"Hey kids, guess where we are?!"

"Disneyland!"

Best kept secret of the year. Really.







I wish I had more photos from the day. Hubbs took some with his piece...I literally took like 10 the entire day. I didn't want to have to babysit my camera, and well...within the first 10 minutes of our being there it POURED. And after that I did not feel much like shooting our grody selves.

We were soaked (so much for our cute hair for pictures), our stroller was SOAKED, our food was SOAKED...but it was SO much stinking fun, so so so worth it. The kids didn't even notice the rain.



Poor Hubbs, natural curl+rain=curlz. I think he is adorable. Love his face here.



Making a wish in Minnie's well.



Memms LOVED seeing Minnie. J-Dawg not sure what to think here.



It is so cute how they just ran up to Mickey. Memms didn't want to leave him. Mickey, in his Fantasia attire even did a little "Happy Birthday" ditty for Memms. It was so so so cute and adorable. She loved him.

The kids favorite rides?

J-Man: Peter Pan (the longest line of the day)
Memms: The Matterhorn (she said she liked the one with the scary mosters the best. Way to go Abomidable Snowman!)
Hubbs: The Matterhorn (I think he liked Memms reaction to it the best, I rode with J-Man, he was a little freaked too.)
Mine: The Carousel (Because we could all ride together and the look of wonderment in J-Man's eyes as he rode was the best gift in the world)

Definitely a place of magic. It was a day of magic for all of us. So thankful to have been able to take them there!

Totally going...

...so should you.

Home today...

Photo circa early spring 2007.

...with a feverishly sick girl. I hate it when they are sick. That, and my ward probably thinks I am inactive by now, considering with all the illness our family has had since the beginning of December I have missed like 8 weeks.

Good times.

Anyway, so this morning I am laying in my bed with my hott hott girl, and she is asking me to rub her legs and scratch her back, "Like this!" (The girl has a certain way she likes things done) and I say to her:

"You are SO spoiled aren't you Memms!?"

And she says back in her scratchy little voice, "No I am not, I am just beautiful."

Can't argue with that now can I?

Off to cuddle. Hope your Sunday is the best ever!

Utah Man

Uhm.

For serious.


Best day of my life thus far.


My big brother started a blog.


He is a talented and gifted writer, and funnier than I will get out.


Read him...you'll be glad you did...and to make it better? He is a dood. Blogging Doods are SO so cool.

Utah Man

Just got back...

...from the happiest place on earth. Also other parts of California and Las Vegas. I can't wait to share all about our wonderful week. I am really good at keeping secrets. My kids didn't even know where we were going until we walked through the gates at Disneyland, and Memms looked up and saw "Tinkerbell! Look mom, TINKERBELL!" and we broke the news and they were in complete bliss the entire day. It feels good to be back, to be home.

For now, I must catch up on some work and laundry, and apologize for not being a very good blog friend, reader, and commenter for the past two months. I have wanted to, but I have had this overwhelming feeling and NEED to immerse myself in my little family.

I no longer chat on instant messenger, I hardly ever text anymore...EVER, I keep my phone calls limited, I don't spend a lot of time online anymore. I feel really good and really happy about all of it, but at the same time, I miss my friends from blog world. I am ready to make a new schedule, to include a little more of the things I love to do (like blog reading). Can't wait to see what you have all been up to!

You might recognize these beauties.

Moosh in Indy.










I haven't forgotten you.

Kiss kiss.

Happy Birthday

Two of the best things to ever happen to me!





Happy third Memms! Happy thirty first Hubbs!

"They say it's your birthday!"

This birthday was one of the best I have ever had, really and truly. I am so thankful for everyone who made it so freaking wonderful.

It started out with Hubbs taking me and the kids out for lunch...anywhere I wanted. I chose the Ho Ho Gourmet. Remember that was also J-Man's choice? Like mother like son. If you live near Salt Lake County you MUST go there. It is THE most ghetto looking place on the planet...it looks like something straight up out of 1967 inside, but the food is divine, and if you go for lunch you can feed FOUR of you for $12.00. Yes, we walked out of there STUFFED for under $15.00. It was BLISS. I enjoyed my usual chicken teriyaki while Hubbs enjoyed his usual orange chicken. Mmm, I want to run there right now.

Then we picked up a sitter and went to the movies, we saw Valkyrie. Even though I can't stand, as in CAN'T STAND Tom Cruise...(even though when I was in high school I had a really steamy dream that involved him...) it was a WONDERFUL movie. I highly recommend.

