survival

I'm gonna try to catch up quickly before my life gets shaked up in the next few weeks. so...

February brought valentines day. since I've been such a slacker mom the past several months, i figured we could use some one on one time and i would help the kids make the valentines they chose for their classes and teachers. usually we just do the box of cheap cards and attach a pencil or sucker, but they wanted to do something a little more crafty, which is funny cuz I'm not a crafty person, but they found the ideas, and we tried our best to mimic other crafty peoples creations. Kylie chose to do an imitation candy ipod, with the sentiment "you rock!" it turned out to be a lot more involved than i thought. typical really. i looked at it and figured we could get it done in an hour or 2, but it took so much longer than that.Granted she had to do almost 40 of them as her class size is a little bit out of control, but she was pretty excited with the end result and it was fun listening to her 4th grade stories of drama.

Ty chose to do a super hero sucker guy with the sentiment of "you're a super friend" or something along those lines. his was cake compared to Kylies, so we got his done in under an hour. he cracked me up with how insistent he was about making sure none of the boys ended up with purple caped sucker heros..purple is only a "girl color," and he wasn't gonna let any of his fellow males be terrorized by having a girl colored valentine.

James chose a rocket valentine saying something like "hope your valentines day is a blast" and his was pretty easy too. Being his 1st class valentine party, he was totally excited and was so careful making sure his name was written on every tag. It was endearing for me to see his excitement.

For the teachers they decided on making candy kiss rose bouquets. next year i might be going back to the quick box o cards, but for this year anyway, the kids were so excited and it was nice to have a little crafting/bonding/chatting it up/one on one time with them.

For valentines day, I wanted to do something a little out of the ordinary for the kids too, cuz i cant even tell how many times I've been accused of "loving (so and so) more than"..the accuser themselves lately. since Tommy boy is gonna be requiring a great deal of attention and they are all gonna be having their emotional adjustments, I wanted to try to reassure them a little bit. Daniel and I made heart garlands and wrote different reasons why they are loved, attached a bunch of fun size treats, then hung them in their doorways.  when they woke up, they were just giddy as could be. then we made heart shaped muffins and strawberries smoothies for breakfast,  put little heart shaped love notes in their lunches, made homemade heart shaped individual pizzas for dinner, followed up with heart shaped cupcakes to decorate and eat for dessert. it turned out to be a very happy day for them, and that made me happy.

Daniel had his birthday in February, and we were able to make a quick trip to San Diego to celebrate. His bday fell on a Friday, so we celebrated with the kids, got them into bed, then had the greatest babysitter ever come over and we took off. we woke up and went to the temple. surprisingly we were asked to be the witness couple, which we've only done 2 other times in our married life. Daniel was worried about me passing out, but i thought it actually helped me pay attention a little bit more. it was nice to be there with him. we were only able to go 2 times last year,and i think we will be lucky if we can go even once more this year, what with all the changes coming our way. anyway it was a great way to start the day.

after we left the temple, we did some shopping. Daniel and I have had the same kitchen table since we were newlyweds, and with our growing brood, we have been in need of something bigger. last year we found this table at ikea that i fell in love with. Daniel has since been stashing away here and there so he could surprise me on Christmas, but since he couldn't figure out how to get it from SD to here without me knowing for Christmas, we decided that we would wait until this little trip to do so. we traded Daniels car for his buddys truck for this trip for the purpose of being able to get it back here. so we went to ikea, but after talking to the associates there, we learned that the table i had been loving on for a whole year was actually particle board..so neither of us wanted to spend our money on junk that will totally not hold up to the extreme craziness of our boys, so we forwent the ikea route. sad. Daniel had found a furniture store online before we left town that had a bed frame that we both really liked and suggested we go there to check that out. in our almost 11 years of wedded bliss, we have never had a bed frame, so that was kind of exciting to think about. this tiny little store turned out to be our little furniture haven. not only did we totally love the bed frame, and not only was it beyond extremely affordable (we are talking major steal of a deal)...they also had a solid wood table, perfect size for our growing fam with 6 chairs included in their price(ikeas chairs are sold individually, so that was gonna cost us some bucks there)... and their price with the chairs was half the price of the ikea particle board table without the chairs...so we came away with the bed frame, table and chairs for the same price we were calculating the table for. woo freaking hoo! however, we did go back to ikea cuz they had a table bench we wanted for one side of the table for the kids, plus they had this canvas print of this jungle that we had seen last year that I have been kind of obsessed about, so we picked those up and celebrated our good fortune with a delicious birthday dinner at claim jumpers.

Sunday we explored our resort a bit, biked on a bicycle made for 2,(meaning Daniel did all the pedaling as he didn't want me going into preterm labor, haha) and walked along the beach. i have been craving gourmet cupcakes for months now but since Yuma doesn't have a gourmet cupcake shop, my craving has been unsatisfyingly growing in intensity. having tried sprinkles before, we thought we would expand our  horizons(not that i don't seriously love sprinkles...i just thought we would try another much talked about shoppe) and settled on cupcakes squared. they make their cupcakes square shaped instead of circular..kinda cute.  anyway ever since having them i have been again craving some darn gourmet cupcakes...it is probably a good thing Yuma doesn't have such a place cuz those darn cupcakes are not only darn expensive for such a simple treat, but i really don't need the guilt associated with inhaling such a sugarfest...

