Busy week

Last week I planned to make some freezer jam, with strawberries I ordered in bulk from a friend in a food co-op, (the farm called and said they didn't have enough ripe berries to fill the whole order so it would be another few days/or a week). :-)

We had our garden plot put in by our Scouts as a fundraiser. Brother H came and tilled the plot and the boys came and put cotton seed soil in our garden plot. (thank you so much for helping us, Brother H and Brother M, and the boy scouts!) I bought a bunch of seeds (the kids helped me pick out some of them). We'll see how it all goes. We are novices at this whole gardening thing... We are excited, but... I'm a little afraid of how much work it will be! I may have bitten off more than I can chew... literally. ;-) We have carrot seeds, and zuchine, crook neck squash and cucumber, and beans, and pumpkin and today I bought tomato plants. Little grape tomatoes, and Roma's. Yummy! I have other seeds as well but can't think of what at this moment.

Saturday, I got to help a mom at her wonderful VBAC birth! She already had three girls and now she has an adorable son! What fun!

This week was Stake Conference, I missed Sat night, since I was at a birth... Sunday the youth choir sang, so Rebekah and Amanda sat on the stand and sang, and attended two sessions (since our stake is so large and the building isn't, so we have to split the stake for conferences and do it twice).

This week Bill had signed us up for the transition assistance class, to help us plan and prepare for getting out of/retiring from the Army. He is down to just about a year left. With leave etc... he will be finished next year in mid April or the beginning of May. WOW!!! I can't believe that nearly 20 years have come and gone! The class is all day 8-4:30 daily from Mon-thurs. Although Thursday is Take your Child to work day, and Bill's office has activities planned so Bill is going to take them all to that (not Liam - who by Thursday will be MORE than happy to have me home - this is the most I've ever been away from him! Thank you Mrs. J. for helping us out and keeping Liam for us this week!!!). The class and lectures so far have been somewhat informative, moreso for Bill, but I did learn a few things. I hope the next couple of days are interesting at least.

Tonight after we got home, we spent several hours working on our little garden plot, mixing in the soil, and putting a little fence around it to keep the kids out of it I hope! At least when they are just running wild in the backyard, mostly just to show them for sure where it is at; like they don't know... however Liam thought playing in the DIRT was so much fun!!! I need something to help keep him out of it, when he's out there playing, so he doesn't pull up anything before it even has a chance to grow!

the kids mostly just played and jumped on the trampoline. Amanda helped lots. Bill worked really hard trying to get some posts up from the trees in our backyard, to use to hold the fence up around the garden. They were really hard to get out, with the growth from the tree over the years. Soon I'll start planting...

That's the latest from our little corner of the world.

I Love a man in Uniform...

A friend sent me a message today with the link to this Gratitude Campaign. Check it out, it is something simple, and yet appreciated. It got me thinking about our time as a Military Family and all those still serving, and all the families that are left behind to cope with the day to day things of life, while the military member goes off on deployments.

Ever wonder how to say thank you when you see a military person in uniform? See a simple way to do it from across a room or as you are passing by.http://www.gratitudecampaign.org/fullmovie.php Please pass it on to family &friends! The Gratitude Sign

As a young girl growing up, I knew my dad had served in the military, (in the Philipines in WWII) but I didn't know anyone else personally who'd served, and not during my lifetime, and it was never anything I imagined I'd be a part of. After a year of college, I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up, and I went back East to be a Nanny in N.Y. Through, a series of various circumstances, I began going up to West Point Military Academy and was invited to attend Church there. I eventually met and later married my sweet husband Bill, after he graduated.

While associating with the families at West Point, I got a small taste for what it was like to be a military family, however, little did I know what that would mean for my life!

We moved to Alabama, first for a school, then we went off to Germany, where we lived when Bill went off to the Gulf War in saudi Arabia for 5 months, and I stayed and had my first baby. Gratefuly a dear friend came and spent a couple of months with me and helped when I had the baby. We have lived in AL, Germany, AL, Calif, New Mexico, Japan, and Alabama again. During our almost 19 years in the military Bill has been deployed twice, and been gone for various schools of anywhere from 6 weeks to 4+ months. Those times when my husband was gone for weeks or months at a time and I was alone trying to raise our growing family, I don't think I was nearly as supportive as I should/could have been, and I sort of go into a 'wo is me' mode. It has been difficult, but as a family we have actually been blessed and have not had nearly as much separation as many of our friends and other military families.

For most of the past 4 years Bill has been in a job where he was wearing Civilian clothes, and when the military changed uniforms last year, there was a time he thoguht he would never even wear a uniform again. There was a part of him that missed being in uniform, and he commented once about Liam never even seeing him in a uniform. A few months ago his job was changed, and he had to go out and buy the new uniform. Though we all still like the old green camaflouge uniform, it is kind of nice to see him in uniform daily again. (even if it's the grayish digital camo).

