We teach them how to weld...

I know you're supposed to teach your kids how to walk, talk, feed themselves, etc. But at our house, we also teach them how to weld. (Okay, not really but just go with it.)

How it started: Merril was out in the garage, modifying something on his truck and there were little pieces of metal on the floor. Maxine picked them up and started to make a shape but said she needed to glue the metal together. Merril pointed her to the welder and gave her a few pointers and away she went. (Eye and skin protected is essential.)

Merril said she has a real knack for it. Most people have the problem of overthinking it. Kids don't have this problem.

Jack needed to learn too since Maxine was learning.

I was a little scared just taking the pictures because people aren't supposed to look directly at welding sparks because they burn the retina. I ended up getting the shot ready and then saying "GO" and clicking a couple of shots with my eyes closed.

Finished horse.

It's cute in a creepy sort of way. :)

A little story...

Do you ever have those days when everything drives you nuts???

Maybe you're having a bad hair day.

Do you feel so exhausted you can't stay awake another second??

Well, we hope not. But just in case, we wanted you to know that happiness still exists right around the corner.

Love is waiting for you. Go give someone a hug.

Been busy...

Don't you just hate that? I've been too busy but yesterday I had a day all to myself. There wasn't any PTA, Young Womens, or preschool to teach and I spent the whole day outside in the yard. Not that I don't like to do PTA or teach preschool or go to Young Womens, it was just a lot all at once. I made another grow box in the front yard and planted 2 blueberry plants and strawberries. I weeded my berry patch on the north side of the house and planted most of the garden. The garden has tomatoes, peas, carrots, onions, and banana peppers. My pic is a little overexposed but I still haven't put image editing software on my new computer.

My apricot tree is full of blossoms!! Seriously, I'm going to keep bees some day. I'll be the crazy bee lady.

This is one of my new new strawberry plants! I'm hoping the new grow box in the front yard will be the right amount of morning sun and afternoon shade. Here's keeping fingers crossed!

Hoover Dam...

We drove past Hoover Dam last weekend and stopped to take a gander at the new bridge! The kids wouldn't sit still for a picture and took off.


Here's the new bridge, view from the dam. It's hard to tell but it is massive! There's so much concrete and I was in awe.

We walked across Hoover Dam and Maxine kept trying to lean over the edge of the dam, despite signs everywhere saying, "Danger, Keep Off Wall."

Nobody died, although the wind was blowing really hard and Juliet was pushed by the wind a little bit. This is my favorite picture of the day.

When the wind blows...

There was a huge storm that blew through our part of town a few days ago and let's just say that I was afraid of losing some trees because of the wind. So now it's a calm beautiful day and I was driving and noticed something caught in the telephone pole wires. Right in the middle of the picture, can you see it?

Still can't tell what it is? How about now?

It's a tumbleweed. Now, generally speaking, tumbleweeds tend to roll along the ground. That must have been some ferocious wind.

Juggling abs...

So I've been learning to juggle this year. I used to juggle 3-8 times and then drop with a top count of 13. Now I juggle around 13 times without a drop and my top consecutive count is 33. I practice for 5-15 minutes a day, depending on my mood. So I've noticed that juggling is exercise. After 10 minutes, I'm sweating slightly, my abs are tight and my heart rate is elevated. What? Seriously? It's not super cardio but every little bit helps right? Merril and I have started joking that we could start a new areobic fitness craze called Juggling Abs by Jamie. "It's fun! It improves hand to eye coordination...and you can do it from the comfort of your own home! And you could have abs like these>>>(and then a stunt double with super awesome abs would provide the close-up shot because the days of showing off my abs are over.)

You heard about it here first.

Bikers...

