The Story Behind Our Fireplace

Our fireplace got done a couple of weeks ago! We LOVE how it turned out!! Don't worry, that isn't the carpet you see on the floor in front of it. That's the carpet PAD. I have better taste in carpet than that. haha ;)

There's a little story embedded in part of the design of it ... it has to do with how David and I met. Some of you already know this story, but for those of you that don't - here's a little background on how we met.

About 7 1/2 years ago, I was engaged to someone else. I moved into an apartment in Orem - the apartment my soon to be husband and I would live in together after we got married. I ended up breaking off the engagement, but stayed living in the apartment since I had already signed a contract.

The Bishop of the family ward there came and knocked on my door one day to meet me. I gave him the 411 on my situation while he was there. He asked me if I would like the info for attending the singles ward in the area. I said, "NO WAY!!!!" Ok, I didn't say it in those words, but I did tell him that I had no interest in meeting anybody at the moment AT ALL and that I just wanted to attend the family ward for a while.

That Sunday I went to church. Then I came home. Shortly after, there was a knock on my door. It was my future husband with a plate full of the nastiest chocolate chip cookies I had ever eaten in my life. No, seriously. At least I knew he actually made them himself though - that was sweet! He said the bishop had sent him over to welcome me to the ward.

I was a little confused. I knew I had told the bishop that I didn't want to meet anybody, so there was no way he would send a guy to my apartment for that purpose. So I asked him, "are you my home teacher?". He said, "no." He was kind of being subtly flirty in a look-at-me-I'm-trying-to-make-you-think-I'm-a-cool-guy sort of way. I was REALLY confused. He had come from the family ward so he wouldn't be single - would he? What young, single guy would attend a family ward? I'm sure my confusion showed on my face. I just had to ask this next question ...

"Are you married??"

He laughed and said, "no."

Hey, you never know - right? Just covering all my bases.

So, I accepted the cookies and said, "thanks." They were on a glass plate and he informed me that he had taped his name and number on the bottom of it, so I could return the plate when I was done with it.

A few days later I called to return the plate. He asked me if I wanted to go out for some ice cream. I accepted. We went out. We saw each other everyday after that. We were engaged 3 months from our first date. We were married 3 months after that.

Funny how things work out sometimes. :)

Now, to tell you the story from David's perspective ...

David's dad came home from some church meetings that Sunday and informed David that the Bishop said there was a new single girl in the ward. In the bishop's words, he described me as "tall, dark haired, and beautiful".

He said it, not me.

So, David looked around for me in Sacrament meeting, but didn't find me. During priesthood, the Bishop pulled his son and David out into the hallway to talk to them. He asked, "did you see her?" They hadn't.

So, the Bishop walked them over to the Relief Society room. He pointed me out and said, "there she is, 3rd row from the back on the far left. Go make her feel welcome." David quickly called dibs and went home to start making me some cookies.

He had it all planned out. His mom tried to put the cookies on a paper plate, but David wouldn't have it. He wanted to put them on a glass plate, so I would HAVE to call him to return the plate. Giving him an opportunity to then ask me out.

Pretty smart plan! It obviously worked quite well. :)

We displayed the cookie plate at our wedding reception.



So, back to the fireplace.

David's dad had an AWESOME idea. He made a little mini plate to put on the center of the fireplace. How cool is that?!! He also took some of the scrap pencil molding that was left over from something else on the house and he made the 2 rectangles that are on the sides of the plate.

WE LOVE IT!!!

Growing Stronger

I'm still behind on blogging, but I needed to write this post today. Don't worry though, I'll still go back and tell you all about the last few weeks a little later. :)

Well, today was our last Sunday attending church with the Rock Creek Ward. This morning when we were getting ready, David asked me if I felt sad about it. I thought about it for a second and said, "I think I'm ok."

Well, I was wrong.

All through Sacrament meeting I would occasionally tear up. I held it all together during Sunday School. And then Relief Society ... wow. I almost had to leave a few times cause I thought I was going to totally break down. Somehow I managed to keep it all under control, though (barely) ... that is until I hugged a couple people in the hallway afterwards and then I lost it. I got out of the building as quickly as possible after that. David had to wrangle the kids to the car on his own, cause I didn't want to stick around and have everybody see me bawling my way out to the car. I HATE crying in front of people. I'm such an ugly crier. It's like I transform into the Hulk or something the second the tears start uncontrollably coming on. (sad Hulk, not angry Hulk) Ya, not pretty. I'm almost unrecognizable.

