Hallelujah Halloween Has Happened

Kim is always on my back about not posting to the blog, which I know I can't write on now that she has taken it over(I always start stuff and she takes it over because she is better at it or I am too scatter-brained to finish it). However, I am taking her up on her challenge tonight to say that I have never been happier to have such a meaningless holiday over with. The stress around this house lately has been incredibly high and I was starting to wonder if my wife had been swapped by a network television station without me knowing just to have cameras buried all over the house to get my candid reactions.

We did make it through with no loss of limb or life and I am still awake past 9:30. I will say that now all I have left to deal with is the Christmas flight to Texas on the stressometer, since Thanksgiving will most likely be at a restaurant(thanks Hodel's). I just hope some Asian people don't come out and start singing Jingle Bells and Deck the Halls, if you know what I mean. Kim is definitely an amazing woman and I am lucky to have her(every once in a while I just wish I could put her in her own rubber room around holiday times, somtimes.) Thanks Kim for making this Halloween special. Our family would be nothing without you.

My least favorite

I have decided that Halloween is my least favorite holiday right now. It takes so much time and effort on my part and my reward is a bunch of fighting with my kids about how much candy they are allowed to eat.

This year I decided to make my kids costumes since I am just tired of having to spend large sums of money on cheaply made costumes for one nights use. Now I can't decided if my time is worth the amount of money I save (not to mention my sanity). This year Mackenzie is the tooth fairy, Ethan and Landon are both toothbrushes, and Ashton is a tube of toothpaste. Sounded pretty easy to me, nothing to difficult. Wrong. Mackenzie's is turning out to be a "ghetto" version of what I had envisioned, I haven't even started to do the boys since somehow I think I might need an engineering degree to put it together, and Ashton's is still in the planning stages.

I will continue to be stressed about it and will also still be putting finishing touches on the costumes in between going to a costume parade, working at Landon's carnival, helping in Ethan classroom cookie decorating day at which I am supposed to make the cookies and bring the supplies for the cookie I am in charge of, making chili for trunk or treat, and then getting kids ready for trunk or treat. After that I will then be fighting with my kids to stop messing with the costumes, telling them to stop whining about how they are hot and/or itchy, trying to keep track of them at the trunk or treat, making sure they are not sitting somewhere at the church shoveling handfuls of candy into their mouth, listening to them cry because they don't want to leave the trunk or treat and that they need to hold their pumpkin full of sugar on the car ride home, try to figure out where they got the candy that they are eating on the ride home since I am holding their pumpkins with the candy, tell them they cannot sleep with their pumpkins even though they promise not to eat all the candy, and then listen to them cry themselves to sleep. At which point I am hoping that some really really nice person has decided to go all out this Halloween and hand out full size candy bars which I will then quietly take out of my kids pumpkins and enjoy eating as payment from them for participating in this beloved holiday. Is there such a thing as bah humbug for Halloween?

My heart is racing and my palms are sweaty and we still have just under two months before it happens. In 53 days I will be boarding a plane. The anxiety may just kill me but it is going to happen. Originally we were going to rent a car and drive to Texas for Christmas because flights were too expensive. Jared was able to find some cheap flights that made it the same cost as driving. I am not sure how to explain that spending two days and 25 hours driving with my 4 kids in a car will cause me less stress than a 3 hour plane ride but it does. I have somehow managed to avoid having to fly since Oct. of 2005 and I think that it has probably made it worse. Jared has promised to medicate me. Although he did say he would give me enough to just take the edge off so that he does not have to try and get 4 kids and a doped up wife on and off the plane, I am pretty sure he can take whatever he thinks will take the edge off and double it. The last time I was medicated while flying I was given a Xanex. The dentist I worked for wrote me and Rx for some. I don't' remember the dosing on it and for that matter I really don't remember anything that happened after I swallowed the pill. All I know is that I somehow got on the plane in Salt Lake, got off the plane in LAX, boarded another flight to Hawaii, and woke up to the flight attendants telling everyone how to say hello and thank you in Hawaii. I think I'll take another one of those please and thank you.