My kids have wanted to ride their bikes a lot lately. Maxine commented that she, "...should really have a bike helmet..." *sigh* Maxine grew out of her first bike helmet a while ago and then we lost it. Jack or Juliet have never had bike helmets. The reason? They're expensive! They're around $15-25 a piece and I needed 3. I didn't want to drop $60 for bike helmets. But a recent discussion with a friend made me feel like a slacker parent for not providing safe riding gear for my kids. (It was a good thing Megan, at least someone is caring about children safety.)

So the last time I was at the D.I., I noticed a surprising number of bike helmets for sale. So I took all the kids down and sized them up. Total cost: $10.49 for all 3 helmets! The helmets were $3 each! Juliet's helmet was missing a buckle but I bought a 6-pack of buckles for $1.49. They're all in really good shape. Jack's helmet is the nicest and best looking. It's matte black with shiny red flames and a visor. Maxine and Juliet have average, run of the mill helmets.

I made them wear a shower cap while they tried on helmets. Hee hee hee. I love the D.I. but I always want to sanitize things before use. So here they are!

*They'd all be riding for a while and it was a really cold and windy day. Juliet was done riding but I made her pose for the picture. She wasn't very happy with me for it.

I've lost something...

I've always considered my hair to be one of my top 5 features. But lately, I'm struggling. It's not that I don't think my new haircut is good or cute, I just think I'm a dork at styling it. I stand in front of the mirror, puzzled, because my hair never ends up looking quite right. Maybe it's the bangs, maybe it's all the layers but I can't figure out how ladies with short hair do this!!

You know in the movies when the actress is pretending to be someone else and has a wig on with a bobbed cut? You know how she pulls the wig off later to reveal long beautiful tresses underneath? That's how I feel. I feel like I'm wearing a short wig and my real hair is hiding underneath.

Poor Merril, he's great. He's told me 900 million times that my hair looks fantastic. Each compliment is heart-felt and genuine. The problem is, I'm not feeling it yet! He said today, "So don't tie your self-confidence to your hair." I thought to myself, "What?!? That's what I've got going for me!" So while I'm trying to figure out my new do, I'm trying to appear self-confident and cute.

But inside, I'm feeling kind of lumpy. And eeks! I have to go get my driver's license renewed next week!! My awkwardness is going to be captured on my driver's license for the next 5 years. I'd better grow some confidence by then.

Day for new hair...

A month ago, I decided I was sick of my hair and wanted to cut it. I have enough to donate but I'm going to try my hand at selling it first. If that doesn't happen, I'll just donate it. But I wanted to do something different and drastic. Something stacked and with layers. So I talked to a couple of people and my friend Sara said she cuts her girls' hair and would give it a go. Her kids are always super cute and so she gave a wack at it! This is me at dinner on Friday.

Before:
My friend, Sara G., did an excellent job and I'm loving my new style! Keeping it edgy looking is my biggest challenge.

I worked on a couple of different styles last night and flipped out and messy was fun, and it also looked great out of the shower. I keep overflipping my head, in anticipation of flipping more hair out of the way. There's just not that much up there.

Merril and I both had a fun Saturday. His hair needs to be long for Halloween 2011 so he did Mohawk Saturday at the sand dunes.

He also went wakeboarding in a wetsuit on Saturday. I did not partake in such mischievousness because it sounded cold and the kids wanted to go home.

Merril and Ryan: because it's more fun to be an idiot with a friend.

But the mohawk had to go before church on Sunday. Hope you had a good Saturday too!

Think your blog isn't having any effect?

Merril came across an article written by a 20s-ish, atheist, feminist gal and how she's addicted to Mormon Mommy blogs. She says that for her, escaping into the lives of these happy, shiny people makes her feel better about life.

If you want to read the whole article click here. And although I don't post crafty things, it made me feel good about blogging and being Mormon! :)

New Year's goals

I know people tend to set lofty New Year's resolutions but about the only thing I want to do is learn to juggle. Merril bought me a book and juggling balls about 3 years ago. My high score so far is 13 consecutive "juggles."

If anyone has any tips, I'm all ears!