Honestly, I was really surprised that I was so emotional about it.

This will be our 3rd move since we've been married. We've lived here the longest ... Place #1 - 1 1/2 yrs. Place #2 - 8 months. Place #3 (here) - almost 5 years.

I never cried the first 2 times we moved. Obviously, we've lived here a lot longer than anywhere else, but I don't think that's why I feel so emotional about leaving.

We've had a lot of ups and downs in our 5 years of living here - personally and spiritually. Well, I guess I should speak for myself here ... I'VE had a lot of ups and downs here - personally and spiritually. There was a period of time (a LONG period of time) while we lived here that I would complain to David almost daily about how much I hated it here. I would complain that I couldn't wait to get out of here ... PLEASE PLEASE get me out of here. David was searching for a different job at one point and he was one of the top 2 people in the running for a job in Seattle, Washington. I wanted him to get it SOOOOO bad. I was CERTAIN he would get it. I would look on the internet almost daily looking at housing out there, because I was so sure he was going to get it and that's where we were supposed to be. My best friend since middle school lives out there and it was just SO PERFECT. How could it not be the answer to my prayers?

He didn't get it.

I was heart broken.

At the first two places we lived at, we had friends. It seemed effortless. Friends just seemed to happen. It was GREAT. We always had someone to talk to. We almost always hung out with friends on the weekends. It wasn't just a superficial, "hi, how are you?" 678+ times over and over again as I happened to see my neighbor getting into their car at the same time as me or as I passed by them in the hallway at church. We really had FRIENDS.

When we were looking at moving here, it felt RIGHT. We prayed about it and it felt RIGHT.

Over the years of living here, I couldn't figure out "why??". If this was the place Heavenly Father wanted us to be, WHY was I so miserable? WHY did I feel so ALONE?

Making friends was NOT easy and effortless here. People were friend-LY (for the most part), but I didn't feel like we really had FRIENDS. It felt like everybody in the neighborhood, except me, had their close group of a few people they were really close to - ya know, the people that they spend time with BESIDES just at our kids' birthday parties and other 'invite half the neighborhood' kind of get-togethers. Why did everybody have their special friends, but me?

I can't count how many nights I cried my eyes out to David asking him, "what's wrong with me?" "why don't I have friends - REAL friends?" "I've never had a problem with people liking me before - what's changed?" "I feel so alone.".

I think I discovered today why Heavenly Father brought us to this neighborhood. Looking back on it, I figured it was for me to GROW through my struggles - but, I didn't really understand what I had GAINED through this experience ... until today.

Sister Deroche taught the lesson in Relief Society today. Throughout the lesson, she brought up the same question several times.

"What has He done for you?"
"What has HE done for YOU?"

All of a sudden all the pieces to the puzzle inside my head had FINALLY come together.

HE was my FRIEND. All the prayers I sent up there begging for comfort, begging to not feel alone, begging for a friend ... HE was my FRIEND. HE comforted me. HE made me feel like I wasn't totally alone. HE was there. And when I ungratefully, without words, said that friendship wasn't enough - HE would graciously send me a friend.

Leslee, you don't know this, but I can't count how many times your text messages saying 'it's been a while, we need to get together' or something similar to that, came EXACTLY when I needed them to.
(And as a side note - it's a good thing you were never my visiting teacher, cause I know I probably would have thought you were just 'doing your job' when those text messages came if you were. haha) I know I'm not your closest friend in the neighborhood, but you were mine. THANK YOU! And no, this is not me saying goodbye - I still plan on being friends. :)

I was supposed to live here so I could grow closer to my Heavenly Father. So I could KNOW that he's really there and that he REALLY cares about me. So I could know that I'm never alone, no matter how much I may feel like I am. So I could gain a stronger testimony of the power of prayer.

I'm grateful for our last almost 5 years here and for the experiences that have helped me grow and to become the person I am today.

In Sunday School, Sister Randall talked about how trees living right next to a stream have shallow roots. The water is right there and they always get plenty of it, so their roots aren't as deep and strong because they have no need to grow deep and strong. On the other hand, the trees that aren't right next to the stream have deeper stronger roots - even though they had to get those roots by digging down deep through the hard, rocky soil. They are stronger because they don't have the water so easily right next to them. They are stronger because of their struggles. (I probably kind of butchered her awesome analogy, but hopefully you get the point)

I've still got a lot of root growing to do, but I've gained a few deep strong roots through our experiences here over the last 5 years. While I don't hope to have these same struggles once we move, I'm grateful for what I've gained through it all.

