Snowy weekend

Susan reminded me how it WILL snow in March even though that we just celebrated the first spring day. She has lived here for three years and it came without fail. I forgot all about it after living in Utah for nearly ten years. Years just were flying and so many things have happened. I just lost sight of simple things that come from living in Utah in particular. It will be melting in a blink of eye and sun will come out finally.

Yesterday (Saturday) was wonderful. Actually, it was hectic but I am so glad we made it through. I was asked to make a dinner for a family who had their newborn in the hospital, have a brother in law who is going to open his mission call letter at 2 p.m., a birthday party for three people in family and having some food to bring to this party. I was on my feet most of the day trying to get so many things done. Our kids felt the excitement and played along. I am sorry to say that Annalise was getting too soaked in that. She got so cranky that she bit, push, hit Suzy at the store. That girl! I was thinking at everyone, "Trust me, Annalise is not like that monster with me right now." Annalise is really the sweetest little girl and I adored her when she was a baby. She really is a cuddly-wuddly. I just wanted to call her "Cuddles".

Clint's brother opened his mission call and celebrated his nineteen birthday yesterday . . . as I said up above. He is called to Germany Frankfurt mission . . . It came as a surprise to everyone. I know it would delight Clint's grandma whose parents were born there. I told Clint's mom that it is so neat to think how he will speak German fluently when he is back home. I felt sad that he had to go away so far . . . But it is a "good thing" as Clint's mom said. He will be entering MTC May 28 . . . Thus missing Ian's baptism. I still am so glad for his sake. He is doing something very important for the Lord.

My sister, Christina, is going to graduate this spring (I THINK). I have been a little behind in news with her. It was nice having her and her boyfriend visiting us occasionally on the weekends while she was making a film on "Blue Box" as its actress. I must admit that after watching trailer that it is very hard for me to be objective. I mean, it is my sister in there! Here's the link for you guys to watch . . .

http://lancepickett.blogspot.com/2008/03/movie-trailer-blue-box.html

If you guys don't know . . . There suddenly is loads of filmmakers in deaf community up and around making many films based on deaf culture and viewpoints. Like Bobby Giles on VPMan. I haven't seen that. But I know there are some reactions in Deaf Community in Utah. I can just say that it is lots of fun! Hee hee.

Well, back to my sister, Christina . . . She is a student at University of Utah now and majoring in theatre arts and film something. I am proud that she is working so hard and doing well in the school. I remember how it was rough for her in the beginning but she pulled it through and managed it. I just wish sometimes that she is not so busy that we can see her a bit more often. But I think it is the way things always will be until we all die and go to the Heaven.

Susan and I keep in touch fairly often. She is dancing with joy right now because two of her kids just got accepted into Syracuse Art Academy and we are very curious about how it will turn out. Susan and Gabe are just doing great. Susan is looking forward to Gabe graduating with bachelor degree this May. Gabe also just got done with making a new bedroom for the boys down in basement. Every time when I see him, he is always up to something . . . Doing homework, doing a home project, and all. That guy is so busy! I truly am looking forward to him being able to just loaf around and spend time with his kids.

Easter weekend

We had a wonderful time celebrating easter last weekend. My kids had fun going on egg hunting with Trinity, Emma, and Anne Marie. I thought the story of 8-10 yrs old kids going off before the sound of horn was particularly funny. Not to mention how 6 to 7 years old kids saw them going and went themselves!

Timmy is so in love with playgrounds now. He gets excited at sight of slides now.

I have been struggling with miragrine headaches past week now . . . I have been feeling woozy and having regular headaches everyday. I always feel so exhausted by the end of day. Clint has been wonderful, helping out with kids during bedtimes. I have to drink more water since that I wasn't taking good care of myself two weeks ago. I think it was what brought headaches on. I still am glad I was able to manage some things like making some dinner, keeping the house clean, and fulfill my calling in nursery.

We had a lot of fun in nursery. All of kids came in being nicely dressed. A lot of girls are dressed in long flowing pink dresses with beautiful hair. I enjoyed most of that. I spent a lot of time having to help the nursery leader to clean up the closet. Somebody got into there during the week, ate all of the little kids' snacks, scrawled crayons onto the doors, and mixed the toys all over into stake's closet. Our dear nursery leader was furious but there aren't so much we can do about it since that closet's lock is broken. She is trying to find the special kind of lock where you won't need keys and has long locking part. I was glad I decided to make some snacks for kids the night before, though. Ha.