Election and Lazy People

So the other day I was watching fox news (the only news station I can handle until Nov. 5) and they showed some clip of Obama. Ethan starts asking about him who he is and what is he doing. So I start to tell him and realize there is no easy way to sum the whole thing up into an answer a 6 year old can understand. I tell him he is running for president. Then we proceeded to have the following conversation

Ethan: Are we going to vote for him?
Me: No
Ethan: Who are we voting for?
Me: McCain
Ethan: Why?
Me: because we agree with his ideas more than Obama
Ethan: What does Obama want to do?
Me: take more of our money away from us
Ethan: What is he going to do with our money because if they really need money I can give them mine.
Me: No you are not giving your money to the government. Obama wants to give our money to other people.
Ethan: Why, because they don't have any?

At this point I was starting to get frustrated since I wasn't even really sure what to tell him since it is hard enough for me to understand let alone explain it and what can you really tell a 6 year old. So in my "I need to get out the door to get to my parents house and I am in a hurry" frame of mind this is what I told him and I am pretty sure it is going to get me in trouble somewhere along the way.

Me: Obama wants to take the money that daddy earns by going to work and give it to the lazy people who don't want to work and earn their own money.

Crap! Did I just tell my 6 year old that? The kid that will repeat anything you say to anyone at anytime and has the longest memory of anyone I know? Yes I did and in the time it took us to drive to my parents Ethan had Landon and Mackenzie chanting McCain win, Obama lose, and when he walked through the door told my mom that she need to vote for McCain because Obama wants to give all our money to the lazy people. Nice. The only good thing about it is that it is hysterically funny to listen to Landon try and say the name Barack Obama.

Well, I finally got all my pictures off my camera. Either my computer or my memory card is not working. I had all these pictures on there and they would not load on the computer. I thought I was going to have to hunt down the USB cable that is somewhere in this house to get the pictures off. I thought I would give the card one more try and wallah it worked and I got all my pictures off. So I thought I would take one more picture and see if it worked again. Unfortunately it did not so I will be unable to post the picture of all my Tai Pan treasures which I am sure disappoints so many of you. We will be getting a new camera, a way better camera and a new computer in the next few weeks so hopefully nothing exciting happens that I need to take pictures of. Scratch that Halloween is in a week so jared now has a tighter deadline and for those that know him well decisions take him longer than anyone I have ever known so today I will become the nag until it gets done. Moving on though......

Mackenzie had a bike parade at school to end their transportation unit. It is very funny to watch this parade. You have the kids that zoom past with no problem, then you have the kids that are a little shaky and you hope they don't fall off and you are nervous for them, and then you have the kids who are really not sure about the flow of bike traffic and end up somewhere they shouldn't. Anyway, it was very cute and mackenzie was very excited to take her scooter to school

Of course Fat Boy was there and having a good time as well.

Later in the month we took the kids to the pumpkin patch. They have this great pumpkin patch about 5 min. from our house. It is a family that turns their small farm into this fall setting with pumpkins everywhere and corn maze. They have the cheapest pumpkins around. We loaded all our pumpkins into the little wagon and then took them up to the front. I think we had about 9 or so pumpkins in all different sizes. She counts up the pumpkins and says let's say $20. I love that pumpkin patch. It's close, cheap, and very cute for pictures.

Amazingly enough we actually got a shot of all the kids together with everyone looking in somewhat of the same direction and no one is crying.

Like I said before, on Mon. I headed down to Tai Pan. They told us that all Halloween stuff was 50% off. So my mom and I loaded up on stuff and then checked out. For some reason the registers were not ringing up all the Halloween stuff at 50% off. The lady ringing me up said I will just have to input it manually. No problem. She tells me my total is $98. What? I have never left that store spending that little. I thought it must be that some stuff was half off. We drive home and my mom left her receipt in my car. I start looking at it and think why is her total more than mine I actually got more items than her. So I lay out all the stuff I got and start adding up. My total should have been much higher. I look at my receipt and start to look at what they charged me for the items. When I was watching her scan the stuff all the totals were coming up right. The very last thing she scanned was something Halloween and she had to manually give me the 50% off. Well in doing so she gave me 50% off all but 3 or 4 things. I kind of felt bad about it but realized that they had forgotten to put 2 mugs I bought into my bag. So I didn't get 2 of the .97 cent mugs I paid for but I think I got way more in return.

Happy Birthday to You!

You know who you are.

The one who mends all our clothes and sews many things when visiting.

The one who will always tell us to go have a night out without the kids when here.

The one who has more patience than should be humanly possible.

The one who makes really really good Mody Rolls.

