But, I Thought She Was in Utah

One way or another, I just may be crying by bedtime tonight.... #1 had to pay a baggage fee today at the airport. I watched her put her debit card away when the transaction was completed. While I...

Wordless Wednesday: Hannah Understands

And Just Like That....She's Gone

Wellllll, she's off, and I (yes, me. Crier of all criers) didn't cry. Okay, so I got a bit teary and I wouldn't let go of her when she hugged me and I couldn't just walk out of the airport and...

One More Update Before She Leaves Tomorrow

image: Julia Shinkle Photography I've decided that I have to write everyday now. My girl will be gone tomorrow, and I want to make sure we have a record of all of the wonderful things that happen...

Four More Days

image: hiusa.org Four days!....and I'm feeling a bit frantic. What to do? What to do? After a wee bit of stomach pain, the typhoid pills are taken, her things are all together, and she's busily...

Wordless Wednesday: What She's in For?

Good-Bye, Nutella....Oh, How I'll Miss You

Dad and me Went to see my dad today. While I was there, I asked him when his stomach problems started. I remember him having almost constant stomach pains when I was a teenager. He shared that he'd...

Unity through Family Chaos

At the Warden's school, near the end of every school year, they have a big after school soccer tournament. Yesterday was the day. The Warden invited us to come watch. I had to take #5 to an eye...

Another Mission Preparation Update

image: juliashinklephotography We went and had #1's immunizations a week ago or so. While we were there, they were insistent that she have a rabies vaccine, which would have been fine (the church...

Silliness!

image: superstock.com Once upon a time, within the last ten years or so, there was a tropical storm in Florida that caused a huge amount of damage. One thing was reported in the news. It went a...

Heart Breaker

image: mcctherock.org Little girl stood right next to me this morning as I sat working on a project. I leaned over and asked her if she was going to the preschool graduation tonight. She quietly...

Up

image: mlive.com I'm up....Kids crying my name in the middle of the night.... Coughing.... Needing to be covered up again after getting up to use the bathroom..... This has been my night so far, so...

Two Weeks to Go

Someday, after I'm dead and gone, someone just might post all of the posts I haven't published that sit in the background. Let's just say I'm glad I'll be dead and gone. All the juicy stuff is...

While the Troops are Away

Head's spinning with thoughts and ideas. Forgive me while I let them out....gotta relieve some pressure. image: advantagerealestate.com Originally, the plan was that we were all going to go to the...

An Awesome Experience for My Kids

I drove up to the high school, dropped my big kids off in the usual place, found a parking spot, and climbed out with my little kids to head to the preschool this morning. I could hear country...

Maybe Not as Bad as You've Been Led to Believe

I just want to write something....anything today. Just so I can say I wrote for two days in a row. Wow, how things change. It used to be that I'd have to stop myself from writing a third or fourth...

Tantrum to Tranquility

image: flickr.com I've shared the fact that one of my children has some anger management issues, right? Well....I believe we're finally on the right track. I thought maybe I wasn't giving him...

Shout Out: Julia Shinkle

This is one of those posts that has sat in the background WAY too long. As I attached the new family photo at the top of this blog this evening, I remembered writing this unfinished post and...

My Eyes Have Been Opened

I haven't revamped too much around here. Not as much as I would like to, but those changes will come in the future. For now, I've added two tabs at the top (more are to come)--"What's for Dinner"...

A Little Ugliness and a Whole Lotta Questions

image: momspark.net Y'know, kids whose moms blog have a real disadvantage. Mom always has the last word, or...almost always. In my case, thankfully, my kids don't mind. I think it helps that in...

Thoughts from Today - Three Days in a Row, People!

Look at me!...Three days in a row. Proctored the A.P. European history test today. Four hours on my feet. I'm beat (and a poet). So dragging, so I'm off to bed. #1 caught the Warden and me up in...

Just a Piece of My Insanity - A Starting Point

The Warden often uses the quote, and I think this is quite fitting for the "Madhouse:" Did Einstein really say this? See what a skeptic I've become? It's kind of like how #2 credits every possible...

Sour in More Ways than One

As we've dealt with red dye #40 and "Sweetie," I got to thinking back to another of my children. I honestly thought that Sweetie's issues were genetic because one of the older children showed very...

Update on Mission Prep

It's been awhile since I've given an update on #1 and her mission preparation. I'm sure, if you spoke with her, she'd give you the exact number of days until her departure. Then she'd assure you...

Creating Our Own MTC

We had stake conference over this past weekend, as I mentioned in the previous post. One of the things that stuck with me from what was said was the fact that now that the mission age is younger,...

The Future

Family pictures tomorrow! I've been planning and plotting just what color combinations we're going to wear. It's funny. I used to dread this, but I think I have it kind of figured out now to the...

Ladder of Inference

Great day! Today was the Oregon American Mother's conference. It was FABULOUS! There were some profound things shared. The theme was "A Call to Action." I definitely felt the urgency to be active...

General Conference (Sunday Afternoon): My Notes

These notes have been sitting here waiting to be published. I planned on putting all kinds of pictures in place, but considering it's been as long as it has, and I still haven't done it, I'm...

Oh, the Insanity!

It's one of THOSE days, but there have been a lot of THOSE days lately....working so hard to get caught up but turning around to find that someone has thwarted my efforts and the work begins again....

Premeditated

Yesterday at church this brother got up and started talking about work and how his boss would assign him to do a project, and he'd start in. The wheels'd start to turn. He would write down his...