Day 182-Half Way Through The Year!

{Tate spent FOREVER drawing this picture of the temple-he wants to send it in to the Friend Magazine}

I've had a lot on my mind lately, and I have got to write my thoughts down to PREVENT myself from going crazy.

• First off, just wanted to say how GRATEFUL I am for my family. Bryan & Tate are awesome-that's all there is to it!!! I am so blessed to have them in my life.

• Once again... I've been seeing a doctor to help figure out how to help my body get pregnant and stay pregnant. Infertility/Miscarriages/Birth Defects are no fun, in fact they stink (there I said it). I've been through plenty in the last 8 1/2 years... from losing a baby to Anencephaly after 2 1/2 years of trying to conceive, to FINALLY having a perfect son born to us after 3 1/2 years, to having a miscarriage after another 2 1/2 years, to not being able to get pregnant for yet another 2 years and still not pregnant. I tell you, infertility can do things to you if you let it... I have my ups and I have my downs-but I'd say that for the most part I've somehow stayed sane. AMAZINGLY.
  
• As I said before, I've been seeing a doctor (trying to get some more answers) and to figure out what my next step is from here. I've already been diagnosed with many things including endometriosis (which makes it hard for me to get pregnant in the first place) as well as a DNA Mutation-I am compound heterozygous for the C677T mutation and the A1298C mutation (which makes it difficult to stay pregnant). When I finally do get pregnant again (which I'm hopeful will happen sometime), I will be considered high risk and will need to be put on progesterone as well as daily heparin shots, and most likely bed rest-just to keep from miscarrying.
• Trials are hard, I know I'm not the only one who has them. We've all been given our own set of challenges in life. It's what we make of them and how we learn and grow from them that matters.
  
• I ALWAYS find comfort in the poem that's found in the front of the book, "Charlie's Monument" by Blaine M. Yorgason (BTW-It's a very inspiring book and one of my personal favorites-one of which I highly recommend reading).
  
  
  

  God, before he sent his children into the world,
  

  gave each of them a carefully selected package of problems.

  
  

  "These, "He promised smiling, "are yours alone.

  Only you have the special talents and abilities
  

  that will make these problems your servants,
  

  and no one else may have the blessing these problems will bring you."

  
  

  "So, go down to your birth, and to your forgetting.

  Know that I love you beyond measure.

  The problems I give you are a token of my love."

  
  

  "The monument you make of your life,
  

  with the help of your problems,
  

  will be a token of your love for me."

• My Dad and I were talking the other day about trials and challenges. We both agreed that if we were given the choice to trade our problems with any other person in the world, we would choose our own. Even though trials are hard, I can honestly say that I'm grateful to have the ones I have been given. But at the same time, what I'd give to have another baby of my own right now :) I just have to keep on telling myself, "All in God's time!"
  

Day 181-A Little Bit of Heaven

Aren't these clouds just gorgeous? I snapped this picture while playing (and testing out the slides) at Wet N' Wild last night with Bryan and Tate. When the clouds look like this, it always reminds me of Heaven and it makes me feel like it's not that far away...
BTW, Wet N' Wild is amazing!!! The park will be opening to the public shortly and you won't regret going. We had a blast last night. Since it was just family and friends of employees, the Life Guards were extremely lax with the height requirements on the rides and so even though Tate is only 44 inches, he was able to ride ALL of the rides including the Tornado (which you normally have to be 48 inches tall to ride)!

Day 179-Tate's Make Shift Whisker Burns

Tate found a piece of sandpaper tonight with a sticky back side to it, and attached it to his own cheek. He then found Bryan and while rubbing his face against Bryan's said, "Now I can give YOU whisker burns Daddy!"

Days 177 and 178-Just a BUNCH of Playing

The last few days have been fun. I think that 90% of our time has been spent PLAYING which included- Neighbors, Cousins, and Aunts- puppets and singing, bounce houses, building lots of forts, swimming, piggy back rides, dressing up, sand castles, legos, a bed of nails, and lots more fun!

