The Beast

Okay so here is an update of how we are doing on are plan of getting more healthy. First off I should just say" I "because Clay does not seem to want to play yet! To his defense though he has been very busy. I have done okay. I have got on The Beast or treadmill everyday for the last 5 days. I do an hour and try to go 4 to 5 miles. I have also done my pilates and started with the P90X. Talk about hard core , the P90X is!!! It has been harder this time staying on track. My left knee is acting weird. It makes a horrible sound going upstairs. Not sure what that is.....oh well, it's not stopping me yet!I have been paying attentions to my portion size when eating and bought a whole bunch of 100 calorie snack bags.So now it time for my confession I am making marshmellow popcorn right now so we can finish watching the 2nd season of Dexter. Bad bad I know but I'm not having dinner!Yes I am hungry all the time but I am hoping my stomach will hurry and shrink. At least this time I am doing it without a magic pill. But I do miss my blue speckled pill, dang it for ruining your heart!

I Know I Am So What Are You

You know how you see those crazy pet people, that act like their pets are human and you think I would never be like that?Well.............I have to confess I have become one of those CRAZY people!!!I really am quite ashamed by it and didn't think I was that bad until I cleaned the drawer where I keep Gracie's outfits.Man just saying that sounds sooooo bad!!Dog outfits shouldn't even be in a sentence!Well anyways, here is my confession, yes I love my baby, yep that's right my baby.Since I confessed about the clothes might as well about the carseat. Got to keep my gracie safe.To those that are laughing and mocking me, I know secrets about some of you and your pets so hush!I chalk it up to~~ 1. I decided to get her on my own 2. search long and hard for her 3. saved the money myself so I am invested in the little girl! : )

My Life In A Box

We recently cleaned out our basement.In the process of doing that it meant we had to go through lots and lots of boxes.My whole life story was in those brown cardboard boxes.So many memories came rushing back to me , some that I had completely forgotten about.Some brought tears to my eyes but mostly smiles and laughter.I found old love letters from Clay from when I was away at college, letters from friends from long ago, announcements, obituaries etc.Tons and tons of pictures from teen years to recent.To my facebook friends, yes they will be coming up in the future on FB, so watch out!I found Clay's and my wedding announcement and the key from our honeymoon suite.The little hat from the hospital that we brought Brittany home in.And of course every mother's favorite lots of homemade cards and letters from our kids.When I was in college a few roommates and I started a cleaning business to make some extra money for important things like...... ding dongs! Our clients, the few we had were all male college students of course.I found the contract we made up and had them sign.It really was fun catching up on old memories. So many names of people that I forgotten about or could not remember their new last names.Thanks to facebook I have connected with so many.So I packed them all away again and will continue I'm sure to add to my life in a box!

Putting It Out There

I can't believe another year has gone by!The worst month of the year is upon us at least in my book. I hate hate January.I really think that is why I had Brittany in January just so it would give me something to do! = } Every year Clay and I start making list of what we are going to try and accomplish the new year.Every year we always start out with losing weight and getting more healthy.This year is no different except I am telling it out loud here!Every once and awhile I am going to blog on how it is going, the good, bad and ugly!Wish us luck!!

HO HO HO!!

Well another Christmas has come and gone.Usually Christmas has always been a stressful time for me, mostly because I put it on myself.So many years of buying zillion gifts for four kids and making sure it was all even and that their dreams would all come true.Of course I blame my own parents of starting the tradition of going overboard!But now that they are older the stress level has went way down!Clay and I never bought gifts for each, it was enough to just buy for them but we had gifts to open this year from each other and that was fun.What really made Christmas is our little Talan!He was so much fun this year.Still wasn't too sure of Santa even though it was his buddy Papa!Thanks to him the magic is back!

Trees Trees Trees

I can't believe it's that time of year again to drag all the Christmas crap from the basement. It always takes several trips up and down!This year we have 12 trees to put up.Mind you only 4 are decorated, the rest just have white lights on them. The four that are decorated I only have to decorate 2 because I leave the other two decorated when I pack them up. Yes that is out of pure laziness!The one in the kitchen changes every year and this year it is the grinch tree. I also changed out the colors of my two big trees. It's hard to see in the pics what they really look like. We went with brown, green, gold and silver in the living room and red and silver in the family room.We'll see how long they last before I get tired of those colors!

Gratitude

Our computer crashed about 2 months ago. We had it fixed once and it lasted about 3 weeks before another virus killed it. A friends father just rebuilt it and said it might last a little longer but not for long. We knew our next computer would only be a Mac so it was going to be awhile before we could save up for one. We got a BIG surprise last night. Our wonderful kids surprised us with a new Mac computer!We were shocked to say the least!! We both feel that it is too much and they should return it but of course they will not hear anything of it. What touched me more than a fantastic computer was why they did it. They said they only remember having wonderful Christmases.They knew we had times when their wasn't much money but when they woke up on Christmas everything was there they had asked for.Jeremy can even remember back to Christmas 1992 probably one of our hardest but he remembers it fondly.I can't tell you how much joy that brought me!It's wonderful to feel so much gratitude from your children.

Lots To Be Thankful For

My parents were brave enough to have Thanksgiving at their house again this year in St. George. It is always a crowd! There were over 25+ people there. But we must also count the dogs, they numbered 5. Thanks mom for loving dogs and letting us all bring ours!There were dogs and grand kids everywhere! My sister Leinani has a best friend who has a second home up the street from my parents. They were in Palm Springs so they let us use it. So a few families crashed there. I have a brother and sister that live there too so we were scattered everywhere. We had a so much fun! My Mom always goes to great lengths to make everything perfect. She still insists on doing all the meal planning and most of the prep is done when we arrive. Some day she will let us help out more..... I hope!She also always has fun activities for the grand kids. They decorated sugar cookies and a gingerbread house. One day the girls all went to New Moon while the kids went to Planet 51. At night we played games, poker and karaoke. My Mom even rapped with her grandson.
Priceless!

Our Little Monster

Shantel invited us over for dinner and to go trick or treating with Talan.We were so excited to go!We had yummy tacos and then off we went.Talan loved it!He ran from house to house.She had brought the wagon for Talan to use in case he got tired but the kid wouldn't have anything to do with it.Someone got good use of it.....the dogs Gracie and Starr!Clay pulled them along the way.Talan was saying Hi and Bye to everyone.It was so much fun to watch him.His Grandma Barb and Aunt Susan met up with us too.I am so glad we got to be there for his first time of trick or treating!
His minute in the wagon
Clay giving the dogs a free ride
Our Little Man
Grandma Barb and his Aunt Susan

The Sweet Family

Pumpking Carving

We have always carved pumpkins as a family when the kids were little. Now that one has started her own family we started the tradition last year of making a family pumpkin carving party.We have dinner first and then start carving. My boys take it very seriously and search high and low for the right thing to carve. They amaze me every year. Talan was not too interested in it yet but maybe next year.This year we had a old classmate that Clay has know since grade school come over.He found out Randy Neal lives here from facebook. It truly is a small world. It was great catching up with him.It was a fun evening.
Intense pumpkin carving

Spencer and Talan sporting their new mouths
Spencer's skelton
Jeremy's Dr. Evil
Clay and Randy-old friends