I'm SO EXCITED to be opening up a new chapter of our lives. As strange as it probably sounds after all I just wrote, I honestly WILL miss it here. I'll miss all of your faces and saying "hello" to all of you at church, even though we never became super close friends.

Goodbye, Plum Creek! If all goes according to plan, we will be moving the first week of April.

P.S. I need to go to the temple. It's been a while.

Haircuts

I took the girls to get their hair cut a few weeks ago (yes, I'm really behind on blogging. This is the first of several posts to come over the next day or so), and their cuts turned out so cute! Allyson had been begging me forever to let her cut her hair "short just like Elastogirl's hair from The Incredibles". At first I didn't really think that's what she wanted, because previous to this she would tell me all the time that she wanted her hair "long just like Repunzel's hair" (which it wasn't quite THAT long, but her hair was reaching to just above her behind ... so it was getting pretty dang long).

I thought that when we got there that she would back out and decide she wanted to keep her hair long, but she didn't! She was SO excited to get it done. I was worried that when they were all done cutting it that she would ask for her hair to be long again - but she didn't! She loved it, still loves it, and I love it too. It's such a cute cut on her and it's so much easier to manage when it comes to washing it and brushing it.

Katelyn was in need of a haircut, too. This was the first time she's had it cut since way back when Allyson did a hack job on it a couple years ago with the scizzors at home.

Here's a pic of the hack job. She's still so stinking cute - even with a terrible haircut. And I can't believe how much she's grown since then!



Her hair needed to be evened out. Although her haircut isn't as drastic of a change as Allyson's, it's still super cute, looks so much better now that it's all even at the bottom, and she loved getting it done.








These are some pics I took at home after I styled their hair myself on a different day.

"A Place For Everything, And Everything In It's Place"

The title for this post was Allyson's class saying at school one month. I thought it was pretty fitting.

David and his dad have been working around the clock building shelving in the closets at our new house (in fact, they're there working on it right now and it's 10:47pm)... (correction - 12:30am now)... (correction - David just walked in the door and it's 1:21am). David's dad goes and works on it during the day (David sometimes does when he can/needs to, also). Then David heads over after work and they both stay there working til late. He frequently doesn't get home til after midnight (tonight would be one of those nights).


It. Looks. AMAZING!!!! They've done an awesome job. I was able to go down and help on a few different days. I learned a lot and I even cut some boards on the table saw myself! Ya, I felt pretty cool. Mostly I just passed tools and went and got things that were needed. It was pretty much the same as my job I had for 5 1/2 years before I had kids (dental assisting), except I was passing MUCH bigger instruments this time, lol.

I'm SO excited about how it's all turned out! I took pictures for this blog post before a couple of the closets were finished because I couldn't wait to share how awesome it all looks - but don't worry, I labeled the stuff that's missing in the pictures, so you can get an idea of what it will be like when it's done. :)

One thing I've struggled with a lot in our current house is not having an organized place to put everything. I'll go to grab one thing out of a closet and everything else that's in there comes tumbling down. I REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted to have shelving and things already in place in our new house, cause I knew we would likely never go back and put it all in later. Thankfully, David's dad offered to help in that department and has saved us THOUSANDS of dollars - no question.

Here's some pics of our new closets ...

The office closet



There's one more shelf up high that you can't see in that picture.

The coat closet



The mud room closet



The pantry (my second favorite closet in the house)



The cubbies on the left and right side are for cook books and small items that usually get lost behind all the bigger stuff ... and anything else I want to put there. :)

The guest room closet



The hall linen closet



The laundry room



Kyler's closet



Allyson and Katelyn's closet



The master bath linen closet



David's closet



My closet (My most favorite closet)



David's dad is putting lids on the hampers too, so when they're closed we can sit on them to put our shoes on or whatever. (and it looks nicer that way, too)

I'm THRILLED with how all the closets turned out!!! I can't wait to feel organized again (I felt organized once upon a time before we had kids and accumulated all of the stuff that comes along with having kids).

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU Keith and David for all the time, hard work, late nights, bloody fingers, dirty clothes, muddy shoes, port a potty bathroom trips, and nights sacrificed away from your families to accomplish all of this. It's VERY appreciated and I LOVE IT!!