Beka and I love root vegetables...

I went to the park the other day with a friend, Beka, and we started talking about gardening while the kids played. We discussed different things we wanted to plant this year and I said, "I'll do carrots and onions because they're so easy to grow here." (It's hot and dry ALL SUMMER LONG) So then she was saying how much fun it was to grow potatoes in her garden last year. I had grown potatoes as well last year but forgotten about them until about a week ago.

A week ago...I was peeling potatoes that I'd purchased and was absently thinking, "Potatoes are good. I should plant potatoes next year.....Wait!! I planted potatoes this year and they're still out there!" I have heard that you're supposed to wait a couple of weeks after the tops die down to harvest but I've just read other sites that say to harvest a couple of weeks after they flower. I waited until halfway through winter. :)

So the next day, I went out with my shovel and dug up about a dozen potatoes. (An Easter egg hunt in January.) They ranged in size from medium to very small. Here are some from dinner.

The best part of the whole experience? I didn't even have to buy the starts for the potato plants! I planted potatoes that sprouted roots while hanging in the pantry. Fun! Just FYI: They taste just like potatoes purchased at the store. So I'm not planting them next year because the taste is superior, they're just fun to grow.

Sick week...

We started the week with Maxine spiking a fever. So we stayed home, watched tv and generally laid around in our pajamas. Tuesday she was feeling better. Thursday morning Jack spiked a fever. He's feeling a little better today but still lethargic. He's watching Top Gear in his Christmas "Stig" pyjamas (that's how they spell pajamas in the UK).

Juliet awoke this morning with the fever. She went back to sleep at 10:30 a.m. and has been asleep since. (I could've nabbed a better pic with my new camera but the shutter sound is quieter on my point and shoot and I didn't want to wake her up.)

The fevers have been uneventful, pretty low-grade and no vomiting thankfully. Just Tylenol and a lot of laying around.

The unintended by-product of feverish children? Not being able to leave for errands and generally looking around the house for things to do. I'm all caught up on laundry, I've organized a closet, and cleaned the storage room that has all the camping gear in it.

Before it was cleaned, there was stuff ALL OVER THE FLOOR, bins were dumped out to find something in the bottom and never put away. The sleeping bags were unrolled, climbing gear was dumped out of its bag, and 3 years of cups and garbage toted down there by the kids and left. Now the room has order! Yeah!

I decided I wanted to wire a light in there too. Since we're not currently working on the basement, I told Merril to pick up a cheap light fixture from Home Depot. It was $1 and now I can see what I'm looking for at night. That was so totally worth it.

And just as a side note, I've noticed I'm having a harder time throwing away anything fabric-like. Older shirts, jeans, baby blankets and keep trying to think of a way to piece a quilt together with all the scraps. And then I felt like someone living in the olden days when they used to piece quilts together with any scrap they came across. Hopefully I can piece something kind of cute. Not likely any time soon. :)

Homemade gifts...

I like to make some homemade gifts. I made Juliet some flower bows that weren't very interesting but I worked hard on Jack and Maxine's gifts. I made Maxine a scripture case. It was inspired by a quilting friend. Maxine loves this scrap fabric that we've had hanging around the house so that's what it's made out of. Think Asian and silky.

I made Jack a stick horse because we have 2 and someone is always left out.

The horse is smiling but you can't tell from this angle.

And Merril got me this!

He got it used on Craig's list and it was a steal. I will most likely take my little camera lots of places because I don't always like to lug a huge camera but the new camera is fantastic in low light!!

And this last picture is a nativity picture from Christmas Eve.

Nutcracker Patrol...

My Dad loves Christmas nutcrackers. Even that might be an understatement. He collects them and probably has upwards of 500 in different sizes. So occasionally, he gives us some when he gets duplicates. I've had a hard time thinking of where to put them. This year the kids brought them up from the basement and put them in front of the tree. The purpose? To guard the presents.