Day 176-Sleep over and Water Park with Cousins

Tate spent the night over at his cousins-Rebecca, Anson, and Kathryn's house last night. This morning, we met over at Tempe Beach Park and played for a while before I took him back home. All the kids had a blast! It is such a fun park.

Day 175-Working an 80+ Hour Week!

Bryan has been working like crazy these last few weeks trying to get the "Water World" (I guess that it's been bought out by "Wet and Wild Waterpark") project completed on time. Last night he added up his hours, and I wasn't surprised at all when they were over 80 for the week (and that's with taking Sunday off). Just Friday and Saturday alone he worked a total of 40 hours! Oh, and this isn't including the work he has been doing for "SUNKISS POOLS"-his own pool company... He spends MANY hours a week doing that as well. I'd say at least 15-20hrs./week. I seriously don't know how he's been doing it!
Bryan emailed me this picture with the words, "Work CAN be fun". I admit, it looks fun and all (especially since he's allowed to try out the slides), but not fun enough to be working those kind of hours.
Do you blame me for counting down the days until he will be over with this project? I want a Husband again, and Tate wants a Dad back...

Day 174-Tate's Favorite Cereal

Yesterday while at the store (just for the fun of it) I let Tate choose ANY kind of cereal he wanted... While many children would choose Lucky Charms, Fruit Loops, or even Cheerios for breakfast... Tate chose to buy "the Original Shredded Wheat Biscuits." It has been his favorite for a long time now, but only with LOTS of honey on top.

Extreme Play Fundraiser-This Thursday!

I've never actually been to Extreme Play, but from what I hear it's lots of fun and kids LOVE it. Hope to see you there on Thursday!

Day 173- "I Love My Daddy Because..." Book

We spoiled Bryan this year for Father's Day. He got the "My Dad Rocks" as well as this cute little book. IDEA HERE. I ordered the board book "I Love My Daddy Because..." off of amazon.com for $6.99 (Great Deal), and recovered it with pictures of Bryan and Tate that went along with the words. (There are more pages to the book then those shown here). It turned out cute, and Bryan really liked it.

Day 172-Father's Day

Bryan took this 4 generation picture last night... I feel so blessed to have such amazing men in my life. Thank-you Bryan, Dad, Grandpa, and Keith for being the BEST!

Day 171-Winnie the Pooh & The Little Bug Too

Tate is NOT the kind of child who enjoys watching TV. Most of the time he would much rather be doing something else. I've found that this can be both good and bad. Of course no parent would WANT their child to be a TV bum, but (I'll admit) there are times when I've had to MAKE Tate watch a movie just so that I can get stuff done. Even then, he typically gets bored half way through the movie or tells me that he's been watching too much TV (no joke).
The other day I MADE Tate watch Winnie the Pooh (so that I could shower). He watched the one called "A Tigger Inside and Out", I'm sure that you've all seen it. You know, the one where Tigger loses his stripes and then his friends don't know who he is... He then tries to figure out who he is, and Tigger's friends suggest that he may be a rabbit. So Rabbit takes Tigger to his garden to determine by his gardening skills if he is indeed a rabbit. Then Rabbit leaves and asks Tigger to "watch over" his garden by not allowing ANY BUGS to eat his prize winning tomatoes. Tigger then marches up and down the garden rows with the bug spray that Rabbit had left him. Just then a cute STARVING little bug appears and asks Tigger for a tomato. Tigger had compassion on the poor bug and let him eat one. Then Rabbit comes back to see that his entire garden had been eaten by little bugs and he attempts to spray them and Tigger out of his garden. Whew, hope I summed that up right...
Anyways, shortly after my shower I noticed that Tate was in tears (crying uncontrollably). He was heartbroken that Rabbit would be so CRUEL to the hungry bugs. He just couldn't get why Rabbit wouldn't want to share his tomatoes. I'm not exaggerating when I say that Tate cried for close to 1/2 hour straight. He even threw the movie away! (I retrieved it out of the garbage so that I could take some pictures of the bug). Tate told me that when he grows up he is going to have a garden that is ONLY for the bugs. Later that day I went outside to find that he had placed 3 cherry tomatoes from the fridge on the patio for the bugs. The movie obviously affected him.
I guess that from now on I'm going to need to be more selective in the movies I MAKE Tate watch...