The only places in our house that won't be super organized right away are the craft/sewing room and the garage. The craft/sewing room is a small room that doesn't have a closet. I found some cool ideas on pinterest for some ways of organizing a room like that ...




It'll probably be a while before I get around to doing anything like that, though. I have some decorating I want to do before I tackle that. :)
The craft room and the garage are both places that can easily be organized later on down the road without completely turning our house upside down to do it.

Things are moving quickly now! All of the hard floors are in, the painter is supposed to start painting tomorrow (he'll take about 2 weeks), then cabinets and counters will go in, and all of the fixtures after that. We'll probably be moving in around the end of March. We're so excited!! It's definitely a very bitter/sweet transition, though. We will miss you Plum Creek/Rock Creekers!

Our Anniversary Get Away

We just celebrated our 7th anniversary on February 11th!! It's hard to believe it's been that many years ... And then I look at our engagement picture hanging on the wall. Yep! It's definitely been 7 years!

Do you recognize us? haha ;)



Ahhh, to be young and 21 again. That would be nice. (22 for David)


David surprised me with an AWESOME get away for our anniversary 2 weekends ago. He arranged to have his parents watch the kids (thanks Keith and LaVerne!). And then we went out for what I thought was just going to be dinner and a movie.

We drove up to Sundance and ate at the Foundry Grill. (I had no idea that's where we were going to be eating at.)



I spent about 1 1/2 hours doing my hair. It looks kind of Napoleon Dynomitish in this picture - like I'm about to go around selling glamour shots. But it really did look pretty awesome in person (you'll just have to take my word for it). Usually when I actually try to make my hair look pretty and fancy, I spend FOR.EV.ER. doing it and then end up hating it and wetting it down and blow drying it straight or round brushing it - ya know, the way you see me wearing it just about everyday (unless I'm wearing a hat). I was pretty happy that it worked out this time. :) I'm not very talented in the hair dressing department. I feel bad for my 2 daughters who have to have me do their hair everyday. Sorry girls!!

So, we're at the Foundry Grill and David insists we order an appetizer, and soup, then some of the most expensive things on the menu for our main course, and then dessert - 2 different desserts, actually. And it's definitely NOT cheap to eat at the Foundry Grill for dinner. I assumed he had something up his sleeve, cause he knows I would NEVER be ok with spending that much money on one meal.

When the waitress brought us our check at the end of our meal, it was $114!! David then pulled out a voucher that gave us our whole meal for FREE! Long story short, it's a work perk. Awesome. :)
We did pay the tip ourselves - so I guess it wasn't totally free. Not too bad, though!

These were our main courses. I totally spaced taking pictures of the appetizer, soup and desserts. (By the way, all of the pictures in this post are going to be pretty low quality. We only had a camera phone to take pictures with up there.)




When we were sitting in the restaurant, David handed me a gift with a card. I opened the card and this is what was inside ...



Yep. Sitting inside the most expensive restaurant I've ever eaten at and there I am holding that card.

Just call us Mr. and Mrs. Classy!

Thanks, David. I will cherish it forever?? LOL

When I opened it up, this is what it REALLY said ...



Awwwwwwww.

Skip ahead a little bit for a minute ... A couple days later we're in the car with the kids driving somewhere. We hadn't unloaded everything out of the car from Sundance yet, and Allyson (our 5 year old) decides to start pulling stuff out of the bag that's sitting right next to her seat (we were unaware that she was doing this). David and I were in the middle of talking up front, when Allyson calls out, "Mommy? Why does this card say 'Wow boobs'?" I quickly and calmly responded and said, "that's not what it says sweety, you need to open it up all the way to see what it says." So she opened it up. Then we hear her say,"Ohhhh, I see."

... the down side of having a literate child. haha ;)

Back to Sundance ... So, we leave the restaurant to go back to the car. David then unveils surprise #2. He opens up the back of the van and I see a big blanket covering something. He pulls back the blanket and it's a bunch of bags packed with all the stuff we need to stay the night somewhere. He then tells me that we're staying the night up at Sundance and we get to go skiing that night and all day the next day!!! (And all of it for FREE!)

I was so excited!! Before David got promoted at work a couple years ago, he used to sell seats to Seminars his work would hold up at Sundance. We used to get free nights stays up at Sundance pretty frequently - a perk of the job he did. Since he stopped working in that role, we don't get free stays up there anymore. So, for him to get hooked up with all of this for our anniversary was a pretty awesome surprise!!

