a special message from Jake

***I'm Jacob Clement and I approve of this message***

blog homework

I have really fallen behind on my blogging (thanks to Em and facebook) I thought I would try to catch up on a blog tag I received from Tenille (my favorite pretend sister-in-law) a while ago. Here's the rules:

1. Link to the person who tagged you
2. List the rules
3. Tag six fellow bloggers
4. Leave them a comment so they know they've been tagged
5. List 6 random facts on your blog

This will be a challenge for me. Random seems to be my middle name and I feel like I'm an open book so it might be hard to come up with things people haven't already heard.

1. My actual middle name is not Random it's Florence. Making my maiden name Eliza Florence Reed. Like all my other siblings I was named after ancestors. When I was little I use to feel like my name was really old fashion and weird. I can remember wishing I was named Jennifer or Amber or something like that. For a while I use to tell kids my real first name was Elizabeth and that I only went by Eliza for short. Everyone pretty much bought it and left it at that until one girl said, "If I was you I would go by Beth instead of Eliza..." I was sort of crushed that she confirmed all the feelings I had about my name, so for a very brief time I would respond to Beth by a couple kids in my class.

2. I am horrible at most things domestic. I am average at best with my cooking skills and much lower than average with cleaning, organizing, laundry etc...

3. I arranged Jeremy and my first "date" with his sister Amanda. It involved lots of luck and a fair amount of sneakiness. Jeremy still denies that I asked him out first.

4. There are very few vegetables that I will eat.

5. In my opinion a new outfit is soooo much better than any kind of happy pill doctors can prescribe. I seriously think that doctors should just prescribe a new outfit to all the woman out there that need a little extra help. I'm sure it ends up being much cheaper than all the co pays and doctor visits.

6. I really HATE Barak Obama... he scares me. Mitt was robbed!!

Now I get to "tag" six fellow bloggers: Let's see I will tag Jocelyn, Shaunna, Sarah, Carl, Heather W., and Vicki Good luck everyone!!

So I scored a 40 on this how ever there were a couple that I left black even though I may have done them. If I did do them then they weren't memorable. Looks like I have a lot of living left to do...

So here’s a list of 100 things. All the things I’ve done are highlighted in red. Copy this list on your own blog and come clean on everything you’ve done. Do it. You know you want to.

1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyland
8. Climbed a mountain
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18. Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitch hiked
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
41. Sung karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten Caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had your picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee
100.Visited Italy

halloween 2008

Thanks to Mom and her amazing sewing skills we were able to pull off another awesome theme inspired Halloween. The girls all LOVED their costumes (and really what's not to love). They commented all night on how "puffy" they were. They really want to wear their skirts to church this Sunday. Jake had many funny comments about his costume this year. First let me explain that I have their weird obsession with having all the kids dress in a theme. Last year we were blessed with our fourth child and were finally able to make my dreams come true of a complete Wizard of Oz cast (Dorthy, Tin Man, Scarecrow, AND lion). This year the girls have been very obsessed with Hairspray. I thought that they would love to dress either in 50's or 60's style clothing. After a few phone calls with my mother we came up with poodle skirts white shirts and scarfs. This of course meant that Jake would have to play along and dress as a 50's style little boy. I bought him a pair of very snug fitting jeans, a crisp white t-shirt, and I searched for two months for an inexpensive leather/pleather jacket. The jacket was never found so come Halloween night Jake's first comments was, "This isn't much of a costume mom, I think I would rather just stay home and pass out candy this year." I tried to tell him in the big picture he is totally in a costume. He just has to stick with his sisters so everyone knows what he "suppose to be". As the night went on Jake really warmed up to his costume and the theme.

When we finally ended the night and got back to the house Jake asked me, "When will I be old enough to pick my own costume?" I started thinking about this and as sad as it is to think about Jake probably only has about two or three more years of Trick or Treating in him, so I am considering letting everyone just have free range next year on costume choices. I'm not going to lie the thought of totally random costumes makes me a little ill. The other thought that keeps creeping into my thoughts is, the movie Twilight is coming out this year and it's really suppose to be a huge hit... doesn't a family of attractive, kind "vegetarian" vampires sound cute? I'll keep you all posted.

tag I'm it!!!

So my fabulous blogger friend Tenille has tagged me twice (unless she knows another Eliza that is). The first tag is a photo tag I am to post the photo that is in the 8th file and 6th picture over... Drum roll please.................


Here is Morgan at Chuck E. Cheese or as my good friend Torrie likes to call it Chuck E. Disease. She hasn't had much luck with Mr. Cheese and her kids' health. We have all been lucky and left with our heath intact

Let me see, I will go ahead and tag Torrie, Mom, and Brooke to post their 3rd file-4th picture.

flashback

So I was looking at some of my older posts and started laughing out loud when I watched this old video of Brooke. You may have all seen this but I think it's worth watching again.

fall photos

These are mostly for our grandma's and papa's benefits but while you're here you might as well check them out... I can guarantee they'll put a smile on your face. These pictures were taken Friday night at the kid's school. They had a family pizza picnic to encourage parents to come by the school and check in with their kid's teachers.