Recently he told me they were asking (I guess in his office?) for volunteers to go to Iraq. Though it would have been very difficult to have him go again... I do understand his slight dissapointment at the fact that he can't volunteer because he is now diabetic and can't be deployed. Not that he WANTS to leave his family, but his sense of Duty to Serve his country is 3 generations strong. He wants to do his duty as a Military Man, and I love him for that. Even though Liam will doubtfully remember much about his dad actually being in the military, but I hope that we will be able to share enough about this heritage of Military Duty and Service that he will appreciate what his forfathers have given.

growing pains...

Rebekah is 17, looking towards her last year of high school, and thinking about colleges. I can't believe that she is getting so grown up! There are times that we butt heads and I'm sure we both wonder if we'll make it through this phase of life... however, there are other times when I see a light at the end of the tunnel and I really like the person she is growing up to be.

I guess in some ways, all first children are guinea pigs and all parents are learning, and sadly it ends up being the first child who you make more of your mistakes on, I suppose.

Every once in a while Rebekah will gather up her siblings, for a day out. Sometimes one on one, and sometimes several of them or all together at one time. She'll take them shopping with her, or to lunch or sometimes even a movie date. It's fun to see how excited the little girls get when she tells them she's taking them out! The other day Marissa actually asked her if she wold take her out to have fun! It isn't even the money, or location, she could just take them to a park, or to have a picnic lunch somewhere. They just think it's cool to go and spend time with her.

Sometimes to give me a break she has started taking Liam out running errands with her as well. It is very nice to have someone who can drive and run errands for you... There are benefits and perks to being old enough to have children old enough to drive I suppose.

Then again, sometimes it's hard to think that in just over a year she will be heading out on her own and will leave us behind, for all practical purposes. I've been on my own since I left home to go to college after graduating from high school - Not that I had a lot of options, losing my parents at a young age. However, I have definite mixed emotions to now be on the other side of things. There is a new song out by Billy Ray Cyrus and Miley Cyrus, called Ready, Set, don't go.. It is really sweet, and sort of tugs at your heartstrings, when you think about your kids growing up and moving on with their lives.

I guess the other thing that is a bit difficult for me, is the fact that I don't really know what an Adult Child/Parent relationship is. My mom passed away just two weeks after I turned 20 years old and my dad passed away just 2 1/2 yrs later. I'm sorry to say I am not as close to my in-laws as I might have liked. I hope that as my kids grow up and get married that I will be able to have good relationships with them and their growing families.

Well... I write this today because Rebekah had a rough day. She has a friend who is having trouble and is concerned for that friend. Her other really good friend was involved in a car accident someone ran a light and hit the car - totalled it, so she' s concerned for that friend as well. Then this morning she had a little problem, and couldn't get a hold of me at home. Liam and I had a rough night last night... I saw the clock at 12 something, 1 something, 2 something, 3 something and 4 something. I was surprised I actually heard my alarm clock in the first 5 minutes to wake up and get the kids off to school this morning! Once they had all left the house at 7 am I went back to bed with Liam and apparently fell asleep! When she called the house and my cell phone repeatedly for help... I didn't hear it at all. I had turned off the ringers to the phone by my bed... and my cell phone was plugged in downstairs, (I don't have a client/pregnant mom - due right now, at 38 weeks I go on call for the mom's I work with, so I try to take advantage of the off times). I used to hear the phone ring downstairs even if I didn't have the ringer on my bedroom phone turned on... however, now that we built Liam's room and we don't have the 'open space' straight down to the office with it's phone, I don't always hear it upstairs anymore I've noticed in the past week - even when I'm awake!

So, she tried to call me, tried to call her dad, who is stuck in El Paso, TX because of the American Airlines canceling all their flights for two days now, for inspections, and we are unsure when he will actually get a flight home! Dad finally answered her calls, in between him trying to contact the airlines, etc... he then tried to call me. Finally he called our good friend J who luckily is somehow always there for me (I don't' know why she's so nice to our family, but she is, and we are so grateful!), and actually has an extra key to our house, and so she came over, rang the door bell, banged on the door as well as continued to call me, and then came into my house, got the extra key to Rebekah's car, and took it to her, where she was stuck since seminary. Then, poor Rebekah had to go into school late, use one of her very valued 5 parent notes for her excuse for being late for school (a call was made home and I actually was awake at this time, since J called again to see if she could get me... and finally I heard the faint ring of the phone downstairs, and it got through my subconscious). When she arrived at school she also had to have the two students who's books she had locked in her car with her own things, called from classes up to the office to get their books, and she was stressed that they might have gotten in trouble for not having their homework to turn in or for not having come to class prepared with their books and things...