The one who will stay up really late after kids have gone to bed to talk to us.

The one who lets my kids be kids and play in the dirt, put together hay rides for them, build blocks with them, and takes them on tons of walks.

The one who keeps telling us we are doing a great job as parents even after witnessing a major meltdown from one of our kids followed by a meltdown from me.

The one who is always willing to help in anyway and who thinks that there is nothing better in the world than having all of her kids, their spouses, and all her grandchildren together.

Landon says: He really likes it when you come over

Ethan says: Loves to go on walks or bike rides with you

Mackenzie: Likes when you color with her

So here is a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the one we all love very much.

Jared and Mom (June 2007)

Happy Birthday Mom/Grandma Simpson!!!

Whew!!!!

Well I am down to less than 24 hours. Jared gets home tomorrow night. All I need to do is make it through church tomorrow and my mom is making dinner and having me and kids over so I am not by myself the whole day. I have to say I am pretty impressed with myself. I am still somewhat sane and will require no medicating to recover from the past few days. Jared has been in San Antonio since Wed. for the dental convention. I was a little jealous he got to go back and eat at some of my favorite places Rudy's, Gringo's Chris Madrids to name a few (although knowing jared he didn't eat at all of them in order to save a few bucks), he got to see his sister Teresa who is a hygienist and was getting some of her own CE credits, and he got to walk the exhibit hall floor which is usually full of all kinds of good free stuff. We are all very excited for him to return. Tomorrow I will get a nice 2 hour break from my kids during primary. I don't like to think of my kids primary teachers as babysitters but for tomorrow that is what they will seem like. I did get lots done while jared was gone since after the kids go to bed there is no one else to worry about so I just start cleaning and organizing. The very best part (besides jared getting home safely) is that early Monday morning (like 6 am) my mom and I are headed down to TAI PAN TRADING!!! That's right, it opens on Mon. and I will be there with money in hand. Jared happens to have monday off so he is going to shuffle the kids around and hopefully finish my attic while they are at school so I can put any of my seasonal Tai Pan treasures in my new attic. Happy shopping to me!!!!

Mother of the Year

Maybe I should try this next time. If I saw someone do this I would probably give them a standing ovation.

I don't think it is safe for me to be out anymore. This morning I left my house at 9:30 am picked up cookies for a lady I visit teach, went visiting teaching. So far so good. Went to pick up Landon and then it all went down hill. I then proceeded to drag three of my kids all over Bakersfield looking for unfinished wood frames and sheet metal in order to make a magnet board that I am convinced will help my kitchen become more organized. We walk in the door and my mom shows up with my aunt and uncle from utah. They were just driving around looking at houses and thought they would stop by. Oh and this morning when I left my house it looked extremely frightening and for someone reason the cleaning fairy did not show up for work today while I was out. So I then proceed to show them my house all the while repeating how I knew I should have picked up my house before I left today. Although they kept saying they didn't care and that they wouldn't expect anything else for someone who has 4 kids. After they leave I try to get Ethan's and Landon's homework done. Then I load my kids up and head to the grocery store with all of them to get salad to take to my mom's for dinner. On the way there while asking or yelling insert which ever one you like at my kids to lower the volume, I stop at a red light and then proceed to go through it. Stop half way through the intersection think to my self why am I in the middle of the intersection and then make my way through it to the tune of many honking horns. Get to the store and wonder if I should be driving anymore, repeat all rules that need to be said before entering the store, grab a cart and enter the 9th circle of hell. My cart won't steer the way I want it to go, I almost run over a few toes of strangers, Landon knocks bunches of lettuce onto the floor and then ethan announces it to me and the rest of the produce section, mackenzie is crying because she wants to not be walking, have a cookie, get gum out of my purse, and then not be in the cart. We leave the store with only a few minor glares and I am sure a few comments of "doesn't she know what causes pregnancy". So now it is late, I am off to bed and hopefully off to a better tomorrow.

The longest day

I do have to say that there are some great perks about conference.
1. I do not have to get up and run around crazy in order to get me and my kids ready to go.
2. I do not have to hurry and try and get my house picked up before we leave so that when I get home from church I can just relax instead of cleaning up things.
3. I do not have to get ready and try to find something that will fit these days.
4. I do not have to worry about how we are going to make it through sacrament without any meltdowns.
5. I will usually make a big breakfast of Swedish pancakes, eggs ,bacon and OJ and will be able to eat some of it myself.
6. I get to hear some talks that I am pretty sure were written just for me in order to make me a better person.
7. Jared has no meetings and no visits to make so he is home!!


