VOTE OR DIE

I think I have mentioned before that I get a little "down time" at work from time to time. The other day while sitting in our little interpreter's office I was having a discussion with some of the other interpreters. I don't want to sway your opinions so I won't tell you which side I was arguing in our little debate.

The issue we were talking about was this: If you are in a social friendly gathering what do you think is the more appropriate burp method. Are you a silent "burp and blow" type or are you the loud and proud type? Do you even do this in social settings at all? Do you excuse yourself and find a private location to take care of business?

I feel like in this time of great changes in America with elections going on candidates need to address the real issues (this being one of course). I am just trying to instigate a little communication on this less often talked about issue. Now it's time to use your voice and vote in my poll to your right. Thank you and God bless America.

***side note*** If you have ever spent much time with me then I am sure you know my opinion but please don't reveal it in your comment. I need this poll to be on the up and up.

quilt giveaway

I read about this online giveaway on our cousin Jocelyn's blog check it out. Her stuff is gorgeous!! Good luck everyone and please mention that I sent you.

Happy Birthday Mom!!

What can I say about my mother that I haven't already said? I know those who know my mother would agree she is a wonderful wife, mother, grandmother, and servant of the Lord. Most people know she has been through so much with her health lately that we all feel like we were the ones given a gift this year on her birthday. She is so amazing and I truly feel honored to call her my mother and friend. Happy birthday we love you dearly!! Now go out and party like you're 54 again... you deserve it!!


To read some of the amazing experiences that have helped mold her into the woman she is today read this short synopsis of the past 55 years in her own words.

a conversation with my 5 year old

Today while driving home from work/school with Brooke (Brooke attends a preschool on the same campus that I work at) we had this conversation:

Brooke: "Next week can I bring a boyfriend to my house for a date?"

Mom: "No silly you're too young for a boyfriend."

Brooke: "But iCarly has a boyfriend." (iCarly is a new t.v. show on Nickelodeon the main character is named Carly).

Mom: "She's lots older than you Brooke... (a short pause) Brooke do you know what a boyfriend is?"

Brooke: laughing and speaking as sassy as a five year old can, "Noooooo!!! I'm just a kid. Don't YOU know what it is?!?!?!

Morgan updates

Yesterday I was thinking about living so far away from family and friends and realized that most of our loved ones have not even seen Morgan walking yet. Babies change and grow up so quickly so I thought I would try and capture Morgan's newest tricks on a video for everyone so far away. Enjoy!!

***side note*** Morgan had just eaten a chocolate chip cookie so that's why she's a little gross.

a day at the museum

I was asked by Riley's teacher to help out on a first grade field trip to the High Plains Historical Museum in Canyon Texas. I was thrilled that I was able to arrange my work schedule so I could go. We had a wonderful time. As we were driving down to Canyon from Amarillo I was told that I had the best of the best kids in my group so that I would be willing to possibly do this again next month when they all go to Wild Cat Bluff. After we got to Canyon we had our little sack lunches and then went into the museum for about two hours to tour around. I thought one of the most interesting things in the museum was this piece. It appears to be a carving of three American Indians blowing bubbles.

Just as promised my group was fantastic. I had five little kiddos including Riley and I'm proud to say that no one in our group set off an alarm or bled in the museum. I can't say the same thing for the other groups there.

FHE and a cute video

Yesterday in Sacrament meeting we had a missionary theme that I thought we could carry over to our FHE tonight. We are going to write to two missionaries and then I am going to see if I can get the kids to memorize this short song. I saw this through blog hopping today and I think it's adorable. I thought I would post it for other families to see and possibly learn. Have a great week everyone!

it's gardening time

Jeremy and the kids have been really fired up with planting a fruit and vegetable garden. I think it sounds like fun but I honestly have some sort of post traumatic stress syndrome from gardening in my youth. It's actually very cute they all went out and bought a bunch of seeds and then soaked them for a few days in water. A couple of days ago Jeremy promised them that they could wait up for him to get home from work so they could plant their seeds in little peat pots. We now have the peat pots in all our kitchen and dinning room window sills. Thanks to daylight savings Jeremy comes home from work in the evenings and has about an hour of sunlight left for him to clear his little garden out. Jake and Jeremy both bought themselves some gardening gloves and rakes. They have cleared an area of about 25 feet by 10 feet and are just waiting for our seedlings to be strong enough to transplant into their new home. We hope that in the next 3-4 months we will have pumpkins, corn, cantaloupe, watermelon, zucchini, squash, tomatoes, and strawberries. We will keep everyone posted on our progress. The whole thing seems very provident/pioneerish to me.

wow...