After running an errand to help my friend J out (finally something small I could do for her to help repay all her kindnesses to me and my family!), I stopped at subway and bought Rebekah lunch and delivered it to her school as a possible peace offering to say sorry she'd had a crummy day and that I was not available to help her this morning. I hope she understands how much I love her and want the best of everything for her. I hope that if not now she'll understand someday... of my love for her.

I love you my first sweet beautiful baby girl!!!

My very generous and caring daughter...

I was thinking about this just the other day; Sariah is a very caring person towards others - particularly the downtrodden, or less fortunate. She does not like it when others pick at and make fun of children with dissabilities and wants to help them. She wanted to call a charity to ask how she could donate her dolls and things that she has outgrown. When Hurricane Katrina hit just hours south of us a few years back, she (and her sister) donated some of her money to that. Tonight we were watching Idol, and she asked how you go about making a donation to help the poor children in Africa or less fortunate across our country. I told her, and she got her bank card and made the call, and donated $5.00 of her money. Then the other girls wanted to donate something, and I told them daddy said we could make a donation so I offered to do a $5.00 donation for each of my children. They were excited for that. Then Sariah wanted to do more and called and did another $5.00 donation. She was talking about how when she grows up that she would like to move to somewhere like Africa and help the children. I know that deep inside her, she really feels this kind of thing. If we could only get her (and all of our kids) to be more loving, compassionate and kind toward their siblings.

I just had to post about my sweet amazing daughter.

She is really growing up. She will turn 12 soon, and move up into the Young Women's program at Church. She will get to attend young Women's Camp this summer. How exciting!

More than 2.5 children in todays world

A friend sent me the link to this article. I guess it hit me and I felt strongly enough about it to write the author an email back about it. Below is my reply:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/04/AR2008040403217_pf.html

Pamela,

I enjoyed your article in the Washington Post.

I am the mother of 6 children. I can’t imagine life without any one of them. They each bring something different to our family. When we started our family years ago, I never dreamed or imagined I’d have 6 children! I knew I didn’t want a ‘middle’ child and I wanted more than two, so I guess that led us to at least four. I grew up in a family of 5 children, which as a young mother did seem like a lot, but now with 6 of our own, we have a good life, albeit crazy at times. People often ask “How do you do it?”, in shock when they hear I have 6 children. I say, “one at a time!” I have to admit I sort of feel the same sense of shock and awe at moms of multiples! However you manage to “do it” one day at a time.

My children don’t attend all the sports or social lessons, and events that some kids do... we don’t shop at the most expensive stores in town, but they are well clothed and well fed, and we hope they know we love each and every one of them. We do not plan to spend a fortune paying for their college careers, because I think the people that I have known who had to work for it, seemed to appreciate it that much more because they had to invest more of themselves in it to make it happen. I hope this holds true for my children as well.

I will tell you that the statement about the mom who “already had one boy and one girl” hit home with me! I myself had girl after girl after girl... until the end. But it was very annoying to me with each pregnancy or birth that produced ‘yet another girl’ that somehow, that fact ‘made it acceptable’ to others, to try again. As if it would therefore have been unthinkable for me to have wanted another baby, - be it boy or girl – just because we felt like we wanted them! It was as if, if we’d had a boy somewhere in the mix, that it would not have been o.k. at all for us to continue wanting and trying for another baby. That really bothered me a lot over the years. Now that we did happen to have a boy at the end - #6 – people still assume we kept trying “until we got that boy”. For me, we ‘kept trying’ until our family felt complete.

We did not have 6 children to try and prove anything to anyone, and it certainly isn’t because of financial prosperity, and to show off. Our children bemoan the fact at times that many of their friends, live in fancier houses than we do or have more expensive clothes or ‘toys’ than we do, and it is ‘because’ we have so many kids! I think on the other hand they have it pretty darn good, and just don’t even know how much they’ve been given, and hope some day they will learn to appreciate all that they had growing up. I hope that they grow up to be good people, and to have good relationships with each other. I hope that my husband I get the opportunity to watch as they grow up, get married and have families of their own, and to try to encourage fun, loving relationships between all the little cousins! Won’t that be fun! To have a posterity of ‘good’ productive people, that certainly seems like a good reason to have had each of these little people that bless my life daily.

Best of luck with your baby #3! Enjoy the time you have with them, and don’t worry about what others think!

Bitten by a bug...

I woke up yesterday and knew things weren't going to be good. I just didn't feel good. Bill brought me breakfast in bed, and though I tried to eat it, I just couldn't. (Sariah talked him ino making breakfast this past week so they ate well before teh SAT's) (not just cold cereal - mom is a cold cereal type unless it's brunch - but I don't cook breakfast).