After the church, we drove up to Syracuse and visited Susan and her family. My other sister brought her boyfriend to celebrate the easter with us. We had lamb and barley, fish, flat bread, haroset, and others. It was fun. Our kids had a blast with their cousins. Unfortunately, they were so overstimulated with no naps in pocket . . . Clint and I had our hands full with them. Ha ha. They were hard asleep when we got home and dressed them up in pajamas.

I am so glad it is turning into spring too. I love it how the days become longer. I love it how the green things are beginning to bloom. I am looking forward to picnics with families, summer BBQ, July 4th and all of the fun.

The City is done with installing the drain. We are waiting to see if it would help our basement to stay dry this year, It should be known for real by this April. I am wringing my hands in anxiety!!!

Clint is working on upstairs still. He is done with rooms. Now, he is working on hallway and fire blocks. He will be going to the store to get more wood today.

I got a week long to do my stuff. Along with usual chores and all. I hope that you guys will have a wonderful week too!

The ramble

Da da da. Yeah, yeah. I sometimes think that my days are a bit boring but to others, I guess aren't. I have been spending my time trying to think up something different for dinner. I hate trying to figure what we are going to eat for dinner. But Clint never complains. When I cook, I usually make something really good. Ha. I guess I am going to make lasagna dinner tonite. I will need to see how I can make girls' dish differently because of their milk allergies. Soy cheese never went well with lasagna.
I have been keeping up with my goal: making two pages to add to my children's scrapbook pages everyday. So far, I am working on Timothy's. I enjoyed having some helps in layout ideas. I usually am less creative when I am tired and I always am tired half of the time. I have about two whole boxes to work through so I got my job all cut out for me.
Do you guys know anything about limited edition print of art work? I just purchased a print titled "Sacred Grove", signed in gold by Greg Olsen. Right now, there's a small dent/puncture on it which I would like to be repaired. My friend who works for framing shop told me that it is part of the standard for a licensed professional to call for new print and tear the old one up based on serial number. I wonder if they would do that?
Timothy really is a sweetheart. He is extra cuddly and wants attention from his mom. I usually spent most of my time cuddling up with him. It is fun to see how he talks more now. He is beginning to string two to three words together.
I haven't been shopping so much lately. I really hate going shopping for one and only ONE reason. My kids love playing hide and seek on me. I just have total meltdown when I find out that one of my kids are missing. I really want to shop more for food storage stuff. My family still is about less than 3/4 way from a year worth that we need. I really like shopping at Macey's. They have all of the stuff I need. My major problem right now is where to put our food storage. We were planning to put them in the basement but due to regular water problem that come every summer, I had to put them into garage for temporary purposes until we are able to completely solve that problem. Oh well. I prayed about it and the answer came that it will be solved.
Tomorrow is the closing date for CTMH thing. I guess it will just take me less than an hour to do the procedure. I think I have to do it individual orders since that I don't get enough orders to make it an official gathering. I, at least, am still at consultant status anyhow.

My first Open House as a consultant

I made a such scary step in my commitment toward doing some stuff related to Close to My Heart company. I have been purchasing its products and loved them so much. I just decided to become a consultant. Today was my first open house and I will hold workshops in future. Whew!

I had so much fun with my kind friends who just made time to come out. We all made bookmarks. My sister even drove out from Syracuse to make this event special for me. I wish more could make it. I know they would love it too.

I asked some people about workshops. They expressed interest. I guess I can hold some card making/scrapbooking workshops.

I committed to it for up to a year to see how I can do it without affecting my family and my other responsibilities. If I see how it works out with me then I will keep on doing it.

I am so sick of being sick

Three weeks in the row would I find one of our kids being sick! Two weeks ago, it was flu. A week ago, it was strep throat which EVERYONE in the family got. Today, Timmy has fever of 101.4 and Suzy is throwing up. She began throwing up on her blanket and she had to walk to our bed and threw up on it. Ha. I told her mildly, "Do you know that you can go to toilet and throw up in it?" She wailed, "I cannot." I guess she could not with the sleepy confusion and darkness. We got up 5:30 a.m. to clean the mess up and Clint just started working ever since that time. I went back to sleep. Clint woke me up at 8:30 a.m. telling me that he is going to the work. Bless his heart, I found the kids all fed and dressed. Ian's lunch was packed. It is very nice of my husband to take care of that!
Suzy still is sick this morning. But she was able to eat toast and drink juice. That girl needs something in her. She is terribly so pale. I guess I am going to focus my day totally on taking care of kids and doing a bit of scrapbooking. I also am washing the laundry due to the mess made this early morning.
I hope so much that this sickness won't last this time around and that we won't get sick ever again.

