Mothers day 2010

Call me crazy, but I think that Mother's day is one of my favorite holidays. I didn't live it up this year like I normally do by requesting it to be a full two day holiday. This year I didn't want to be coddled and take time off from my motherly duties. This year, to celebrate, I wanted to be a mom. Although, John did let me take a nice Sunday nap while he held down the fort after church.

I loved that the first words out of John's mouth Sunday morning were, "Happy Mother's Day, can I get you breakfast in bed?" I told him that I would rather take a shower while he woke the children up and fed them breakfast. That was a wonderful shower. I loved the homemade gifts and I especially loved the Primary presentation. Why does that always make me cry? I love being a mother to my children. I think I am the luckiest person alive to have these 4 beautiful children in my life, and my wonderful husband as my companion through it all.

Here are Hannah's thoughts on motherhood:

M-Makes me smile

O-organized

T-Teaching me not to do bad things

H-helpful

E-entertaining

R-really, really nice

Helping to promote a more sober world, one bike at a time.

I found a bike! I looked on KSL classifieds two weeks ago and found this beauty for $85. Can't beat that price for a brand new bike, only ridden once. The only problem...well...It was a "Cruizan Rum" bike. And it wasn't shy about advertising it. The guy who I bought it from was about 25 years old and didn't seem to be the bike riding type. He told me that he won it in a bar raffle. Anyway, I looked beyond that and tried it out, it rode beautifully and fit me perfectly. Yes I realize that it is a man's bike, but that way John can ride it too.


I brought it home and got to work. After-all I couldn't, in good conscience, advise my children to stay away from alcohol while advertising rum on each bike ride. I decided to try my skill in uncharted territory--refinishing bikes.

Here it is after disassembling, sanding, priming, painting, decorating, lacquering and re-assembling. Thankfully, my sister-in-law told me that the front fork was backwards, so I changed it soon after I took this picture. That was a little embarrassing, but I was just proud that it didn't fall apart during that first bike ride. It still rides beautifully, and I think I am in love with bike riding again. It brings me back to my college days where I lived on my bicycle between classes.

Since I didn't know how to do "fancy" I decided to settle for "inspirational". I found a quote from Albert Einstein that worked perfectly. "Life is like riding a bicycle, to keep your balance you must keep moving." It's hand written, but I think that adds to the effect that I wanted. I can't wait to get a trailer someday so that I can take my girls with me on my long bike rides.

Time to plant...soon!

It is a good thing that it is almost time to plant our garden, our tomatoes are outgrowing their pots and are getting too tall for our light box. This is the first year I have used a light box to grow things from seed, and it has worked beautifully. The plans were given to me by my friend Julie who is a master gardener, along with her husband. The big plant in the front is a giant cabbage that Hannah brought home from school last month. In a few months she will be able to take a picture with it and enter it into a competition to recieve a $1000 scholarship. We'll see how that turns out. At any rate, it will be fun for her to see it grow.

Johnnys Birthday wishes

On her student's birthdays, Johnny's teacher has each class member write a note to put into a booklet as a gift. I love children's artwork, I loved the pictures and notes in the booklet. Here are a few of them. " I like you because you like monsters"

"I like your hair" (notice how spikey it is)

"I like you because your funny!" (I love the look on Johnny's face next to sweet serene Anne.)

Johnny is 7!

It is the beginning of our Birthday Marathon again! It comes so fast. That can only mean one thing, our children are growing. Such a happy thing, but it makes me feel sad that I will never have my six year old boy again. This is why I keep a blog, so that I can remember life when they were small. I tried my sister's recipe for marshmallow fondant this time. It was awesome, but I didn't have much time to work on it so it is a little sloppy. Johnny insisted that we celebrate his birthday on his actual birthday, which was the morning after John and I returned home from our cruise.

He got plenty of outdoor toys this year because we are trying to persuade him that outdoor, active, activities are super fun. I think we are making headway in that area. The problem is that he gets hot very quickly, hence all of the water toys.

We told Johnny that he could have a big party at home with lots of friends, or he could invite 2 friends to go someplace fun with him. He chose the 2 friend option. He decided that we should play rollerball at Boondocks and invite his cousins, Cody and Elena. Johnny loves spending time with Cody and Hannah, they are the two people who he can really relax and be silly with.

L....L....L....ucy

As a mom, it is my job to make sure that my children learn important skills to carry them through their lives. Unfortunately, sometimes I don't realize when I push too hard. Lucy is talking in full sentances now, and you can tell exactly what she is saying if you know where to fill in the consonants. I have been trying to help her with this, but this time she gave me a really big hint that I need to let up a bit. :)

From the dictionary of Maddie

Rainbowlish (adjective); A word used to describe something that is very colorful or sparkly.