We didn't have a lot of time to get the sitter home, so we nixed dinner and went home and, well you know the rest...next year I will save the coppers a slice of cake.

The next morning we had breakfast with my mom and all of my sibs. It was totally awesome. I got so many fun cards and gift certificates, I felt like a queen. Really, I couldn't stop smiling. They meant so much to me. Even this week I got two cards with little certificates in them for here or there and I am just so happy. Thank you to everyone for thinking about me, it was the best EVER.

A few days later I went out to eat with two of my besties. They treated me to a lovely...yummy meal at Johnny Carinos. If you haven't had their Rosemary Chicken, you MUST try it sometime. Divine. I felt like a princess having my friends buy me dinner. Then we ladies tripped it on over to my fave store Target. We had fun rummaging through the dollar bins, I was super excited to spend my $20 I got for my birthday from my mom...when my sweet friends hand me a card with a giftcard to none other than...my favorite store. I had to fight back the tears. I can't tell you how much this meant to me. Money has been tight around here for months and months. I have happily gone without so many things, and truly it hasn't bothered me, but to be able to buy myself (with the help of my friends) a beautiful sweater and some killer heels...it just meant so much. Much more than I can ever express to them. Thank you.

Then the best ever...cupcakes. The ladies found a cupcake shop (hello divinity) and picked up some rocking flavors. You must visit this website and shop, the story behind it will make you weep.

Me enjoying a milk chocolate with orange frosting. Yummylicious.






Leish's Red Velvet.



Linds and her Carrot Cake.



The unwrapping.



The eating.



And mrs. r in all her glory downing the Vanilla in one fail swoop.




I hope to have many, MANY more of these. Just like this one.

The Pink Schwinn

I remember vividly my seventh birthday.

It was the year I got my first two-wheeler bicycle.

It had training wheels. (I know such a late bicycling bloomer I was.)

I knew it was not "new". I tried not to let that show...even though tears stung at my eyes knowing it wasn't the shiny new bike of my dreams.

Still, I was excited. My brother Marcus made sure I was excited about it. He talked up the banana seat, and was extremely encouraging that soon I would be riding without the training wheels. Just like him. (I wanted to be just like him.) Having a winter birthday sucks...but we made the best of the day and rode the bike up and down the hallway of our house, through the living room and back down the hall. (Thanks mom for letting us do that.)

The day after my birthday, or shortly there after was the day my dad left us, and being fully aware that my parents were getting "a divorce". It was for the better, but that is another story, for another time.
(He may have been gone before this, but I recall this birthday being a defining moment.)

This made my mom a single mother. Hence the understanding now of the second hand bicycle and the utter love and teary heart I have when I think back to this time in our lives. How she ever supported herself and us on her job of $8 something an hour is beyond me. This left my brother and I home alone quite a bit. Back in the 80's though, I guess it wasn't such a big deal to leave your kids home alone as it is now. Needless to say this left my brother and I a lot of idle time...alone, unsupervised.

One day, my brother's fascination with my bike must have gotten the better of him. See on that cool banana seat up there, there is this "handle" of sorts. I am not sure what possessed him, or me for that matter, but somehow I ended up tied to the bike by a rope while he got onto the bike (sans training wheels by this point) and told me to "Run! Run fast!" Mmmk.

So I ran. I probably got a good fifty yard dash in before I face planted it into the middle of the street and had road rash from my chin down my chest and tummy to my lower...very lower abdomen. I can't quite remember if my mom was home, Marcus jumped off the bike and untied me. I remember spending the entire evening with warm cloths pressed onto the damaged areas of my tummy, trying to get all of the tiny rocks and such out of my skin. Oh how it hurt to wear pants for days. :(

Then we moved. We moved across the street from my grandma. She lives in a very old part of Salt Lake City. Not too far from her house is a 7/11. My brother and I would go there seemingly daily (although financially that would be impossible) to get some Lik m Aid Fun Dip and some Neopolitan ice cream sandwiches. What could be a more perfect ride than the Schwinn?

So there I am, sitting on the back of the seat while Marcus mans the pedals and handlebars. I am holding onto the little metal handle, trying with all of my might to keep my feet out of the spokes. (Remember mom always warned you about that?) When to my chagrin my right heel got caught in the spoke, ripped off my shoe and ripped off my heel with it. I was screaming and howling...and Marcus was still going, intent on the Summer treats waiting at the sev. Finally he stopped and I limped back to grandma's house. Grandpa put me back together and all was fine.
This time? Weeks to heal.