anyway...our babysitter was seriously so awesome, not only did the kids have so much fun with her, she actually got them to behave during church. too bad we cant just adopt her cuz she is absolutely amazing.
Daniel got the table, chairs and bench assembled, then moved on to the bed frame and the canvas print. i love how new furniture just totally takes a look from blah to wow so easily! but after our room was put together, we looked at our old hand me down night stands and dresser and were feeling like they were sucking away the coolness, so Daniel, being so totally awesome, decided to coolify them by sanding them down, and re-stained them a dark color that matched the bed frame...oh my goodness does it just look so frigging great...I'm seriously loving it..and to be honest, the smell of paint  has been a bigger craving than cupcakes, so to walk into our room and smell the newly fresh painted furniture smell...oh it is heaven to this severely anemic preggo.   and in addition, we got rid of the tacky mirror that was attached to our dresser, and found a beautiful framed humongous mirror at kirklands and Daniel got that hung up too, so now our bedroom is like my little heavenly painty smelling fancy looking haven! i love it! now to save up for the sectional we want. ha

Last week my Joshy started taking a couple steps on his own, and this past weekend he was walking all over the house. He will cross the entire length of the family room on his own. He is so excited about his new trick too and just smiles the whole time he is walking. I love it, but am sad he is growing so fast. He is gonna be running along side his brothers before i know it.

Bennieboo has a bday coming up and wants to watch the sunset on the beach for his "present", so we are gonna take an overnight trip to san diego with the whole crew this weekend. should be fun right? 5 munchkins plus Daniel and  i crammed, into a hotel room on 2 beds. haha. oh boy....but for some reason the kids seem to think it is the most fun thing ever to sleep at a hotel..i dont get it.  we are gonna be celebrating with gourmet cupcakes and a stop into chick fil a, so this preggo is gonna be aye-ok with a night of my huge belly squashed upon by a couple of my kids, just so Bennie can have his watching the sunset on the beach desire, and i can have a few cravings satisfied! Lets hope I don't go into labor until we are back. haha

toast is loving cub scouts and  is finally passing off some of the little things in his book. He went to a cub scout day-camp last weekend and had a blast. I hope he will keep up that excitement for a while. I think it is beyond adorable to see him so dang excited!

Kylie is and has been and continues to be my right arm. seriously. I don't think I could survive this pregnancy and these boys without her. She has been coming up with little games and crafts to keep the boys entertained on the many days when I can barely breathe or when I am on the verge of passing out. I feel bad that she has so much responsibility placed on her young shoulders, but am so grateful for my girl. she is pretty amazing.

James is loving preschool even though he still acts so shy with his teacher. He hasn't wanted me to help him with his reading and sight words until  very recently, so we have been working on that, and I love that one on one time with him.

Bennie cant wait to start preschool in the fall. he misses his best buddy on the days he is at preschool. Ben has been reading things at random just from blending the letter sounds together. We will be driving through town and he will randomly tell me words from various signs. It is quite comical, cuz i haven't done much in the past 2 years with my younger boys as I've been pregnant and weak and exhausted and they are just so busy playing, so for him to have picked it up mostly by his own self cracks me up.

Daniel has been busy busy. He and I went out on a date last weekend and bought a new car as we will no longer fit in our 7 passenger van as soon as Tommy boy arrives. We have been talking and looking for several months, and now that we are counting down, we made it happen. we have been Toyota fans forever, but we have kinda switched our loyalties to Honda. Daniel got his accord last year, and the redesigned Odyssey totally fits us, so Daniel talked to his buddy and we got things taken care of. Now to try to keep my kids from trashing it.

so just to document for document sake, this pregnancy has been a bit of a mess. granted i kinda thought i was gonna have some issues as I've had a back to back pregnancy before and that was rough...but this one has really taken the life right out of me. thankfully  my Tommy boy seems to be just fine, so that is good. unfortunately my physical health is worse for wear. my body is completely worn out/run down and  it is causing all sorts of crappy issues. some have mysteriously disappeared, but a bunch of others are being all grouped in to one big box that they say comes from  "severe anemia."  it is funny though, cuz one week my dr will be like, "I've never had a patient with iron as low as yours" or "you are scaring me to death" or "i cant explain this, so I'm referring you to a specialist" but other weeks he is like, "oh yeah,  no biggie, most likely cuz you're iron is so low, but it'll be fine"...i just never know with this office. Sometimes I go away so worried, other times I'm just so confused. I have had more dr visits these past 3 months than I have ever had in my life. I've had to see a cardiologist, been referred to a nephrologist and i'm scheduled to see a hematologist next week. plus I've had to go get tests and blood work up the wazoo(oh how i hate needles and having people suck my blood to put into tubes..i cringe just thinking about it) and had a nice go around of injections to boost my red blood cells at the hospital. and how the fetch i have even been able to get to all these dang appts when I can barely get out of bed in the mornings to get my kids fed and ready is a question i ponder frequently...seriously this has just been so not fun.I just am ready to be done though cuz I feel like I have been pregnant for 80 weeks with a few weeks off for postpartum in the middle there. and that is quite the catch 22, cuz as much as I'm ready to never be pregnant again, I know that what is to come is gonna be extremely difficult and overwhelming for a while...granted a new baby always brings such a sacred presence into the home, but still... 6 kids 2 being babies, 5 of them boys...YIKES!
that's where we are at..and next time I blog..i will be the mother of 6...whoa. never thought i would be able to say such a thing.