I don't think any of my blog buddies know sign language or work with deaf people but I also don't think you have to be closely connected to the deaf community to appreciate this:

a gross moment

A gross conversation I had with Riley this morning read at your own discretion:

Riley: yelling from her room "Mom..."

Me: "What's wrong Riley?"

Riley: with tears running down her face, "someone barfed on me last night!!"

Me: looking around at her bed and seeing dried up throw up on her pillow and sheets, "Riley are you sure you didn't throw up last night?"

Riley: "No!! Why would I throw up in my bed?!?! Brookie did it!!"

Me: yelling from Riley's room, "Brooke..."

Brooke walks in.

Me: "Brooke did you barf on your sister?"

Brooke: looking at me like I'm an idiot, "No..."

Riley: "She's lying!!"

Me: "Riley I really don't think Brooke threw up on you I think you did it when you were sleeping and you just don't remember. Does your tummy hurt?"

Riley: "Will I get to stay home now?"

Me: "I guess if you don't feel good you can stay home today."

Riley: "Yeah I don't feel good and plus my hair is crunchy from barf so I have to stay home today."

I continue to get ready for work and get Brooke and Jake ready for school. As we are leaving for school I hear Riley asking Jeremy this question:

Riley: "Daddy can you make pancakes for breakfast?"

BUNCO!!!

My good friends Shaunna , Erin and myself all thought we should start a Bunco group. We had our first official Bunco night last Saturday and it was a blast! I would highly recommend this to anyone who likes girls night outs, good food, chit chatting, no kids for a couple of hours, and major laughs.

I have played Bunco in the past however it was forever ago that being said it was somehow enough experience to qualify me as the MC for the night. I have never played without 12 people so we invited our nine other guests and got a confirmation from everyone that they would be there. Then of course we got a call about three hours before the night was to begin saying someone was backing out. We were all a little frantic for the next two and a half hours while we tried to call every female we knew who had ten dollars (these were our only qualifications to get in at this point). I eventually was able to get a hold of my friend's teenage daughter who was free and thanks to a little babysitting she had done the week earlier she also had the buy in needed. She was thrilled to be invited and even though she was the only one under aged there it all worked out. Everyone brought ten dollars to play so there was $120 in the pot as prize money. We all decided that the prizes would go as followed:

most Buncos- $50

most wins- $30

most loses- $20

travelers- $20

I would say that weirdest/funniest moment of the night goes to my "toe cancer intervention". Here's what happened...

I have a really great friend named Danielle who is always much more concerned with my health than I am. I wouldn't call her a hypochondriac......... to her face :) she just loves spending her free time googling every sort of sickness or ailment known to man (we love ya Danielle and wouldn't want you any other way). Now that you know her background you need to know a little bit of mine. I have this really gross mole/possible cancer on my toe. It has been there as long as I can remember and yes it has slightly changed color and size. I really never even think about it but Danielle has been hounding me to get it checked out ever since she has known of it's existence. About a third of the way through our Bunco game Danielle realizes that one of the ladies there is a physicians assistant specializing and working in a dermatologist's office. For the next 30 min she begs me to take off my shoe and sock and let this poor woman look at my mole. I kept trying to change the subject but it wasn't going to get dropped. Eventually Beth (the PA) is curious enough to see it that she also starts in on me. At one point there was mention of an intervention involving me getting pined down and someone else taking my shoe off (I say bring it sista... you know I could have taken you down hehe). Finally I gave in to the most anti-climatic ending, Beth looks at it for literally two seconds and says, "oh that's fine and normal".

Of course now that the shoe and sock are off everyone has to stop the game to check out my gross toe. It really was funny I wasn't at all upset I was just laughing the whole time. I guess it could have been worse... an OBGYN could have shown up.

After playing/talking for about 2 1/2 hours the game was over and four lucky people (including myself :) ) walked away with a percentage of the pot. Everyone loved playing and we hope to make this a monthly event we already have our May Bunco night on the calendar. I think everyone involved looked at this as a fun cheap girls night out. I know that I would have spent more than ten dollars to sit at a restaurant with my girls talking and eating. We got to do both of those here and you get to leave with the chance of a little spending money in your pocket. It was a win win for everyone.

sick sick sick

I'm so sick of being sick!! I have a great post about our bunco game last night but I'm just too dang sick to do it justice. Let's just say it was FAN-TAB-U-LOUS!! I will have to get better so I can post pictures and give you all the scoop. Maybe tomorrow. I'm going to lay down.