They stand as watchmen to make sure no one tampers with the presents. Especially Merril.

Merry Christmas!! I'm watching It's a Wonderful Life!

Leaky...

I was getting ready for bed 2 nights ago and the floor was damp. Just as background information, we have a waterbed. Sure enough, it had sprung a leak and dripped a little on the floor. So instead of jumping into bed, Merril and I were draining a waterbed and inflating an air mattress. Bummer. Got a new one and it's filled but that's not what I wanted to do right before Christmas. ;}

Triple Combination Challenge Completed...

I just finished the Doctrine & Covenants, the Pearl of Great Price and the Book of Mormon in 3 months! I have until Sunday the 19th so I finished a few days early. This challenge was such a wonderful blessing to me! It was an eye-opening experience to read the scriptures so quickly. The people and the history made more sense instead of dragging on reading the Book of Mormon over a period of years. I was moved to tears a number of times, I was inspired, and I was chastised. I was exceedingly saddened by this people that were so happy and so faithful and then turned so horribly wicked and destroyed themselves. During this Christmas season, I encourage everyone to have more faith, more charity, give selflessly and consecrate themselves more because this brings happiness! :) Merry Christmas!

It's the wood that makes it good...

A friend of ours does odd jobs cleaning houses after they've been foreclosed. So he calls Merril and says he has a whole bunch of wood that he's taking to the dump unless we want it. So Merril calls me and I say, "YES I WANT IT!" Now you might be thinking to yourselves, "What's so awesome about free wood?" Wood makes fire. Fires makes roasted marshmallows, dutch oven cooking, bonfires, tin foil dinners and improves general well being when sat around. Plus, I feel it adds to our preparedness factor by being able to cook some food or provide heat in an emergency. So here's our new wood pile. Next will be a fire pit, I'm sure.

And if anyone else feels like they want to ditch some wood at my house, you're more than welcome.

Where is it?

Merril and a buddy from Australia were at Wal-Mart the other night. They were shopping for things you can't get in Australia. So Merril called me from Wal-Mart and said, "Where are the Twinkies?" I narrowed my eyes and said, "The end of the bread aisle? I think there's a whole Hostess section there." After a pause on the other line he says, "Oh yep! Here they are! Thanks babe!"

This isn't the first time Merril's called me with a question about where to find something in Wal-Mart. I'm his personal Wal-Mart associate, except I don't get paid. And to date, I've never steered him wrong. I'm just trying to figure out how to market it. I could post little signs in Wal-Mart that say, "Can't find what you're looking for? Call Jamie." Heaven knows I spend way too much time there. The greeters must think I have no life.

The Silver Lining...

Maxine woke up at 5 a.m. saying, "I feel like I'm going to throw up." Bummer. So I stayed up with her and she ended up throwing up at 6 a.m., 7 a.m., and 8 a.m. Double bummer. So she earned a day out of school and I looked at the inside of the house and thought, "Well, I'm not going anywhere today....I might as well finish decorating for Christmas!!" So I put up the Christmas village, the pine garland, the advent calendar, and the stockings. Afterwards, I figured I could assemble Christmas cards. Normally, I would've worked for an hour and quit. But I didn't have anything to do so I finished them all! They're addressed and ready to go.

Maxine didn't throw up anymore and seems completely fine now. And because she was sick, I got a lot done!

My First Ever Black Friday! Yikes!

I love to shop! But, I've never participated in the whole "Black Friday" hysteria because it never seemed worth it to me to save $10 on a pair of kids jeans for Christmas. But this year's budget is a little tighter than years' past so the thought of saving $25-$50 on some Christmas presents had some appeal. Wal-Mart was selling toys and housewares stuff at 12:01 a.m. I figured I could just stay up a little late and head over to Wal-Mart to nab a few items. That seemed totally doable vs. the idea of 4 a.m. at Target.