Daylight's Saving Time Mishap

Yes, it is a mishap. I didn't know when it began until when I set my eyes on the time of my computer. At first, I was baffled with the difference of time on the computer and the time on our oven. It was when it hit me- Daylight's Saving Time! I exclaimed that to Clint who was standing in the kitchen. But it was too late. We were just ten minutes from church's starting hour. It takes fifteen minutes to drive down to Utah Valley Deaf Ward and even longer just to drag our kids out of their beds, get them dressed, fed, and all. Our kids were so cranky. I have no idea!! I made sure that they went to bed early the previous night. Well, what a fix we were in! We were at the church at 10 a.m. and Annalise had her first talk in the primary. She was so cute! She went as "When I do something wrong, I feel sad. I feel sorry, pray and ask Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father to forgive me. Jesus Christ makes me clean and helps me to go back to Heaven and live with Him again." I made some pictures for Suzy to hold while Annalise speaks to the primary. She was so adorable! Ian still was surly so I took him into nursery with me. He made everyone to laugh when he answered questions while the teacher was more used to more silent audience. He helped me cleaning the toys up, giving children snacks and all. He was munching on the food happily, I will daresay.
Back to Annalise's talk . . . . Annalise acted naughtily by sneaking into my scrapbooking stuff and took out ink pen and drew on all stairs in the hall. I scolded her and she drew her lower lip out and say, "I feel sad. I feel sorry." echoing her talk just making me to laugh.
Annalise is every inch of three years old, I will say. But she is adorable all the same. From the day one until now, I love cuddling with her and playing with her. She is a such good natured child!
I felt a great deal of relief when I sent my kids off the school today. It is nice having them home and all but sometimes it is a bit wearisome having to discipline them constantly. Ian is a such restless little boy in many regards. But he already is making a good explorer. He spent a lot of times in garden last year just to find bugs in there. Timmy already is following in his footsteps. For an instance, when I was walking out of a buffet restaurant, Timmy pulled fire alarm switch. It took me back to the time when Ian pulled one when he was three years old, thus interrupting the sacrament meeting of another ward and everyone had to walk out of the church building and wait for it to stop. Talk about your embarrassing moments. MY boys are very good at embarrassing me! Ha.

Cutting Timmy's curls

Timmy had the most adorable collection of CURLS! I LOVE every strand of them. I felt so sad when it was time for me to cut them. They were beginning to droop and Timmy was beginning to make everyone to think he is a girl instead of a boy. In the bath, his hair went past his shoulder! Ohhh . . .

Two weeks, I clipped them away. I don't know which is more tragic . . . Cutting his curls or realizing that he is growing up too fast.

Done with CERT Class!

Last Wednesday, I was able to complete the last course of CERT. CERT stands for Community Emergency Response Team. All firemen have been training people everywhere to prepare them to come in the assistance in the case of massive disaster that goes beyond the ability and resources of our professionals.

I must confess that it is very difficult for me to come to the class every time I take a course. Sometimes, knowledge can be a bit frightening. I had to endure some gruesome piece of information and learn how to manage with that. There are just some nights where I can't simply sleep or go back to sleep because of the bad dream that come from what I heard in CERT class or just knowing too much that leads me to feel stressed easily. I figured that I HAD to know how to manage it than to know nothing- which is the worst thing I can do if anything terrible happens.

The last course was the worst of them all. We had to do a stimulated disaster and show to firemen how we can do it and get some counsel. Firemen told us that there's no pass and fail in this course. We just need to wing it like we do in the real life. When I saw the stimulated scene, I told an interpreter dryly that we will profit more out of it by selling tickets so people can get scared like they do in the haunted houses.

I woke up in the middle of night because I had a dream where I was called to assist an injured victim, I was standing hip deep water and I was scrambling for anything that can help me with victim. I felt awfully helpless in the dream so I woke up with my heart beating so hard. I wondered about that . . . I didn't see anything gruesome in the dream but I believe that I am the most scared of feeling helpless and having no idea of what I should be doing.

I am so glad it is all over. I still am glad that I took the class. Because of the class, I feel a bit more prepared not only with knowledge. I was able to identify exactly what my family needed . . . fire extinguisher, first aid, and all AND BE able to use them all. I am glad I can add some stuff to our storage and help with family emergency preparation.