We've been told NO!!

So my husband rarely takes time off since he's worked at his current place of employment. So this year we decided that we would like to take a few trips and tried to schedule them months in advance and get them approved. Well, we wanted to take a trip in April for a weekend and go visit my family in California but we just found out mid January that the "boss" already wants that same time off and so Chris was told No. We also want to go up to Idaho in June for two reasons, for our anniversary in the beginning of the week, and then Thursday, Friday and Saturday for a family reunion on my side of the family. (Since they only take place every two years and we are way big into family history so that would have been a great opportunity to get photos, and complete families etc...) Well the entire week we wanted to have Chris take off is fine Monday - Thursday but Friday is a big fat NO!!

Which bums both of us, because that was the critical date for us to make the major potluck day and see the majority of all the people. So now we're not sure if we want to make the nearly seven hour trip to get there just for a night and then turn around and do the same thing. Not my idea of fun, so I think we'll have to forego both of the trips due to scheduling conflicts with his boss. Pretty lame -- but somehow we'll compensate and figure out something different to do. So for now, I'm a little disappointed that we actually try to co-ordinate and plan far enough out that we could have a "family vacation" but we got shot down for both planned trips. AGGHHH !!! I guess that is life!!

Essay from a Third Grader

So Kaylee has to submit an essay for the Freedom Festival Essay contest and this is her essay. I helped her with the typing and the "editing" but most of the thoughts were completely hers, I had to keep asking her probing questions and we came up with this : Mind you she is in 3rd grade and 8 years old (she'll be 9 in April)

Awesome Things Called Values

By Kaylee Randolph

I am going to let you know about some American Values that I get to enjoy. They are Family, Freedom, God, and Country. If we lived in a country where these values weren’t important our lives could be miserable and terrifying. We would be miserable because in other countries God and Freedom might not exist, and without our freedom there could be slavery, and as a kid we might not be able to play inside or outside on a nice sunny day. Without God, we might not be allowed to pray. So these four values practiced together are important to Americans.

Family is important to me because I would not be alive without them. They make me feel good inside because they love me, and teach me what I need to know to be a good person. They also support me when I am afraid. If I didn’t have my family I would be lost, scared and confused. So I’m glad that I belong to a family that is nice to me, and includes me in the games that they play, and make me feel special.

I love freedom because we are able to have our families live together. Families are good to people like me because they can support us when we are sad. We have the freedom to love someone when they need to be loved. Our freedom is possible because our ancestors fought in wars, which made it hard on their families. They even had to fight in war in the winter when it’s snowing, raining and even in the negative temperatures. Their families sacrificed their loved ones so that we can enjoy the freedom we have today. I’m grateful for our ancestors working hard to help make it possible now. Freedom is important to me because I would not be able to go to school or maybe I would, but I might not be able to say the Pledge of Allegiance if I didn’t have freedom.

I love God because he gave me a family, freedom and lots of things. I love God because he gave me a friend; she plays with me at recess and is nice to me. God made this country for me because He loves all of us. With God all things could be possible. If everyone believed in God, and he was here everyone would be nice to each other and there would be no wars.

I love my Country because I am free .I love to be free because I can speak what I want to, and walk where I want to and not be scared. I love my country because I am able to learn and be educated because I like to learn everything I can.

These awesome values I’ve mentioned are important when we are lost, sad, confused, and also when we are happy. When we are lost, sad or confused we can go to our families for help, and we can even ask God for help. When we are happy and things are going well we can also have fun with our family and share our love and good times with them too. When things are going very well I am allowed to pray to God and thank him for the good things he has given me. The American Values of Family, Freedom, God and Country help make me happier since they are valued in the United States of America.

Happy Birthday Josiah !!!

JOSIAH

Today is my nephew's 5th birthday and I wish we could be closer to celebrate with him. We love you little guy -- now you're 5 and getting bigger. Sorry that we can't be there, but I'm sure your having lots of FUN!!! See you in a few weeks. ( got the picture from Shantil's blog)

EXPLOSION!!

Talk about a "freaky" experience:

Last night while Chris and I were laying on the living room floor watching a movie, and just after Heidi was sent BACK to her room, she slammed the door and just after she closed her door we heard a big "BOOM" and our house was shaking pretty violently. Chris and I jumped up, and paused our movie, of course, and dashed for the door. As we looked out our window, we noticed all of our neighbors doing the same thing. It was heard that maybe it was an earthquake, but after being in several of those as a younger person, I knew it wasn't an earthquake. Our thoughts were that it was an explosion.

