Richard and I were sitting on the couch when a little note was passed to us. It was a handwritten invitation to a "nail salon." It was adorable! We went and I got a manicure while Richard enjoyed a pedicure. They had a nail dryer set up (a fan), along with a nail station, a make-up station, and a hair station. When I was finished I tipped them all 2 quarters and the 'technicians' couldn't have been happier. This is why I LOVE having girls. They have such great imaginations and can play for hours with almost nothing.

change is in the air!

Okay so I'm going to do something out of the ordinary for me. I am going to make myself very vulnerable. I'm putting myself out there and am going to tell everyone of my biggest struggle since Sadie's been born. (okay not my biggest, but it's pretty up there on the list) After Sadie was born I had 20 extra pounds that I could just not get rid of. I tried everything and seriously nothing worked. I battled with self-esteem issues everyday. Well then I had my sweet little Natalie and was stuck with another 20 extra pounds on top of the already 20. Those of you who know me, know that I have always been relatively small weighing around 115-120, and athletic. So an 40 pounds of flub is just disgusting to me! So to add to this trial, I also suffered from Postpartum depression after Natalie was born. So all the extra weight was making my postpartum worse. And I am not a depressive person. I hate being down!

Anyways I am not one of those lucky women who loses weight when they nurse (actually if you are one of those moms please don't ever talk to me again!). Well the past few months I have been feeling more like me and getting past the depression. And Natalie decided to ween herself off of nursing and so I have decided to make a change. I am getting serious about this weight loss and started the slim in 6 program by beach body. I started Nov. 3rd and as of yesterday (Nov. 12th) I have lost 9 pounds. I am ecstatic! It is about time and hope to have lost at least another 10 by the time I am done with my program in 4 1/2 weeks.

So when I am done with the slim in 6 I will start the power 90. I feel liberated and am glad that this is working for me. I have been eating SO healthy and about 1100 calories a day. I am only eating fresh food (almost only, I have been eating some brown rice and stone ground whole wheat bagels), and although I am not strictly vegetarian but have been eating tofu and surprisingly loving it! So if anyone has any recipe ideas for tofu...bring it on please!

So there it is...it's all out there and you all know the embarrassing truth about me. I will keep you posted on my weight loss. And no way am I posting my awful 'before' photos.

Cutie Cousins

Oh my gosh we are so lucky to have my niece and nephew stay with us for a few days. Andrea had her baby on Monday morning (2:34 am) and since Luke is in school and they don't have any family around, we went and picked them up yesterday and brought them to Oroville. It is so funny to see how much Taylor and Sadie love each other. They play SO well and just giggle all the time. It's also fun to have a boy around. Andrew cracks me up! He is an excellent artist. Iam used to getting drawings of castles, ponies, hearts, and rainbows. Well Andrew drew a picture of iron man along with a detailed picture of his hand and glove. It was so cute. I have the best memories of my cousins Kathleen and Christy when I was young and now I get to watch my kids make memories with their cousins.

Sad day for America

It's a sad day in America. Americans have fallen for the smoke and mirrors and are expecting The Chosen One to make "change." How disappointed we will be when the only change he makes is to his stance on nearly every major issue facing our times. America will not be any better in four years. Only deeper in debt with increased spending on social programs, looser borders and higher taxes.

Mark my words!!

Should have elected Ron Paul.

on with the sugar high

So halloween marks our one year blogging anniversary! Yeah happy day to us. Halloween gets more and more fun as the girls get older. It was fun to see Sadie's excitement this year since she knew what was coming. When we were in disney world, we bought the girls really nice princess outfits. So McKenzie went as Princess Jasmine and Halie went as Princess Ariel. Sadie went as Strawberry Shortcake and Natalie was a lion cub. Richard dressed up as a vampire because he's awesome like that. He always tries to dress up with the girls. I dressed up as a devil for work but didn't think it was a wise choice for the ward halloween party so I changed it up and painted my face as a hillbilly. Anyways it was such a fun night and halloween is so great because it kicks off the holiday season.

old school

I found this picture of Richard and myself from almost 5 years ago. We are getting ready to celebrate our 10th anniversary and this picture is from right after our 5th! It's so fun to look at picture from earlier on in our marriage. I love it!

With a snip snip here!

Before

After

Sadie has wanted to get her haircut since the girls got theirs cut. It has taken months to convince Richard to let me do it. Then right after I cut it Sadie started crying saying that she wanted her long hair back. But she loves it now and so do we!