This is why every good bikes needs a set of pegs.

I miss my Schwinn.

Today.

Today I cleaned all three of my bathrooms. Yuck.

Today we watched Narnia in Portuguese, on my bed...nice and cuddled.

Today I showered at 3:30 p.m. Unfortunately not before this photo was taken.



Today I hugged and kissed on these lovies.



Today we made cookies.







Today was divinity.

Inspired.

And teary.

The Land of Snowy Bliss

With all the illness in our family the past month, and all the luscious snowstorms we have had, poor J-Man has been dying to get outside and play in it. And on New Years he did!

Memms was ALL stoked...we had one small hangup as she didn't have waterproof gloves in her size...so we improvised. We put some huge rubber gloves over her little knit ones.



Bliss.





Memms on the other hand (literally) spent almost two hours sitting in her car seat, in the garage with the door open to the outside world. She didn't want to play in the snow and get her gloves wet...nor did she want to go inside. She was absolutely content to stay in the car and listen to daddy shovel the walks and big brother throw snowballs.

Sweet Innocence.





There is NOTHING better.

Bad Boyz

My husband, who also happens to be a real estate consultant would probably not exactly approve of the following story (it may or may not drive down the value of our home in an already dwindling market).

So, I tell this story hypothetically speaking of course...because it is just too funny not to tell.

The scene: My birthday. It was last Friday. I turned 27. Ah bliss. It was a great day, a story I shall share at a later date.

Hubbs had so sweetly stayed home from work so that he and I could do some cuddling on our couch...and other places that night. I was super excited. We were downstairs watching some show or another when, at some OBSCENE hour of the night, it was close to eleven...we hear the doorbell ring. What the H? We both look at each other with raised brows. Hubbs, who was half dressed ran to our room to get some clothes on and answered the door. It was our neighbor.
He was ringing to inform us of the drug bust currently happening OUTSIDE OUR FRONT DOOR. Literally.

The story: Apparently the COPS were chasing this guy down the busy street adjacent to our home, a very speedy chase I might add, when Bozo the driver decided to turn down our street to try to lose the police in the neighborhood. Tee hee...guess what? We live on a freaking DEAD END. "Private Lane" as I like to refer to it. The idiot drove through our neighbor's sideyard fence and landed the front end of his car in another neighbor's backyard. The guy gets out of his car LEAVING HIS GIRLFRIEND...and makes a run for it. I am not sure if the cops responding had one too many donuts or what, but he got away, leaving his girlfriend to be handcuffed and put in the back of the car. Nice.

It is nice to know I have two awesome neighbors, one who ran after the dood with a bat, the other with a piece of wood. They didn't catch him either.

Good times I tell you. Good, good times.

School Daze

This shall be the first of a small series of posts I shall entitle "School Daze".

As I prepare to send my first born off into the land of curious lunch cuisine and first crushes, my mind is brought back to those long ago days of grade school. At the same time as J-Man is introduced to such woes, I have a little sister entering Jr. High, and another entering High School. So in honor of their preparation and mortification, I will share with you some of the worst moments I had in school.

Laugh with me, more importantly CRY with me...because as my friend put it after I told her this first story, "It has not been long enough, these wounds are still too fresh."
Oh how I pray I do not lose thee...oh faithful readers.

Or as my other friend put it, "Dood that is HILARIOUS."

YOU BE THE JUDGE.

The setting: 15 years ago. If you do the math, we are talking sixth grade. I had a crush on, oh we'll call him "CK". I sat at the same table with CK as well as one of THE most popular girls in the sixth grade--Jenna. I was either lucky or doomed. I prefer the term "doomed".

My family had just moved into a new home, landing me into this new found hell of a place...and in sixth grade no less. When I should have been "ruling the school" I was instead trying to make it through each and every day. No easy feat where I went to school. It was grade A ghettosville USA.

So there was this one day in Spring. I was sitting at the table after running around all recess long...and you know when you run sometimes you get cloggy in the...um nasal region. Well, as the secretions dried, it caused me the most unbelievable mass to ever grace one's nose. I was sitting there with CK to my left nose in a book (as per usual) and Jenna was also reading. So, I thought quickly that if I hurried and dug out the menace...no one would see...and I would be freed of my burden. I must act quickly. I only hesitated for a moment...dig...grab...swoop...into the mouth. Yes. I just admitted to the entire world that I ate my boogs until I was in sixth grade. Back to the story.