It turns out that it was -- and at a place where we know someone who works there. Haven't been able to find out if he was there last night, but I'm praying for those that were hurt - and their families. How scary and sad -- the explosion was felt and heard for miles around.
Talk about getting my heart working!!! That was so freaky!!

Here are the few links that are covering it:
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=2682785


http://www.myfoxutah.com/myfox/pages/Home/Detail?contentId=5805045&version=2&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=1.1.1

I would really like this..... (Wish List)

I've just located this piano for sale and am hoping that we can find a way to purchase it!! It's so beautiful and I have wanted a piano for years ----- HOPE I CAN TALK CHRIS INTO THIS ONE!!!!

Goal Updates ::

More for my personal tracking than for you:

Book of Mormon: Well I'm still only in First Nephi Chapter 12 --- I've been caught up in some other projects and need to get back on board if I'm to make my goal by April 24th -- at this rate I might have to adjust the target date to my Anniversary which is two months later.

Temple: Happy to say that I've made it to the temple every week since the beginning of the year. I even went last week but only to go and do 1 name for initiatory work - because it has to be done before the endowment can be done. My son was sick and it was a blessing that only this card didn't need the baptism (because Chris just generated a whole stack of more cards, which most need the baptisms) so I still was able to go. I'm going tonight after Chris is home from work.

Cleaning my house: Well, I'm trying to stay on top of laundry!! Sometimes I'm good, and other times I'm not so good!! But I think I'm starting to develop a system that will work for me. I just went through and cleaned out the boy's bedroom and found a way to organize some of the more used toys and it's easier to clean up everyday. Of course, the top bunk is loaded with bulky baby items, and boxes of clothes that I still need to go through, and down on the floor are some that were missed getting on the top bed.

As far as the rest of the house, well, as I like to say -- Its a work in progress.

Getting to bed : Well -- we'll work on that some more later as well.

Not raising my voice: Doing better, but not perfect yet -- it's like everyone in my family seems to know what I'm trying to work on and seem to push just the right buttons to make me lose control!!

NOt eating meat -- We won't talk about that right now either!!

That Darn Cat!! But WE STILL LOVE HER !!

This is Phoebe!! Yes, we named her after the FRIENDS character named Phoebe played by Lisa Kudrow!! We've had her now, for about 4 or 5 years ( I think I lost track!!) Well this character sang a song, called "smelly cat" and we just couldn't resist!!

( If you want to listen to the "video" be sure and turn off my music player at the bottom first. )




My cat has some weird things she does, such as: follows us around the block when we go on walks and act as if she's a dog most of the time. She meows at the front door or window when she wants to come in. And as you can tell in some of these pictures she jumps up to the little edge on the front door window and will hang until we let her in. What's even more funny --- when she climbs the screen door in the summer and is at the top of the door and totally spread eagle!!! IT IS SO FUNNY TO WATCH!!! I'll have to try and get a picture this year!!

Here you can see that she has her back legs on the ledge of the screen door and standing up to the window!!! She's so crazy!!!

On the MEND!!

This was Ethan earlier this week -- ON MONDAY!! When we found out he had the double ear infection. He was so miserable!! This picture was literally taken only a few minutes later -- but I think it's precious!! Both boys laying down on the same pillow and thier heads both fit. That won't happen much, when they get older.
And this picture was taken on Valentines Day!! He's feeling a lot better, and starting to be the fun, full of energy, always make me smile self that he is.

Happy Valentines Day !!

So yesturday I was so lucky to find a babysitter ( Melissa W.) for those that know her. I called on Monday afternoon, thinking that she would be busy already and being busy watching someone else's kids. But NO!! She was totally available!!! YEAH FOR ME !!!

So she was willing to come over and be with our kids for about 4 hours!! So Chris and I went our for dinner and then decided to just go to the Mall and "look" around. We went to Deseret Book - one of our favorite places , and plotted out all the things that we would like to purchase. One of them being "Anne of Green Gables" all the movies!!! They carry it for about $75.00 - so I'm going to look around and do some comparison shopping and acquire this in the next few weeks hopefully. The reason being: well we checked out the copy the Library had for the first one and Kaylee was really hoping to see Gill and Anne kiss at the end. Well if you've seen it you know what the outcome is and I really would like for her to see the "Rest of the Story".

Well after we had looked around "window shopping" in Deseret Book for a while we headed for somewhere to get "dessert" so we found a TCBY place and got some yummy stuff there. Yes, yes, it's cold outside but -- when you love ice cream -- it really doesn't matter!!!