Day 170-"My Dad Rocks"-Father's Day Gift

Tate found a tutorial (for making these cute rocks) in our Family Fun Magazine a couple of weeks ago. He has been asking me constantly when we are going to make them... I figured that with Father's Day being in less than two days-today would be as good a time as ever.
I think that they turned out cute, definitely not a craft I would have initiated. But Tate enjoyed helping with the majority of the process, so it was worth it.

Day 169-Snoopy Snow Cone Machine

My sister Christina picked this up for Tate for $3 last week at DI-brand new and in the box. He is in SNOW CONE HEAVEN! I've been using it as a good behavior reward:) I'm always looking for more of those...

The Family: A Proclamation to the World (Page 8)

We are so ready for this page. I'm very happy to have FINALLY made it (I've been a procrastinator). Now we just need to get it memorizing-FUN.
Click HERE for Family Proclamation Printables for YOU!

Day 168-Could I Really Pass For Being Under 18?

Tate's swimming lessons are held at a local Junior High School. This same school offers free lunches during the summer for children 18 years old and younger. Since Tate enjoys it (and I'm not too proud to take him there), I've been letting him eat lunch there right after swimming. I'm not particularly fond of school lunches and I especially don't want to pay the $3 they charge for adults to eat... So, I've just been eating at home afterwards.
Today was different, after going through the food line with Tate I realized that I was completely starving and I decided to buy myself some food. So I got Tate situated at the table and went back to the line for my food. After getting a grilled cheese sandwich, a chip bag, a Popsicle, and a chocolate milk (YUCK, I must have been desperate), I stood there with my $3 in change ready to pay. The cashier lady was like, "You don't need to pay anything. You're under 18 right?" I simply said no. I didn't even mention the fact that I will be 28 this year. That's 10 years older than 18. I'm not sure whether to take it as a compliment, or is that I hint that I should start wearing more makeup and get my hair styled?

Day 167-The Mysterious Bug Bites

We have a HUGE black bug that lives in our house and bites our arms and legs. I saw him for the first time last night (I have NO idea what kind of bug it is, as I've NEVER seen anything like him before). He was on my arm, and when I tried to hit him off he got away. I tried to chase after him and kill him but he was no where to be seen, and I haven't seen him since. Apparently he likes Tate even more than me. Poor Tate has bug bites covering his arms. Wish me luck-I've got to get him today!

Day 166-First Day of Swimming Lessons

Since things have been so busy for us lately... we missed the first session of swimming lessons this summer. I was a little worried that Tate would be behind, but today proved that he wasn't. He did extremely well!
I enjoyed watching Tate's swim class, but it got hot and boring fast just sitting there doing nothing. So, tomorrow I'll be bringing a good book and hopefully going early so I can get a covered bleacher seat.

Day 165-FHE Chart

Here is my finished FHE chart made at the reunion yesterday. Originally I hadn't planned on making it too rustic looking... but after I had finished painting it black, Tate came along with a green crayon and purposely scribbled all over it (I don't know what got into him-I think it was just a long day for him). So it was either repaint or sand down. I'd take sanding any day. Although it turned out far from planned, I like it. For the little hanging hearts-I just used chalk.

Day 164-My House to Your House Family Reunion

Yesterday was AWESOME! We started out at my Parent's house for a pajama party + breakfast and games. We broke up into 3 groups and rotated writing letters to Thomas, playing an ancestors memory game, and practicing for a puppet show. After the three "centers" we had a puppet show performance. I'm normally not a huge puppet person, but it was totally fun!

Then we headed off to Christina and Joseph's house for fruit salad and visiting. The kids got to play outside a little and my Mom showed them where she used to live when she first got married.

Next we went to my house for a picnic lunch at the park. (My camera battery died at this point so no pics-sorry). Then we started a project... making FHE charts. I'll show mine later. The kids had fun painting on some canvas.

After that, we drove to Jonathan and Carrie's for dinner (taco salad) and we finished the FHE charts. They all turned out really good. We sat around visiting while the kids played in the backyard.

It was a LONG fun day!