Is It Naptime Yet

Britta and Lilah are best friends. Britta calls Lilah her special friend and they exchange gifts all the time. When we dropped off a thank you for Sam Lilah made a gift for Britta, which included a rainbow crayon that she had.

Earlier this week Lilah got an e-mail from her friend Britta. It had pictures that she had chosen for Lilah to see.

In return  Lilah thought we should share pictures with Britta.  So I took  one of each girl and then went through what we had.

So here are the pictures for Britta and some that I needed to share anyways.

Lilah’s hand in a bandage.

Her little pinkie finger was hurting her all day, especially when the nail was touched. I thought she had just banged it sometime during the night since it wasn’t hurting till Monday morning. I finally took a look at her nail that night and noticed something under the nail. She had gotten a sliver under her nail and that’s what was causing the excruciating pain for her during the day. Once removed her finger felt fine.

 

Eden with Lilah’s Doodle Bear. (It has been colored on and washed so the marker doesn’t stain or become hard to remove. )

 

 Lilah with our 7 or 8 foot sunflower.

 

The girls with sunflower.

 

A close up of the Sunflower.

A close up of the tiny bee on the sunflower.

So I was lead to this blog from Tales from the Crib.

It’s a satirical blog that has made me laugh a lot.

I can’t say it won’t offend any of my readers, but none of my readers remind me of this blog.

In a week I’ve won a car and a major prize, supposedly, and I never entered any contest.

The first call came last week on Wednesday. We screened it and the message said our phone number was chosen for some top major prize. I need to call them back to claim it.

Uh, no.

Then today there was a message on our phone after we got home from gymnastics that our phone number was chosen, different company, and we had won either a Ford explorer or Cadillac Escalade. We need to call some guy named Kuba to claim that one also.

Again, no thanks.

If I haven’t entered then how can I win? Granted I do sometimes enter things, but I don’t do things to win a car or a house, things I’d have to pay lots of taxes on that I can’t afford. I like cash and things that give me instant and guaranteed savings, like doing a survey to get a coupon.

Under the Do Not Call Law, we avoid telemarketers, but once I call and “initiate” any correspondence then they can call me all they want, or at least that company.
Plus, who knows if it’s not someone trying to get information to use my credit card or get bank information.

I’d much rather never claim the car I’ve “won” than take a chance at getting lots of unwanted calls, or lose my identity.

Jon will be moving job positions. He’s decided to take a position where he’ll be on a team of employees that are implementing a new computer system for the university.  One of the people decided they didn’t want to be apart of it for personal reasons and he was the next best person.

It has it’s pros and cons. One is more money, but he will probably be putting in more hours around deadlines too. He’ll be in a cubicle still, rather than the office he was going to be getting this summer.

It’s also guaranteed for only two years and nothing after that, but as President Ashley stated in a budget meeting discussing the budget cuts last week even some professionals might be getting pink slips at the end of June stating their contracts won’t be renewed next year and his position won’t be needed after the system is implemented. So now, at least he’ll know the system and hopefully they will keep those who’ve implemented the computer system.

This will change the course of his masters a little. I just want him to get his masters so the next couple years are going to be hard, and hopefully he won’t be too grumpy of a husband and dad with all the added presure.

On Saturday we had Lilah’s fifth Birthday Party.

First, I have a five year old daughter. Yikes!

Second, the preparations started Friday. My good friend Sam volunteered to help me, well I asked and she said yes. She even went to the doctor Thursday to get pills to help her nausea from pregnancy so she would be feeling well enough to help poor crippled me on Friday.

We spent a lot of hours on Friday doing errands and getting ready at the house. The girls, or Lilah, Eden and Britta, kept themselves occupied and it went pretty smoothly. Sam also came early on Saturday to help. Luckily most of it was done on Friday, except the cake, which I finished on time only because everyone was late. Those who were there helped tidy up and get the food out.

Saturday was the big day. I ordered way too many pizzas, and everyone had fun swimming and the kids loved the pinata, at least as far as I could tell. I have a video of the pinata and the singing of happy birthday, but Google video is being weird and not working right now.

All the pictures are of the kids swimming because I took those and Jon uses the video part of the camera for everything. Supposedly I can freeze shots for pictures, but I don’t know how to do that. I think we just need a DVD recorder  and a regular camera for pictures.
He did take a picture of the cake that I designed and made. I’m pretty proud of myself.

Everyone but those who were very early arrived at 12:30, opposed to noon the planned starting time. We ate and let the kids play. Then the kids hit the pinata. After the pinata we sang Happy Birthday and had Lilah open presents. Then people went swimming. After swimming people had cake and ice cream and left when they were ready.

Almost everyone took home half to a whole pizza. I ordered 10 pizzas and we had 6 left over. ( I did the math and should have ordered 6. 4 for the adults and 2 for the kids. Jon thought I might need more for the adults so that stuck in my head. I then heard from my SIL that she and her husband would be coming. Somehow I thought I was planning on ordering 8 total (6 for the adults and 2 for the kids.) and since Jon thought I needed more I made the 8 an even 10. )

I gave pizza and cake as parting gifts for all who would take any and we still had 2 pizzas left over for ourselves. I decided it was only fair to give those who came another meal since they all had to drive so far.