On our way to our car while holding the ice cream containers -- we saw one of those picture booths and since I've always wanted to do it and never have - we decided to get our pictures taken, and we had no clue what we were doing and we had fun doing it anyway!! My favorite is the third one : looks like I'm touching his face with my tongue ( but I wasn't) and he's doing an "eww" look. The kissing picture : do we even know how?? Hummm .

We did save our fortunes from having Chinese for dinner.

Wendy : You will do well to expand your horizons.

Chris: Now is a good time for a new collection or hobby.

We came back home and the baby was in bed and the other kids -- we still had to put to bed. But it was such a nice needed, night alone with each other away from the kids. I also gave my husband the mug in the middle and made a bag for each of my kids.

These were brownies that I made Wednesday night, and this is what I had left just a few moments ago!! Everybody loved them. That was our Chocolate for the evening.
Here's a close up: They were so ....... mouth-watering, make you want to beg for more, do anything you can for more... yummy!!!

Thomas of course, hacked up the top with the knife trying to "cut" one for himself. I told him he wasn't allowed to, because the rest if for me!!!!

And yes, my husband did give me a "letter" that tells how he feels, and I read it in the restaurant and started to get watery. He's a sweet man, and I love him to death.

NEW LOOK PATTERNS!!!

Okay so my husbands sister who is my age is getting married March 8th!!! So I've decided to make a long-flowy black skirt to wear for the reception. I found a patter that looks cute and easy so I just bought the material today and I'm going to get to work on it within the next week. Here is what the pattern looks like:

The look I'm going for is the long black one with flowers!! Except the first skirt I'll make will only have a solid black material!! We'll see how it goes!!

Poor Guy!!

So this whole weekend, Ethan has been battling a cold, which has turned into the need to do breathing treatments on him. YUCK!!



I've been on top of doing the breathing treatments here at home and he just looks so miserable and unhappy. I decided to make an appointment with the doctor today. So I called after I dropped my girls off at school and scheduled an appointment. It turns out that at 10 months old he weighs in at 21 pounds and had two nasty-terrible ear infections, so now I've got an anitbiotic to help get the ear infections under control but at the same time, he has a sore throat that doc feels is more viral than bacterial. So he also wants us to do an oral steroid to help open up his air ways so that he can breath somewhat easier.



After going to the appointment and finding out this I went to the pharmacy where I needed to drop of his prescriptions so we can start giving him the meds. On the way home Thomas had fallen asleep and so did Ethan so when I got home I had about 1 hour almost of "QUIET" time and ended up talking with a few people on the phone. I've been up and down for three nights now but finally on Wednesday the little guy is actually interacting with me again, he's laughing and starting to get excited over seeing a bottle again!!! Poor Guy!!

problem solved!!! NOT!!!!!!!!

So this is some of the BAD & UGLY of my life:

Okay so this morning I get a phone call from the lady at the billing office that I spoke to yesturday. She said, that when she got to work this morning that she had a message from my insurance company that said, the midwife was in fact NOT a provider. So now I'm back to square one again. And feeling extremely frustrated !!! So Kiera you are right !!! You get the run around from doctors, insurance, billing office --- basically everyone!!! It kind of stinks a lot!! So now I've called the midwives office and asked if there is any way that they can "resubmit this to the insurance company under another Midwife's name" so that I only pay the $20.00 co-pay. The one midwife I was scheduled with is the only one in the office that doesn't take my insurance !!! AAAGGGHHH

Chris suggested that we just pay our $20.00 and then get Bill Gephart involved. So I'm basically having to pay for a scheduler's mistake --- which I don't feel I should be responsible for. Because I would not knowingly have had this done knowing that I would have to pay just under $900.00 for this. What a headache!!!

BARGAIN DEAL !!!

So I was browsing through the craigslist listings and found one of these:

It's Discovery Toys -- Castle Marbleworks it usually retails for $35 - $36 and this lady had it listed for $15 !!! I've been wanting one of these for so very long and finally it paid off to wait PATIENTLY and I found one for over half off the retail price. Thomas loves playing with the one that my sister in law has and wants to play with it every time we go there. So now he can enjoy it at home as well. So I just picked it up -- and Ethan is having fun with the balls that it comes with because they make noise. What a HAPPY DAY today has turned out to be.

Problem Solved.

Okay so back in August of 2007 I was going to have an IUD placed and thought it was to be only a $20.oo copay. Lo and behold I get the bill a few weeks later and it says that I owe nearly $900.00 for this procedure because they said the provider was out of network. I was frustrated!! So for the last 5 months I've been calling and calling various office speaking to numbers of people all of which were not able to "solve my problem" --- Today I called the billing office and spoke with a lady who was very kind, and I proceeded to explain the whole scenario to her and she said she was going to call the insurance company and find out what was going on. She called me back and said that, the provider was in fact in network and that the insurance company had processed it wrong. So now they are going to reprocess it and I should only have to pay the $20.o0 copay like I thought. Of course, I shouldn't get too excited -- they might goof again. So until they send me a new statement I'll just pray that it is corrected.