Now let me dive into why every conference I scratch my head and think why do I even bother I should just read the talks in the ensign when they come out in peace and quiet while my kids are at school.
1. My kids are home with us all day inside (they got in trouble and couldn't go outside, why do I punish myself like that)
2. My kids will not listen to any part of conference. No game, bribe or distraction would work.
3. Landon informed me that BYU (we were watching it on the BYU channel) is the most boring thing and he never wanted to go there. This was actually the funniest part of my long day.
4. We spent more time trying to get the kids to at least be quiet so we could hear than we actually got to hear.
5. My kids would not play in their rooms yesterday.
6. Jared and I were both in bad moods because our kids were driving us crazy.
7. Jared told the kids that next time we are going to the church to watch conference. At which point I told him I am not going to go to the church to embarrass myself with the way the kids act.
8. It was honestly the longest day I have had in a long time.

We have a new rule in our house. Whatever time you get up in the morning is what time you go to bed. My kids are constantly getting up beyond early. Ethan sometimes 5 or 5:30 and then he proceeds to wake everyone else up. He told me the other day he was going to sleep til 11 and then I would have to let him stay up til 11. I said okay that's a deal. The kid couldn't stay in bed if his life depended on it.
So Sat. morning they got up at 6. Since jared was at priesthood on Sat. night I took the kids to that park so they did get out of going to bed at six that night. So Sun. morning they get up around 6 again. Well they were so horrible yesterday with all the fits, and meltdowns I told them they all had to be in bed at 5 pm. Yes 5 pm. So we ate dinner at 4 and they were all in their beds at 5. Jared read to them for a little bit. Landon was asleep for the night by 5:30. Mackenzie was asleep by 6 and Ethan read in his room until he fell asleep. All was pretty quiet until I hear the sound of water on the floor. Then ethan saying why are you doing that. I go in the back and there is landon half asleep standing with his back to the toilet peeing all over my floor. Really? I thought I was done with this stuff for the day but once again my kids made a liar out of me.

Soccer, Dance and Fatty

I am finally getting around to posting these pictures. This year we have the boys playing soccer and mackenzie doing dance. FYI this will be the last year I do soccer. It is hot and such a pain to lug my chunk of a baby (17 lbs at 3 1/2 months), make sure mackenzie is still following behind me, plus take all of the other stuff chairs, snacks, etc. all over the fields at Cal state where they play soccer. I really want to sign the boys up for swim club but if is a little more expensive so we will have to work on that to convince jared. Landon is loving soccer and Ethan likes it when he makes a goal and thoroughly enjoys the snacks and treats that come along during halftime and at the end of the game. If eating were a sport ethan could medal in it. I have only taken pictures during their first games. Jared and I haven't been at a game together since the first one so it is too hard to take pictures when you don't have an extra set of hands to help with other kids. Thankfully my parents have been here to help with going to games when the boys games overlap and to take the two younger ones when I am by myself. So a very big thank you to them.

Then we have the princess. She really loves dance. She listens to the teacher pretty well and follows what they are doing. I am hoping she did not inherit my sense of rhythm. I only have rhythm in my hands while I am playing the piano. This rhythm does not extend to my feet. So far so good for her though. They don't let parents in the class (except on the first day when I didn't bring my camera). You watch the class on a TV. At first I thought it was a little weird but after seeing that some of the girls stand by the door waiting for their parents the first few times I figured out why they do it that way. According to Mackenzie she thinks it is "awesome" she is on TV.

Then there is fatty, chubabubba, chunky monkey, fat ash, buddha baby, or chunk. These are a few of the names we use for ashton. Honestly the kid is so heavy. I have always had chunky babies but he wins the prize. I now have to put cream in between his rolls. His cousin sent him a bumbo chair a few weeks ago. His fat little legs barely fit in the openings. When you go to pick him up out of the chair, the chair comes with him. I know he will work it all off when he starts to get mobile and then I will miss his chunky little legs and cheeks. I am hoping that he starts to sit up better really soon otherwise I am going to need some surgery on my back to repair it from lifting and carrying the infant seat with him in it. He is still a very happy easy-going baby and for that I am very grateful.