Here are the pictures of the pool part of the party and my cool, yet definitely home-made by an amateur, cake.

 

The cake.

Lilah was kicking around the pool a lot. I was impressed because this was her first time swimming since last year.

Jon right before he blew water on Eden.

After he blew water on Eden with his silly self.

 

Julie and Naia having fun. Julie is also like five months pregnant.

Gracie was not liking the pool.

 

But her sister Aurora loved it.

Aaron, one of the two boys in Lilah’s class.

 Aurora saying hi to my great niece Emily and her grandma, my SIL Elana.

Closer look at Emily, my niece Tasia’s daughter.

Eden on six noodle floats.

Lilah loved the party and said her favorite part was the balloons. She carried them around until people started coming and then I put them on the table.  I think everyone could have just given her balloons for her birthday and she would have been a happy camper. I’m happy I asked Carolyn to pick some up when she got the ice cream that morning.

I was flipping channels last night and I came across the 10 o’clock news on a local station. They were doing a story about a 4 year old boy who was found dead in the family’s SUV Monday morning. I usually do not watch these stories but I stayed tuned to see if it was in my area, because 2/3rds of all things negative happen in like  a 2 mile radius down the major streets we live by. Seriously, at least once a week I see a shooting, robbery or some sort of violent crime in our area on the news. Anyways they showed the cross streets and then the picture and name of the young boy.

I knew him.

He was the youngest son to a family in our previous ward. He was born a year or so before we moved to our current home.

Jon was on the couch and I shook him awake to tell him.

I was shocked. The news anchor mention how the investigation was still on it’s way and how they did not know if it was an accident or if child abuse was involved.

Knowing the family I’m pretty sure it wasn’t abuse but neglect. They must have forgotten him somehow  or thought the other parent or even an older sibling was taking care of him in the busyness of life with eight children.

I feel so sad for this family.

In April we went up to Utah for my cousins wedding.

Here’s when we saw Zarina before the wedding.

The girls love her and had so much fun rubbing her head, holding her hands, letting her touch them and touch their soft dresses.
It was too cute and that is why I have a lot of pictures from it and a video.

I love the last two because of Lilah’s smile and then in the last one you, or at least I, can tell that Eden has a smile on her face.

Here’s how cousins interact when one’s a baby and the other two love her.

Beets are our most successful crop thus far. You can eat the leaves. (I get the steamer boiling, put the cut up leaves in and then remove the beet leaves from the heat. I also eat them with Italian dressing ’cause they’re too bitter to me without it.)
You can eat the root, well the beet is the root.

I did not like beets as a child. My mom would buy them and they were awful.
Then I ate regular beets as an adult at Jon’s house. They were nothing like the beets I knew as a child because the beets I knew as a child were pickled.

Pickled beets are not regular beets.

That said I still feel that beets are not for everyone. I, myself, like the earthy sweet taste our garden beets have, and canned beets are OK too, but not as tasty as our garden beets. Eden does not like beets. I try to tell her they’re red pancakes but she doesn’t buy it and barely touches any beets we give her.
(Broccoli are trees, mashed potatoes are clouds. We give our food different names for fun most of the time. Lilah loves red pancakes. )

This was our beet harvest this year.

I’m thinking we should plant all beets and plum tomatoes because they seem to produce the most for us. Our radishes also grow well, but I detest radishes, and Jon’s breath for the hour after he’s eaten any.

After dinner note: Eden ate her beet without any complaint and even had a second one! I guess she only likes beets from our garden.

Sorry for four post in one night. (Really three post in one night and one very early in the morning, It’s 1:07 am.) This weekend was just very eventful.

I’m also a lengthy writer so I appreciate anyone willing to read it all.

I have a niece who does Works for me Wednesdays, though it’s been a while since her classes have needed to come first and she was in Texas visiting family.

As I was getting my winter stuff put away I thought I’d share a tip of something I find works for me.

Whenever I buy things and they have a nice plastic zip cover I keep it and put my winter blankets or other seasonal stuff in them. This way dust is kept off them if they’re in the open, like the top bunk of the girl’s bed with other storage stuff, or they’re kept clean when on at the base of my hall closet where I also store my broom and the girls love to “sweep” so it’s not always carefully put back.

I was able to fit the top and bottom sheet of my flannel sheets back in there original case, but I use a plastic case from our car seat things to protect the set of our car from the car seats for the pillow cases.

I’ve got my girl’s Halloween bags nicely put away an another case from something.

My comforter doesn’t fit in the case it came in but it fits in the case that was for our mattress cover that I bought last year for our “new” bed.

The afghan/ blanket large enough to cover a full size bed that was a wedding gift made by my mother, fits in our case for the comforter.

And so forth.

It works for me.