So in the end I've realized that persistence can and DOES pay off!! It was quite tiring and frustrating but I've learned a bit of patience through the whole experience and it just goes to show that you need to examine all of your bills closely and when something looks "abnormal" or not what you expected. Call and check out why -- it just may be some fee that you do have to pay but sometimes it can turn out like this. I finally feel like "things" are starting to go in my favor. I made sure that I told this lady "THANK YOU!! YOU JUST MADE MY DAY!!"

I'm an AUNT again!!

My new niece Katelynn Mckenzie-Rose was born on Feb. 2nd 2008 !! I haven't been able to go and see her yet, but did receive some pictures from my brother in law. She looks so cute!! I totally forget how little they can be. She weighed 8 lbs 7 oz and was 20 1/2 inches long. Welcome to this big NEW WORLD!!!

MORE MILESTONES!!

So this last weekend Kaylee was able to finally change her earrings after having them pierced a little over six weeks ago now, and she was so excited and counting the days down and when it finally came she was being such a baby about it!! Finally she let me pull out the piercing studs and put in some of her earings she got for Christmas. She's so darling, if only I can get her to concentrate on brushing her hair all the time. AGGHH

Ethan -- is nearly 10 months old, and can now crawl all over the place, he can handle the stairs in the back of the house and can even stand up to furniture and walks along the front of the couches. He'll be walking before too long !!! Then I'll really have more work cut out for me that I won't be able to handle.

We also watched the Super Bowl and had fun watching the GIANTS BEAT THE PATRIOTS!!! My men had a nice little party!!!

Thomas has been working on Potty Training now since a few weeks before Christmas and he's doing AWESOME!!! He mostly sleeps dry too!! So now I only have Ethan in diapers and within about 18 months he'll probably be potty trained too!!! Crazy --- how your kids just seem to grow and change over night!! I think I'm going to be one of those moms who is completely emotional whenever my kids get recognized for something or whenever they move from home, I don't even know that I'll ever be a non emotional woman again in my life!!! Oh well!!! That MY LIFE!!

The New First Presidency

So yesterday the new First Presidency for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was announced -- so when we had our Family Home Evening last night Chris was in charge of the "activity" . He got onto the internet and printed off

President Thomas S. Monson --- 16th Prophet

President Henry B. Eyring 1st Counselor

President Dieter F. Uchtdorf - 2nd Counselor

So for the activity he said that we could draw a picture of one of these men, or a picture with all three in it. Here are pictures of what was drawn :

Here is a picture that Thomas our 3 year old drew:

Heidi drew this one and she is 5 1/2 ( I think the blue things are hands??)

Katherine drew this one. Can you tell who it was supposed to be?? Not too bad for a nearly 7 1/2 year old . ( Henry B. Eyring)

All I have to say here is Kaylee our 8 1/2 year old has quite the imagination. She wanted to draw President Monson, and then went so bold as to make him "President Monson gone Wrestler" The little thought bubble says : You like to rasl ( wrestle)? But the story didn't start there. When she only had the suit and the head drawn she added arms and hands and obviously looking at the picture you could see why I took one look at it and started laughing. Chris looked and then he started laughing. Kaylee had no clue why we were laughing so much and then said, " what is the hands?" We said that it could be. And she covered up the hand part and said, Middle finger, middle finger etc... for a few more times and then -- Chris asked her if she knew what the "middle finger" meant? She said, " Yes, its a bad word"

Chris and I were shocked that she actually knew that much. Katherine of course, wanting to know everything, says : What word does it mean? Chris came back with : I'm here to teach you good things, so I'm not telling you. ----- I don't think that Kaylee did this intentionally but seeing what she was drawing and how it turned up .... well what can you say. We did have a few good laughs last night.

Then Chris produced this one and we joked around saying that we should submit them to the Friend. So it would be submitted like this: Chris R. age 33 -- wouldn't that be funny if we sent it in and they actually put it into the Friend??? We do have some weird moments of "FUN" in our house and we all love to laugh so last night was a fun one.

I on the other hand didn't draw one, because I was taking care of Ethan making sure that he wasn't getting into the crayons, and markers and such and then I wasn't feeling very well either. Maybe next time I'll have to do the same thing.