We LOVE our teachers!!

Now that you have seen the cute pictures of the kids let me show you what 90% of my pictures of Brooke look like. Brooke is a beautiful little girl who is NOT a fan of taking pictures. I don't think I have to worry about this one wanting to live her life in the fast lane of modeling.

Brooke took these picture of Morgan and me. Morgan LOVES to give very intense kisses (verging on painful). I just love them because they are so sincere and heartfelt.

bad mommy

CONFESSION:

Sometimes I turn into "cyber mommy" and get a little preoccupied with the whole internet/blogs thing. Jeremy will occasionally have to say something to the effect of, "Liza you need to put down your crack pipe and walk away" when I've been on for a while. This all being said here is a prime example of why it's best to wait to do your surfing when the babies are all nicely tucked into their beds.

If you're struggling with the pictures that would be peanut butter. It took four shampoo jobs to get it all out.

***side note*** yes that's carpet in our kitchen, and yes it's the next "big project" for the house. The person who thought that was a good idea needs to be put into a mental hospital.

random sampler

I am still undecided with the whole public/private thing. I actually watched an episode of Law and Order SVU which totally freaked me out but then I checked out the whole process of going private and it kind of looks like a huge pain in the booty. So out of my laziness I will be staying public... at least until the next episode of SVU airs. I loved getting all the comments. There were a few people who commented that surprised me. It's nice to know that the same blogs that I stalk are indeed stalking me too.

Saturday the kids and I got to hang out with a coworker/friend and her kids. It was so much fun getting to know her and meeting her adorable kids. We really had a blast playing and eating at Chick-fil-a and then moving the party over to the Discover Center. After we got home Riley would tear up at the mention of any of the Johnson's names. She makes BFFs very easy.

One thing that I find very cute about Jacob is how he really tries hard to be just like his dad. Dad likes football, Jake likes football. Dad talks about cool fast cars, Jake talks about cool fast cars. Dad follows baseball, Jake follows baseball. You get the picture. Jake tries so hard to keep up with the big boy talk but of course his knowledge is semi limited (I mean the kid is only 9 years old). Jake learned a while back about some super fast car called a Viper. I know nothing about cars but I hear it's like the awesomest of awesome cars. Now any time Jake sees a semi sporty looking car he always asks either me or Jeremy if it's a viper. We can be driving down the street and a yellow Dodge Neon with a little pinstripe job and an added spoiler and Jake will immediately say, "AHHHH Mom is that a Viper?!?!?" To which I have to remind him Vipers are very rare to spot especially in Amarillo, Texas. Jake thinks he sees a Viper like two or three times a week, but of course has never really seen one. Well on Saturday just down the street from us was a fundraiser for a big private school in town complete with a car show. I slowed down so Jake could check out the cars and he screamed, "Mom it's a REAL Viper!!"

Sure enough it WAS a real Viper. Jake was very excited and couldn't wait to tell daddy that he saw a REAL Viper (not a suped up Neon).

Sunday we had our biannual Clement conference tradition of watching the first session of conference followed by homemade biscuits and gravy (Jeremy makes them not me). Jake and girls were Jeremy's little assistants and the food turned out wonderful. My man knows how to cook!! I love our little tradition of watching church in our jammies and eating biscuits and gravy twice a year. Don't you all love Conference Sunday? I loved listening to Sister Dalton's talk on women of virtue. It was inspiring to me and I thought she was a very good speaker. I also felt so proud as President Ballard spoke on all of the advances in South America through missionary work. All my favorite men served their missions in South America and were part of that rich missionary history. I ended up taking some allergy medication with my biscuits and gravy so the second Sunday session was not quite as crisp in my memory, thank goodness for DVR I will have to take the next few evenings to re watch the talks while not under the influence of Benodryl.

Tonight for FHE the kids and I (sadly Jeremy works every night until about 8:30) drove around downtown Amarillo leaving little notes for strangers. I got this idea from Nie Nie and thought it would be a big success with our family. Two weeks ago we actually talked about the importance of being kind to everyone and how it is nice to serve others. After talking about being kind to strangers I gave them the idea of leaving little notes for people. They loved the idea and we went out to Target to pick up the supplies. We then worked on making the little notes and making a list of nice things a stranger might like to read. The two older kids wrote the little messages while Brooke drew some little decorations on the cards. Tonight was the big night to actually leave all our little love notes for others to find. We left them all over including; the police station, library, a small downtown park area, bus stop, civic center and the kids school. After we were done we still had several so we left a couple at some of our friends houses anonymously. The kids were so funny about it all. They would race out the car and look around before leaving the note and racing back. At first they didn't really get why we weren't telling everyone it was us who left them but I explained that sometimes we do nice things for others without telling them it was from us. We really had a fun time hanging out together planting our little love notes for strangers.

warnings there might be changes ahead...