We then drove up to our room, unloaded our stuff and went night skiing.

Here's some pics of our room.

The bathroom.



The bedroom.


The kitchen.


The living room.


The deck. (didn't spend much time out there for obvious reasons. haha)


We had a blast night skiing. It was pretty icy, but it was the first time we had gone skiing in 2 years, so we were just happy to be there! (I was pregnant last ski season)

After skiing we went back to our room and had a nice night talking and drinking hot chocolate. Then we fell asleep by the fire. Sooooo nice.

We got out early the next day and ate breakfast, then hit the slopes again. The snow was much nicer that day. It was icy in a few spots, but for the most part it was just fine.



We saw a celebrity!! Remember this lady?



It's Milla Jovovich. She was one of the main characters in "The 5th Element". That's the only movie I've ever seen her in, but we saw her in a preview for a new movie the very next day after we saw her up at Sundance. It's one of the previews on the "Breaking Dawn - Part 1" blueray. We didn't get a picture of her, though. We looked at her and smiled and she noticed we recognized her, but that was about the extent of it. If it was someone that I was a HUGE fan of, I MIGHT have asked for one teeny tiny picture ... MAYBE. I would feel really awkward asking for it, though and I would feel really bad that I was disturbing their personal time.

For lunch we got our favorite thing to eat up at Sundance ...



Frito Pie and Pulled Pork Sanwiches with coleslaw on them. Yummmmmm. :)

Oh ... and hot chocolate.


We ate at the place at the top of the back mountain. There was an INCREDIBLE view from where we were sitting ... that could only be ruined by one thing.

THIS!!!!


THIS COUPLE WOULD NOT STOP MAKING OUT!!! And I'm NOT exaggerating. We were there for probably about 40 minutes and they would make out forever and then stop and hug for a minute and then go right back to making out again!

Aside from ruining my view, they almost made me upchuck my favorite meal. Somehow I managed to keep it all down, though.

I can't remember if I was SURPRISED they didn't fall down the mountain in a passionate, lustful rage or if I was HOPING they would fall down the mountain. One of the two.

Just kidding.

I may or may not have been hoping that a cold, wet snowball would hit them in the face, though. Which I would NEVER have thrown myself. BUT, if I had happened to be standing witness at the exact moment someone had decided to throw a cold, wet snowball at them, I may or may not have stood happily watching. And if I had been standing close enough to block this snowball of my dreams from hitting them, I may or may not have just stood there and let it hit them.

Not admitting to anything. Just sayin'. ;)

The couple FINALLY left at right about the same time we were done eating (go figure). So we stood outside for a few minutes and enjoyed our untainted view.



GORGEOUS!!!

We had so much fun up at Sundance. We eventually had to return to real life and pick up our children from Grandma and Grandpa's house. We argued on the way there about who gets to see/hold our cute, squishy little boy first ... (I won, hehe) ;).

After we picked up the kids, we went and bought "Breaking Dawn - Part 1" (since it came out on blueray that day) and watched it that night after the kids went to bed.

I have to say, it was definitely the best anniversary we've had yet!!

I love you, David. :)

Procrastination

We were told at the end of last week that if everything goes smoothly our house could be done in about 4 1/2 weeks. I'm sure it won't go QUITE that smoothly, but I'd say between 5-6 weeks could definitely be a possibility. As excited as I am about moving into our new house, my excitement is a little tainted by 2 very big things:

1. Packing
2. Renting out our current home

Ew to both.

I hate packing with a passion. I know something good is at the other end of the tunnel, but it doesn't make it any more fun to do. Anytime we're supposed to pack for a trip, I procrastinate doing it WAAAAY too long. To a point where we find ourselves packing til the wee hours of the morning, and I usually end up deciding to just stay up and not go to sleep. Usually by the time I'm done, I'd only get about an hour or two of sleep anyway and I know I won't want to wake up when the time comes. It just seems more logical to me to stay awake so I won't have to deal with trying to waking up.

Yep, I hate packing .....
and waking up in the morning.

We haven't started boxing anything up yet in preparation for our move ... well, David did pack 2 boxes of stuff in the garage when he cleaned it all out a couple weekends ago. I guess that's something, right?

We're in crunch time now.