Ding Dong...

The TMI (too much information) part of my brain doesn't always work so sometimes I need to ask friends if certain stories are a little too much for my family blog. I have a great story that cracks me up but until I read this post on my friend's blog I wasn't sure if it was TMI or in any way offensive. I know I wasn't offended just amused.

Let me set the stage for you... a few weeks back Jeremy and I were in our bedroom with most of the kids. I was messing around on our computer and Jeremy was watching a basketball game in his baggy athletic shorts with a pillow on his lap. Riley and Morgan were playing together on the floor between our computer and t.v.

Morgan is very fond of playing the ever popular baby game of, "find the belly button". Riley was keeping her entertained by said game and I kept hearing them finding each other's button and then pushing it and saying, "ding dong". They kept taking turns finding and then ringing each other's "ding dong" it was cracking Morgan up. I guess the game was getting a little old though because as I was checking out blogs I over heard Riley say, "Morgan let's find Daddy's ding dong." I looked over at Jeremy who was very much "in the zone" so he was totally unaware of the game that was being played between the girls or what Riley had just said. Riley kind of crawled over to Jeremy and then once again said, "where's Daddy's ding dong?" This time as she said it she started to stick her hand underneath his pillow. Jeremy heard it this time and the look on his face was priceless. He jumped out of his chair and grabbed that pillow for dear life. He looked at a confused Riley and said, "What are you doing?!?!?!" Our very confused innocent little Riley said, "playing find the ding dong with Morgan." Now Jeremy was the confused one he looked at me and I was just busting up. I lifted up my shirt a little, pointed at my own belly button and repeated what Riley said, "they're playing find the ding dong Jerm." It was hilarious!!

Tag you're it!!

I started this post a couple of weeks ago but then things all went really crazy with my mom so I never posted it. Well I finished it all up tonight but can't seem to get it at the top of my blog so you will have to click here to read yet another silly tag... :)

A kind moment

I have to record these little conversations I have with my children or else they will get lost in this big empty head of mine.

Today I picked up Jake from school earlier than normal so he could go get some blood work done. I was going over his day at school and asked him what he learned about today. Jake's class has been learning about slavery in America and with shock in his voice he likes to give me a daily report. Today they talked about Harriet Tubman and "the drinking gourd". Jacob went over it all in detail with me. He told me Harriet was a train engineer in the underground railroad and that she found her freedom from running away and following the north star. He even sang an old slavery song about following the drinking gourd which is the Little Dipper and North star. After going over everything with me he quieted down for a second and then in all seriousness asked me, "could Heavenly Father ever forgive the people who made black people into slaves?" We talked about forgiveness for a little while and I told him that I believe that Heavenly Father could forgive almost anything if the person was truly repentant and went through the repentance process. It is really not hard to find these teaching moments with Jacob he loves to learn new things.

After sharing this story with Jeremy he reminded me of some of the words that he spoke at Jacob's blessing almost nine years ago.

Jeremy felt strongly to bless Jacob with empathy but just at that moment couldn't come up with the word 'empathy' he paused for a moment and used the synonym 'compassion' and then elaborated on it with something like, "...that he will have the ability to know what others are feeling and comfort them when needed."

A funny moment

Last night we were having what I call a mobile FHE. being a one car family we needed to pick up Jeremy at work at about 8:15 and then get everyone home, have our scripture study time, brush teeth, get pjs on and lights out by 9:00. This meant we would use our drive time for our FHE lesson. Jake was assigned the lesson and had prepared a great one on tithing. He started the lesson off by using his "primary teacher" voice and asking, "Does anyone know what tithing is?" I rose my hand and the two older girls followed my lead. Jake asked Brooke first (in the same primary teacher voice), "Brooke what do you think it means?" Brooke yelled back, "Mom raised her hand too, ask her first!" I think he called her bluff. He then asked Riley, "Riley what do you think it means?" Riley's answer I think demonstrates that she in not always the most attentive member of primary/FHE, "Ummmm..... It makes you itchy all over." Jake was a little confused by this answer but went right on with his lesson.

I am proud to say that all three of the oldest Clement children could now answer the question:

What is tithing? (or at least they could have on Monday night)