I decided to head to bed at 9 p.m. to catch a few winks. I was too excited! I maybe slept for 30 minutes before I got up at 11 p.m. This is me right before I left, bloodshot eyes and all. (I was sleeping on my face too, I'm all puffy and wrinkly.)

My friend, Amy H. met me at Wal-Mart and we browsed around until midnight, waiting for the bloody noses and scratching eyes out to start. I was pleasantly surprised that most shoppers were giddy and having a good time. There were a few grouches who should've just stayed in bed.

Total saved on Jack's present at Wal-Mart: $15. Saved $15 on Juliet's presents. Got a stocking stuffer for Merril, saving $5. And bought some towels, a $1.96 DVD of P.S. I Love You, and $12 Corel dishes for me (normally $30). I was saving so much money on everything else...how could I not? They were such a great deal!! Tried to admatch a present for Maxine from a Target ad but it didn't work out. So I ended up paying full price for Max's gift instead of saving $11. So I checked out after waiting in line for 20 minutes (not too bad) and waited for Amy. She got stuck in a slow line after we were separated in the madness. I called her to talk while she waited in line. Asked her if she got everything she wanted. She said, "I got some stuff but I'm going to Old Navy after this and then to Target at 4 a.m!"

Now I was torn. The gift I wanted for Maxine was at Target and I could save $11 instead of paying the full price. So after talking with Amy on the phone for a few more minutes, I decided to stay up all night and go with her to Target. I drove home, hid all the loot from Wal-Mart and waited for Amy to come get me.

We went to Old Navy, she picked out some stuff and we waited in line to check out for a solid 45 minutes to an hour.

Then on to Target. We got there a little after 3 a.m. and got in the back of a HUGE line!! We were all the way down by Lowe's (if you live in my area, you know how far away that is from Target.) My hopes of saving $11 for Maxine's gift seemed to be vanishing quickly. We froze our tails off waiting for 45 minutes and chatted with the friendly people waiting in line. Then the doors opened and we started to move. As the line started to move Amy said, "When we get in there, it's every man for himself." I totally agreed to split up and find her later. We got to the doors and I sprinted to Maxine's gift. That's me:


Okay, so that's not really me but you get the idea! Look how happy everyone is, maybe except for that Target employee on the left. When I got to the gift area for Maxine, there were tons left and I grabbed it! YEAH! Ran through the store and grabbed another gift for Jack, saving $15, and a $3 DVD of the movie ELF, also for me.

Then I went to go find the end of the checkout line. Yikes. It was around the back of the store.

(Pardon the stock photos, I left my camera at home.) Called Amy, she got what she wanted and was still browsing. I told her where I was and saved her a spot. She showed up a bit later with a cart full of stuff. We chatted for probably an hour and a half waiting to checkout, during which I had to run back to the food area of Target and grab a bag of pretzels and a lemonade to eat while I waited. I was starving and it was 5 a.m. by then! I hadn't accounted for the enormous appetite all the shopping would bring on!

So we stayed up late, giggled and saved some cash. She dropped me off around 6:30 a.m. I hid more presents. Then as I was about to get ready for bed, I kept thinking of an electronic item I'd seen in the Wal-Mart ad for way cheap!! I've wanted one for several years but they've always been too much money. I had $50 of my own money, not Christmas money, in my wallet and the item cost $49. Wal-Mart's electronics had gone on sale at 5 a.m. What were the odds that one was still left? So I decided I wouldn't be able to sleep until I checked. I drove back to Wal-Mart and asked if they had any left. The Wal-Mart employee radioed another employee and she said there were 3! I RAN to the back of the store and grabbed one! I'm going to wrap it and put it under the tree to give to the family but the tag should really say To: Jamie From: Jamie.

The store was empty and I walked to the front, checked out and was home by 6:45 a.m. I changed into pajamas, talked to Merril for a minute and then passed out.