Once I commenced the "swoop" of my plot, that is where I neglected that behind the dried mass may lie a long string of...well you know...undried mass. So the big menace took with it all of it's relatives leaving a trail from my nose to my...er um...my...uh...mouth. I know I am kind of dry heaving as I relive it.

This is not the worst of it. As I was mortified that such a situation had occured, and that my plan had not been fully executed with the grace I had so fully thought it should...who is it that was there to witness the entire event?

Was it CK?

Thankfully, no.

Was it Jenna?

Yes. Yes it was.

Mortification.

One of THE most popular girls in school just saw me PICK my nose and EAT it. Death. What was I to do? She sat staring at me. I was still cleaning off the mess. And what is it you suppose she said to me?

"It's okay Kim. I used to eat my boogers too, I won't tell anyone."

I am CERTAIN I was three shades of red, nevermind the green tracing my nose and lips. I can tell you one thing...that day cured me of ever wanting to eat a booger ever...EVER again.

That day could have been very, very different. Jenna and I became very good friends, I can't say because of the booger incident...but friends nonetheless. It was really good for my self-esteem.

As far as eating boogers, in case you are all sitting at your computers reaching for your garbage can to hurl in...read along, you may think twice the next time you grab for a tissue.

I rest my case.

School is hell. Do not let anyone tell you otherwise.

"H'h'h'h'h'hot, c'c'c'c'cup, of c'c'c'c'co, co, coa!"

Nothing says Christmas, and snow and cold like cocoa. Really, is anything more perfect or more dreamy about this time of year than that?

The week before Christmas the store was out of mini-mallows. We had to have the big honkers, and you know what? Even though they are a choking hazard, my kids love them. Love the pudgy cheeks and the dreamy look on J-Man's face. This is what childhood is suppose to be. Sweet innocence and perfection.

Gingerbread, Christmas & Back Rubs

This has got to be the most lazy version of Gingerbread House ever. Remember how I told you we were all sick with some sort of fever, cough, snotty nose and or puke the week of Christmas? We did this house three days after Christmas and I still wasn't feeling tops. So, instead of going to church the kids and I decided not to infect all of their friends and we made a Gingerbread house. Half aced but still tasted yummy.








What is the point of a house if you can't eat it?

Christmas was so wonderful. We kept it small and simple, and yet by the end of the night the kids ended up with some major swag.

We spend Christmas Eve with Hubby's parents. They (along with what we had prepared) brought enough food to literally feed thirty people. There were four adults and two kids. Needless to say we had some major leftovers. I think they are finally gone. Praises. It was super fun to see the kids play with them. We got them a really cool digital frame and loaded it with pics. It was a hit.

The morning started off with a visit to my mom Lorraine's house. She is a dawl and it is always so much fun to visit with all of my brothers. We had a divine breakfast casserole and some yummy cinnamon rolls. Holla.

Then somehow Anna and I got roped into giving Christmas backrubs , scratches, and scalp massages to all of the boys. (Best Christmas present EVER for them anyway.) We, of course got nothing in return. (Next time Anna, you and I are trading scalp massages!)

After visiting them we stopped by to visit my Dad. Love this man. I never talk about him. I really should. The stories I could tell. I will consider it. He and his girlfriend Tish were SUPER sweet to my little family on Christmas. I have tears in my eyes just thinking about what they have done for us. We were also able to see my Dad's mom...she and I are going to get together this Spring and take some photos. It has been almost 25 years since she had some beautiful work done of her. I can't wait to share. We all have a unique relationship with her...for lack of a better term, it is strained. She was very nice on Christmas and we can actually say it was good to see her. She did make some good cookies, didn't she Marc?

Then we were off to visit my Mom and her family...super fun. It was a quick visit since we had a lovely family party a few days later.

The evening was spent with my Mom's mom. She is such a wonderful lady and more tears were shed as my kids, her great grandchildren opened the sweet presents from her. They have enjoyed and played with these little gifts since Christmas and it makes me happy.

Hubbs had to work on Christmas. I know right? Stinker. It was a wonderful year. I loved the simplicity of it all. Looking forward to carrying that over into years to come.