Shortly after everyone left for the day I started getting sick. I read someone else's blog once titled Pass the bowl please... does that ever describe my day! In between being sick - running with the bucket for the bathroom - locking Liam out in the process - I didn't NEED any help! I would lay down on his bean bag chair in his room and try to keep him company, while he played, or lay in my bed and put on cartoons for him to watch. He kept jumping on me - which was seriously unpleasant, especially when he thought it was fun to climb on my head! YIKES!!! I tipped him off onto the big pile of covers on the bed and he thought that was a great game and continued to climb and jump on me! Then he went and got his Noah's Ark and brought it in to play on top of me as well. I just tried to endure it. At one point I had my eyes closed and afer what felt like a long time I looked at the clock hoping the day was passing quickly and I could count on the girls to arrive home from school before too terribly long. It was somewhere between 10:30 and 11 am. I truely didn't know how I was going to handle it. I had previously called Bill while I lay in bed and asked him to make a few phone calls for me, to cancel some appointments that I had planned for the day.
As I lay there in misery, I noticed something and then heard Liam say dada! He came home around 11:30 am.
Oh, I was so greatful for a sweet husband who heard my misery, even when I had asked nothing more than for him to make a couple of phone calls, he came home to take care of Liam (entertain him) and take care of me. He got Liam to sleep for a nap, and once the girls came home from school, they played with him as well.
They also spent some time playing outside in the pouring down rain! As a mom I hate the wet messes that this brings, but, the neighborhood kids sure seemed to have fun (from what I was told). After warm baths and showers, they setteled in to play Wii and other board games and watch movies. I spent the whole day basically in bed. My body and joints hurt so much from just laying there. I finally stopped hurling and eventually towards night time was able to keep a little something down. When I finally decided I wanted some chicken noodle soup to eat, Bill realized we were all out (the kids take soup for lunch at school frequently). I had him contact Rebekah who was sweet and went and bought me several can's of various chicken noodle soup varieties on her way home from work at 9 pm.
Though today I don't feel fantastic, I at least don't feel sick any more. yay! Now I just hope I don't pass it along to my family or anyone else. I haven't felt that ill in a long time!

A funny from yesterday... Bill was reading the third book in a series I had previously read, and made a comment. I told him he could read outloud to me (since the thought of trying to focus my eyes and read a book of my own didn't appeal to me at all...) so that I would know what he was currently reading, and give my mind something to do... he told me he loved me but that was asking too much! ;-) He suggested I watch movie or something on t.v. I said there was undoubtedly nothing worth watching on... he turned it on and started flipping channels. eh ended up on Pride and Predjudice. I have to admit that I had never actually watched it ever. GASP!!!!! I know! I'm not very up on classic literature... I know many of my friends love the book and movie(s), I just have never goten into them. Well, I watched Pride and Predjudice and quite enjoyed it, and it makes me want to read the book, since surely there were parts that were missed or conversaitions or thoughts that are more fully expressed in the book but couldn't be fully shown or developed in the movie. So, if nothing else... I had something good come out of laying in bed sick for hours and hours, I was able to expand my literary experience. :-) I would have to say I'd rather open myself to literature, in a better state of health than I was yesterday!

A day in the life...

I was in such a rush today to get things dropped off at the school I forgot to take pic's of them. They were so cute! (O.K. So I thought so, anyway).
It was SAT (standardized state testing) this week at school. In Hannah's grade 3rd (some of the younger grades)they do a special snack each day afterward for the kids, with a theme. So... we were asked to help with POP the Top off the SAT's! and bring in Popcorn for her class. Well, I can't do anything plain or boring... so, I got out my stamp stuff and rolled red lines on small white paper bags, and printed the little saying of POP the TOP OFF the SAT's! and mounted that on red card stock and filled them all with Popcorn. They looked so cute all lined up in a big basket I have. I WISH I'd taken a picture!

Tonight we had signed up to feed the Sister Missionaries. However, Rebekah started working at Smokey's Barbecue again this week and she was working tonight, so... Instead of cooking a meal at home tonight, we all went to Smokey's for dinner. It was yummy. We haven't eaten there very often since Rebekah stopped working there last summer. I meant to bring my camera to dinner tonight also, but... oh well. no pic's today, just a report of our life. :-)

I just thought of something I could take a picture of!!!

Rebekah has a couple of kids she goes to school with, that immigrated here from overseas. They became U.S. Citizens this week! She was very excited for them (had been in class with both of them over the years). The kids in one of her classes have been trying to get the teacher to let them have a 'party' in class and have Food. So when Rebekah suggested the other day they celebrate the citizenship of their classmate, they all get involved. We made cupcakes. I even found Red, White and Blue sprinkles and I bought balloons for her to take as well. O.K. so truely she wanted an excuse to have a food party, but I think it was very nice of her to want to celebrate and show support for this boy.


- I fixed one left over bag so I could take a picture... ;-)
(I got Amanda to write the message for me, she writes cute! and I didnt' want to have to print out another sheet of words).
I'm sure ya'll think I am crazy!!!