Conclusion: I thought it was super fun, especially with a pal (THANK YOU AMY!!) and would totally do it again. Except next year I might just go and sell hot chocolate at 3 a.m. in front of Target. I could've made a killing. :) Merry Christmas!

UPDATE: After talking to some Black Friday pros, I was told that it's against the rules to run in the store, for the obvious reason of someone getting trampled. I feel like a total bonehead! No wonder no one else was running! They all knew better. I didn't. I apologize for running.

New Jeep Paint...

Sorry to be rude and not post the pics of the painted Jeep but it was a busy week with Thanksgiving and my first Black Friday experience! So here we go!

First off-the Jeep taped off:

And ta-da!

We've since cleaned the plastic panels so everything looks better. These pics still had the dust on the panels.

It is super shiney!! I could go out and do my make-up in the reflection. It looks soooo much nicer!

There is one little problem: The garage was a couple of degrees too cold and paint doesn't stick to cold metal. We had heaters in the garage but heat rises. Result? The paint ran in a couple of spots on the bottom of the Jeep (where it was the coldest). Solution? Problem areas can be lightly sanded and repainted most likely in the Spring when it warms up. Overall, the Jeep looks a million times better. The roof and the hood look superb simply because it was warmer up top.

So there it is. Conclusion? I don't think I'd ever do that again. It was an insane amount of work!! In the end, we got some super wonderful paint with a ton of shimmery metal flake in it so the quality of the paint itself is 100 times better than a paint job at Maaco. So in the end, I think we ended up with a way better paint job but man, that's a lot of WoRk!

It seemed like a good idea...

Our Jeep is old and the paint has been peeling on the hood and roof since we bought it. We looked into getting it repainted and it was $500. Hmmmm....we only paid $400 for the whole Jeep so the paint quote seemed a little steep. Merril has a friend who used to do body work and paint so with his expertise, we decided to paint the Jeep ourselves and save $325. Seems like a brilliant idea eh??

It was a great idea until I realized that sanding a vehicle take a lot of time and energy! We started sanding yesterday at 9 a.m., thinking it would take a couple of hours. We were wrong. Merril left for work at noon and I kept sanding until 2 p.m. when I ran out of sanding pads.

Merril brought home more sanding pads yesterday night and I made a goal to finish today. Merril's doing a Japanese tour so it's all me. I started at 9 again and just finished again at 2 p.m. I think it's mostly done, except for a few places that need to be sanded by hand.

I have 2 fears about this project.

#1-Merril's friend comes to paint on Tuesday and say we didn't sand it right.

#2-We paint it and it still looks crappy.

Yikes! Fingers crossed, I'll be posting pics of our beautiful paint job on Tuesday!!

Poor Jacky...

We went to the dentist last week and Jack had a bunch of cavities. The Doc recommended sedating him for the cavities because Jack FREAKED over getting his teeth cleaned. So he went this morning for his sedation. He was given some stuff to calm nausea and help him relax. He relaxed so much that he peed on the floor. The nurse said it's common and they even had dry clothes for him to change into. (Super awesome Children's Dental!!) Merril said that Jack was laughing hysterically when he was changing him, like he was being tickled. Then he got his teeth fixed. The Doc said he did great. I was there to hold him as he came out of anesthesia. He cracked his eyelids and said, "Mom, you have 4 eyes.....and 2 noses." After a 1/2 hour, we were able to leave and bring him home. He gets a day in front of the TV. Juliet decided she gets equal privileges so both beds came out to the living room.

The double vision is gone now but earlier he was saying things like, "Mom, the second Mom behind you does the exact same things you do." and "When you walked around the Jeep, there were 3 of you."

It's almost lunch time and he seems normal again. He was starving and has eaten a bowl of soup, a peanut butter sandwich and a string cheese. He's supposed to have Jell-O all day. I guess he eats like his father. :)

This just made me thankful that my kids don't have major health problems that require them to be in and out of the hospital!!