Totally Oblivious

Our sweet little McKenzie is totally oblivious thank goodness. She is such a good kid and she has it all. She is so super smart. (Just on a side note, she was chosen to be in a little study on reading at her school. She is in thrid grade and was reading 7th and 8th grade literature) She is beautiful sweet, funny, compassionate and developed for her age. All the boys like her. I went to pick her up from school a couple of weeks ago and she was out on the playground. She was in between two boys who were each pulling on an arm and shouting at each other,

"She's MY McKenzie"

"No she's MY McKenzie"

and so on. She of course was just laughing away! She's always coming home with little trinkets, or erasers, or paper airplanes that different boys in her class have given her. When I ask her why they have given her these things she just shrugs and says "I don't know." So thank goodness she is still sweet and innocent and clueless. This is going to be scary when she gets a little older. Oh by the wAy...she now wears the same size shoe as me (size 7 women) and is less than a head shorter than me! She's so funny and such a joy to us. I have enjoyed sharing stories with her from my childhood. We are very different and she thinks I was a funny kid!

Robinson Crusoe

Yeah the girls tried out for their first play last monday. We had a big talk about maybe not making it and all that good stuff. There were 70 kids that tried out and about half made it. McKenzie and Halie both got small parts. It was for k-12 grades. Little did I know what I was getting myself into. The girls had rehearsals last week from 3:30-8:00 with a dinner break from 5:30-6:00. To finish off the week they had 2 shows on saturday. It made for an EXTREMELY long week for all of us. Natalie was the token crying kid which is always fun (no naps, out of routine etc...). But the girls, especially McKenzie, had so much fun. Richard went to the first show, had dinner with the girls in between shows and then went to work. I attended the second show with Sadie and Natalie. Kenzie was so dramatic and exciting to watch. Halie was also great but she was very tired from the long week and was not very happy to have to do a second show. It was very fun experience for the girls and next time I will be more prepared for hell week! FYI...McKenzie was part of the frownie face tribe (the one in the back row with the bright blue wig) and Halie was a dancing chameleon.

Oh the joys of a 3 year old

Terrible twos....yeah right! Three is so much harder and when you have a child who is extremely strong~willed, it's that much harder. If you know our little Sadie than you know what I'm talking about. She is such an amazing girl. But for all the highs come the lows. Sadie is going to make my hair turn grey prematurely. So the other day she stole something from the store. AHHHHHHHH! Luckily Richard was with me so I didn't have to drag everyone back into the store. So as I'm dragging her back, she yells at me through the screams,

"Oh yeah, do you know what I'm gonna do? Tomorrow I'm gonna spank you!"

This is interesting since neither Richard nor I believe in spanking and have never spanked her!

Anyways Sadie and I went and found the manager and I made her tell him what she had done. Now keep in mind the store is full (of course it would be), and she is screaming, not crying, at the top of her lungs. It sucked. But she is so stinkin' cute most of the time and so much fun to be with. You gotta love her!

Porky Puppy

Well we (I) named Belle's puppy. I told Richard he could name her but he took too long so I went ahead and named her Esme (sounds like Ezmay). Those of you who have read the twilight books know it's not such a weird name. Anyways she is SO cute and super fat! We just love having her around. (Sadie especially) She still sleeps all the time and if you pick her up she molds her body into your hands to get comfy and she's out again. It's so fun.

Pictures...what else?

We went and got our pictures done in sacramento a couple of weeks ago. We haven't gotten back to pick them up yet but here is a small preview of the photos. The girls loved it so much and even Sadie was quite the little poser (McKenzie was a HUGE poser and loves getting pictures done!) We had fun.

Find Joy in the Journey

While I was listening to President Monson today during conference, one quote just struck me to my core. He said "Find joy in the journey." He was referring to the journey of life. I feel overwhelmed with the daily grind of motherhood sometimes. While I absolutely love being a mother, it often comes with hardships. At times I feel bogged down with simple things like laundry, dishes, bills, chores, etc. President Monson seemed to speak directly to me and I am so thankful that Heavenly Father inspires our Prophets and Apostles. I do love being a mother, and I don't want to get too caught up in cleaning and stressing out to wake up one day and have my kids grown. How thankful I am for this simple, yet vital, reminder of my priorities.

Girls just want to have fun!

The girls have always loved dressing up in fancy dresses and putting make-up on. I used to do it all the time with Kenzie and Halie and poor Sadie has gotten the shaft. This is the first time Sadie has gotten to do this. They put on a very fun show for Daddy! He was uncomfortable with how old they looked. I think he was seeing the scary future with 4 heartbreakers!