-We still need to pack.
-We still need to rent our place.
-We still need to finish building all the shelving in the closets at the house (which is looking AWESOME, by the way. I will do a post with pics of the closets when they're all done. I'm SO excited to have organized closets. David's dad, David, and I have been working on it for about a week now and should hopefully finish up this weekend. - mostly David and his Dad have been the ones working on it, though. It's hard for me to get down there to help as often as I'd like when I have 3 kids to look after.
-We still need to pick some things out for the house ... like paint, for example. We were told today we needed to pick colors by the end of this week. We haven't even gone and looked at paint swatches at all yet. YIKES!! That's a scary thing to make a rushed decision on! It's hard to get out and pick things for the house, because almost every company that sells stuff for a house is open 8-5 (maybe 8-6) on weekdays. Most are closed on Saturdays, but some are open by appointment only on Saturday mornings. So, we usually have to drag our kids along with us (NOT FUN) and David has been taking A LOT of time off of work during the day to get things done (not good).

There's always a never-ending list of things that need to be done each day. I know it will all get done and work out in the end, somehow. But, the process of getting there is a bit overwhelming.

I can feel myself going into shut down mode. I do that when I have too many things going on at once and accomplishing it all seems impossible.
Not.Good.
My house cleaning schedule has been slipping these last few weeks. I've still been cleaning, but I haven't been accomplishing even close to what I'm supposed to each week. Don't even ask me about our timeliness to church on Sundays ...

It's time to get recommitted. WHY is that such a hard thing to do??

I'm thinking that until we move, my 1 week cleaning schedule needs to be spread out into a 2 week cleaning schedule. I just don't have the time to keep up on it the way I'd like to right now.

Somehow, we need to manage to get to bed earlier, so waking up and being on time to places isn't such an impossible task.

I somehow need to figure out a way to organize our "to-do's" so they all get done in the time frame they need to get done in. Not sure how I'm going to do that one. I guess finding somewhere to start would be a good first step?

Anyway, just needed to get some thoughts out ........... and procrastinate the inevitable a little longer too, I guess. ;)

Cereal Bowl Divination (for all you Harry Potter fans)

As I was about to rinse out the cereal bowls from this morning's breakfast, I noticed this ...



Only those blessed with "the gift" will be able to see what I'm talking about. For all the rest of you, I'll explain.

Inside this bowl is more than just some old milk and left over floaties from Allyson's Frosted Mini Wheats she ate this morning. There is a prophecy! Do you see how the dried up cluster on the side of the bowl forms the shape of a person? It's head is on top, with it's arms outstretched. One leg is lifted, while the other one is straight behind (like it's leaping over the milk).

Now, to decipher the message ...

It could mean I'm about to face a huge obstacle that I will be forced to overcome (hence why the person is leaping over the milk).

Or, the milk could resemble the ocean. Which would mean I'll soon go on a sunny vacation to the beach and I will jump up for joy when I get there.

Or, it could be .......................... THE GRIMM!!!!!!

I think I'll take option #2.

For all you tweeters out there, I don't personally have a twitter account, but I picked up on a little twitter lingo through facebook. So if you're having difficulty understanding, here's some of the Twitterish language for you ...

#isometimeshaverandomgeekythoughts

#pleasedontunfriendme

#ipromiseiweardeoderant

You get it now, right?

The Tale of the Half Naked Lady (Rated G)

Once upon a time there was a lady and her mom. They both were in need of burning all the clothes in their closets and buying new wardrobes. So they decided to go shopping together.

They decided to meet up on a Saturday at 10:00 am. They both arrived at the meeting place at the same exact time ... almost an hour late. Which would make them genetically related and perfectly on time. ;)

They shopped and shopped and went from store to store. They talked and laughed and had a wonderful time together.

Now, this is a fairytale (which happens to be true) so something terrible has to happen ...

As they went along their merry way, they happened upon a store that was waaaay DOWN deep in the forest and as far EAST as their car could drive. We'll call this store "Down East".

The store was full of Saturday shoppers looking for clothing, just like them. The lady and her mom found armfuls of clothing they wanted to try on. As luck would have it, they made it to the dressing rooms just in time ... cause as the clock struck fairytale midnight, all of the other Saturday shoppers flocked to the dressing rooms causing a big, backed-up line. But no worries, the lady and her mom were safe inside their rooms happily trying on clothes before the others came.

The Lady wanted to be kind and quickly try on all her clothes so the other shoppers didn't have to wait in line too long. As she hurried through her pile of clothes she made one stack of keepers and hung the rejects on the door. She came upon a shirt that didn't quite fit right, so she hurried out to find another in a different size. She then rushed back to her fitting room and closed the door.