After a couple of conversations (Jeremy, Hope, and David) I started worrying that I might need to go private. The biggest reason I haven't wanted to go private yet is because I personally love to blog stalk onto other people's blogs. I'm not trying to sound egotistical by assuming that I too have blog stalkers but let's be honest, we all know that I have an unidentified "fan" in Little Rock. Don't worry Little Rock I'm not doing this just because of you. I don't know I'm still on the fence but I seem to be leaning on the private side as apposed to the public side. In the event that I am pushed onto the private side I would like to know who would like an invite to read my private blog (this would mean you would have to be logged into your blogger account before you could access my blog). I won't do anything rash. I will give you all a week or two so I can add you as a reader before I make the big change.

Private or public... discuss amongst yourselves...

happy fall y'all

This evening we went out and harvested all of our ripe pumpkins. The kids had so much fun planting and tending to their pumpkin patch this year. I think we might have over planted because the pumpkins seemed to take over a good fourth of our backyard. It got to the point that we couldn't mow a huge chunk of lawn because the pumpkins outgrew the dirt plot we had set up for them. After harvesting the pumpkins we went to a few of our neighbors and shared "the fruit of our labors". It was a really nice way to spend the evening together as a family. We still have about 15 pumpkins that are picked and ready to give out. I think we will have to have some of our good friends come to the "Clement pumpkin patch" and pick out a pumpkin or two. In the pictures you might notice an injury on Morgan's face/head. That would be our first injury due to the bunk beds. Poor baby fell out of the top bunk onto the bottom bunk and then bounced into the girls play kitchen. When I asked Riley and Brooke how she got up to the top they both swear she climbed up there herself. I guess no more free range for Morgan in the girls room.

homecoming texas style

This Friday was my school's homecoming (hc). I don't remember hc being such a big deal back in my high school days. Perhaps it's because I wasn't exactly full of "school spirit" back in the day (I don't think I actually went to any of my high school football games). I do know that we had floats during our hc half time shows at Bakersfield High School. The only reason I know that is because one year a kid chopped off a couple fingers making one of the floats. Our high school here in Texas does not do the floats on the field... Oh no they prefer to WEAR their floats on their chests. Three years ago when I started working for the high school I was introduced to a very unusual custom in Texas (maybe it's a Southern thing). On the Friday of the big hc game most of the girls and many of the boys showed up to school wearing a "mum". In case you are not a Texan I will explain what a mum is and some of the mum etiquette.

-A mum is a HUGE wreath like ornament you wear on your chest if you're a girl and your arm if you're a boy. I think the big goal is to add as many trinkets/ribbons on your mum without toppling over when you put it on. Most people make their mum by starting with a teddy bear in the center and building out from there.

-If you are dating someone during homecoming it is very much expected that your boy/girl friend will give you a mum.

-Parents often give their daughters a mum in the event that they are single on the big day.

-Parents would almost NEVER give a son a mum (that would be considered kind of lame and pathetic). Boys will only wear a mum if their girlfriends give them one.

-There is a direct correlation between length of mum and how much you are loved (not really, but the queen bees would argue this is true).

-The most popular of popular girls will wear more than one mum. The most I have seen on one girl is three.-You do not necessarily have to have a mum for all four years but I would guess that 95% of senior girls would feel very sad if they didn't get a mum for their last year.

-You NEVER wear a mum more than once (tacky).

-An average sized mum will run you between $100-$150. Although it's perfectly acceptable to make your own which is cheaper but NOT cheap.

-If you're a girl and you do not have a mum but your bff does you are often expected to help with the carrying/repining of their mum(s). It can almost look like a bride with her devoted bride's maids carrying her train.

-If you are one of the many students with a baby in the school daycare it is considered very cute to make a matching mum for baby and "mummy".

-All Friday I find little trinkets (small football helmets, whistles, bells, ribbons, sports emblems etc.) that have fallen off some poor girl's mum. It's like the girls are walking pinatas... if you bump them hard enough you WILL get a prize.

I took Jake and a couple of his friends to the big game and they were all thrilled with all the little prizes they were finding all night long. I wanted to take a picture of this particular student without looking like a creep or something. I got a side shot so you can't fully see her shirt.

It read, "Future CHS homecoming KING". I thought it was very clever (rolling my eyes).

As requested by my mother here is a randome picture I took of Brooke tonight. I caught her in a "picture taking mood".

***side note*** We won the game making our record for the year 3-1. This in itself is a worth bragging about. Last year we had one win which we celebrated heartily because it was our first win in like 4 years. We have possibly the worst record in the state of Texas. GO LONGHORNS!!!