She took off the shirt that didn't fit and went to look for the hanger to hang it on the door with all the other rejects ... but she couldn't find it. As a matter of fact ... all of her rejects were gone! She looked for her pile of keepers and they were gone, too! Confused, she looked around the dressing room for her purse and that's when it hit her ... she was in the wrong dressing room! Amongst all her hurrying, she had absentmindedly entered the wrong dressing room. Realizing her mistake, she called out and said, "ummm, I'm in the wrong room". She could here a couple of people laugh a little on the other side of the door (likely the original occupant of the dressing room, relieved that it hadn't been permanently hi-jacked by some rude lady jumping in line).

The lady hurried and gathered the items she had brought into the dressing room with her and opened up the door. She then took a couple of steps outside the door. Upon seeing the reactions on people's faces waiting in line, she came to a horrifying realization ... SHE HAD STEPPED OUTSIDE OF THE DRESSING ROOM WITHOUT A SHIRT ON!! She quickly covered the front of herself with the items of clothing in her hand and backed up into the dressing room again, while profusely apologizing to everyone there. LUCKILY, the lady still had a garment top and a bra on, so she wasn't TECHNICALLY topless ... but still - she was VERY embarrassed. The long line of people waiting for dressing rooms found it rather humorous and were all laughing about it and telling the lady, "it's fine! don't worry!".

The lady hurried and put a top on, walked outside and apologized to all of the laughing people again ... then she sheepishly went into her REAL dressing room and shut the door.

As she continued to try on clothes, she noticed a sign on the wall that informed her the store was under video surveillance (to catch shoplifters). Wow, will they be in for a surprise if they ever watch that tape! She still prays to this day that it's not true and they just posted that sign to scare the shoplifters away. (fingers crossed)

Now, a fairytale always has to have a happy ending ...

The lady found lots of cute clothes and accessories to match. When she arrived home to her castle, she opened the draw bridge to pull her chariot into the garage to discover a most pleasant surprise. Her King had cleaned out and organized the garage! It looked magnificent!! Her King kindly greeted her and informed her that he not only cleaned the garage while she was gone, but he also had picked up the house, washed all the laundry, cleaned out his car, bathed the kids, and put them to bed.

Wow, what a lucky lady. :)

And they lived happily ever after.

The End.

I'm a Proud Mommy :)

Here's Allyson's Kindergarten report card and her score from her recent DIBELS test she took at school ...




I'm sure you can all read the DIBELS score, but in case you can't read the report card, here are her grades:

Homeroom: 100%
Reading: 98.57%
Math: 95.51%

She's in an advanced group for her reading and her math and she still got these awesome grades! She tries so hard and does so well in school. She never complains when it's time to do her homework. She frequently brings her homework to me and says she wants to do it. At the beginning of the year she needed me to help her along til she got the hang of it, but now she reads all of the directions on her worksheets by herself and does it all by herself. I just sit next to her and watch most of the time and occasionally help, when needed. Reading is her favorite. She reads at an advanced 1st grade level and will soon be reading at a beginning 2nd grade level (according to the "Reading A-Z correlation chart" that her school uses).

I'm so proud of my little girl! :')

We went out last Saturday to celebrate. We originally wanted to go to Trafalga, but David got home a lot later from working on the house than expected, so we decided we would probably be better off doing something else that night. I really wanted to do something out of the norm from what we usually do, but was having a really hard time thinking of anything. The only thing I could come up with was Chuck e Cheese's and I was NOT happy about it. I remembered that she asked to go to Chuck e Cheese's several times after we went there for her cousins birthday party a while back. So, despite how much I HATE Chuck e Cheese's, I asked her if she wanted to go and she was super excited about it ... so we went.

Now, let me explain why I hate Chuck e Cheese's.

I've been there twice in my life. The first time was for my niece's birthday party a lot of years ago at the Orem location. My first thought when walking in the doors was, "wow, it's REALLY dark in here." Definitely not the fun, bright, happy place I would expect out of a kids party place. There was a small play area for the kids and a fair amount of arcade games, but not a whole lot. And let's not forget the CREEPIEST LOOKING DANCING/SINGING CHARACTERS I'VE EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE!!!! And to top it all off, the mouse (I assume his name is Chuck?) was missing his head!!! It was sitting in a bucket on the floor next to his feet. Now, imagine a bunch of creepy looking characters dancing and singing under poor lighting in a dark dungeon-like place with one of it's creepy friends sitting on stage with them, with it's head sitting in a bucket. Seems like something you'd see in a horror film or a really bad nightmare or something, right?!!! I think I'm lucky I left that place alive that night.

I took the liberty of photo shopping this picture, so you could better envision this frightful sight ...



(That picture was taken at the location by the South Towne Mall, so it doesn't look nearly as creepy as it did that night at the Orem location)

The second time I went to Chuck e Cheese's was for my other niece's birthday party (at the Orem location again). Luckily, all of the character's had their heads attached that time - but still a super creepy place. And Katelyn came off of the play place with her pants soaked from her knees on down from crawling through who-knows-what in the tunnel (I'm sure your imaginations can tell you what it likely could have been ... I know mine was).

So that's why I hate Chuck e Cheese's.

I decided that if we were going to go there to celebrate Allyson's grades, that we had to go to the location by the South Towne Mall. I refused to go to the Orem location. I was hopeful that it would be a little better than the one in Orem, but I certainly didn't expect that it really would be.

To my surprise, it was a BILLION times better than the Orem location!!

It was well lit and bright and cheerful and fun looking and had a much bigger play area and more arcade games and had great pizza and was ALMOST completely not creepy (sorry, those dancing characters have really got to go, IMO). We had a lot of fun and I can honestly say I would take my kids there again - and not just when I have to for someone's birthday party.

Now, I have to brag about Allyson again.

She has INCREDIBLE aim. She was playing this game ...



She kept getting the ball in the 6 point bucket (the highest scoring bucket you can get it in) over and over and over again. Unfortunately, the first time she finished up a round of 6 pointers, she discovered the machine she was using was out of tickets. She wasn't too thrilled about that, lol.

Allyson gets this super serious, concentrated look on her face when she tries to aim when playing anything that requires a ball. Here's that face ...



I seriously think basketball or softball (or both) is going to be her "thing". Last summer we bought a little kids plastic t-ball set to play with at the park with the kids. The first time we pulled it out, we tried to show Allyson how to use it and she REFUSED to hit the ball if it was on the "T". She wanted us to pitch it to her. We told her it would be too hard to do that until she gets some practice hitting the ball on the "T". She still refused to use it. So, thinking I would prove to her how impossible it would be to hit the ball, I pitched it to her. And she hit it!! I thought maybe it was a fluke, so I kept pitching it to her and she kept hitting it!!! And they were really good hits, too!

I think she has some pretty impressive skills going on for a girl who doesn't practice throwing balls in baskets, or hitting balls with bats at home. I'm excited for summer to come so we can practice doing more of that kind of stuff with her.

Here are some more pics from our fun night ...









I looked at Chuck e Cheese's website before we left to see their hours and came across a thing that said they give free tokens to kids with good report cards. So, we brought her report card with us. She was SO excited to show it to EVERYBODY. After we were done eating we pulled out her report card so she could go get her free tokens. She stopped EVERY person on our way up to the register to tell them she got good grades and to show them her report card, lol ... it took us a while to actually make it to the register, haha. :)





We had lots of fun! :)

I've decided that the Easter bunny needs to bring me one of these ...




We lost our point and shoot camera on a vacation a couple summers ago. Since then we've been using my D40 dslr as our "point and shoot". It has an automatic setting and it's a lot smaller and lighter than my REALLY nice camera. I've found that I actually really like using it as a point and shoot. If I knew I could get as nice of pictures out of a smaller, pocket sized camera - I would have gotten one by now, but I have yet to find one that can do as well as my D40. The draw back is that it can't really fit inside my purse, so I have to always carry around a separate camera bag everywhere I go if I want to take nicer pictures than what my camera phone can take. Which is why I want this purse. It gives me the best of both worlds - I can carry all of my purse items in it AND put my camera in it AND have it be well protected AND I don't have to carry around two separate bags.

I'd still like to get a smaller, more pocket sized point and shoot for taking pictures at places that I don't want to carry a purse around with me for (like at the Boyce Avenue Concert in March). Maybe The Easter Bunny, Cupid, The Anniversary Fairy, and the Mother's Day Fairy can combine forces and make something work so I can get my camera purse and a pocket sized point and shoot. (hint, hint) ;)

P.S.
Our door came. We're THRILLED with how it turned out! :)