Rude Awakenings!

I was interrupted from a very deep and enjoyable sleep several times last night. The first was at a mere 2am, and I'm not going to go into details on what that was about. The second, was at 7:30 am, which is technically morning but after having my sleep interrupted once already, 7:30 felt a little more like the middle of the night to me. Anyway, to proceed with the story, Brooke woke me at 7:30 this morning bauling that Ashton smacked her in the head.

 
"Why did Ashton smack you in the head?" I asked, still groggy
   "I don't know, I was just trying to wake her up for school." Brooke says in the sweetest voice she can muster.

Knowing Brooke, there has got to be more to this story. I don't want to say that  Brooke is a bad kid, but she certainly isn't winning any awards for good behavior any time soon.
  "Brooke," I say, rubbing sleep from my eyes, "how, exactly is it that you went about waking your sister up?"
Brooke gives me the doe-eyed innocence look.
   "I just shook her a little and said, 'its time to get up and get ready for school Ashton.' And then she smacked me in the head!"
  "hmmm." Theres definately more to this story .
Just as Brookie is about to snuggle into my lap and really milk me for sympathy, Ashton comes bouncing into the room, leaps up onto the bed and says,
  "Mom, Brooke woke me up this morning by sticking her finger in my butt!"

And...There's the rest of the story.

When I finally did get to the bottom of the whole thing, (no pun intended.) I discovered that Brooke didn't exactly intend to penetrate Ashton's crevice with her finger, but instead was going for the more mild offense of pinching and her fingers slipped. Considering Ashton was not blessed with ample booty, this possibility is quite plausable and I choose to accept it.

As for my choice in discipline, well what could I do really? If it were me waking up to anal probing I think I would have done more than just smacking the culprit.

Lesson learned: choices and consequences.

Probing another's ass = a smack in the head.
Good enough for me.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming,

Life. Already in progress.

The baskets are put away.

The grass in vacuumed up.

 And the girls are back in school! (ahhhh! sigh of relief.)

Its not that I'm some kind of easter scrooge,

but I'm just glad to be back into the normal routine.

Well...almost.

 I'm so worn out from all the sugar rushes

 and little girl cat fights that it is now 12:00 pm

on Tuesday afternoon and

I  AM

STILL IN

MY PAJAMAS!

I know. Gross right?

below are some pictures highlighting the high points of our eratic easter day.

(with four kids, two jobs and a cat. Life is pretty much always eratic.)

ENJOY.

Consumed by wonderlands and games of hunger

I've pretty much been wrapped up in my life lately to the point that I've thrown writing out to the wind. I would apologize except that I don't think anyone really gives a damn weather I write my weekly trifles down and post them for anyone to see or not. Its pretty clear this blog is a blog for me alone to read and reflect on.

Anyhoo, The last couple of weeks have been absorbed by the problems Ashton's having with bullies at school and fights between Ash and Brooke. In the time away from those two things I've got my own dispute I've been working out. Lets just say, I deal with some OCD ridden, narciccistic, persons, but really who doesn't? Then there's the book I've completely fallen into in any spare time. In fact I've even made spare time just to absorb myself into it and out from reality. I encourage anyone to read it. The Hunger Games it is called and its magnificent! It was this month's book club choice. I have to say, I never thought I would enjoy it so much. I read it because it was the book of choice. I am now more than half-way through the sequel. Read it, you'll love it.

Ashton asked if we could go out for a little mommy-daughter night last night. I obliged. We dropped the other kids off at grandma's and went to see Alice in wonderland .  I liked it and I don't care what the critics say. It is not the Alice that we all are used to, and that is probably the best part about it. Its bold and fun and totally thought-provoking. Plus Jonny Depp. Need I say more. He's absolutely terrific in this film, as always.

My only regret about the evening is buying a much larger-than-necessary tub of popcorn because a lot of it went to waste.

On the way back I told Ash that we'd been gone too long and that I bet grandma turns into the red queen when we get back.

Of course she didn't dissapoint and we had a good laugh about it later.

In short, Alice was very entertaining and I would definately recommend seeing it. I'm no critic, but i'm an average house-wife and my opinion should count for more based on the fact that most people are like me-looking for entertainment not a lot of artsy hooplah! I also recommend reading The hunger games if you haven't already.

The Yuckas

For the past two weeks my family and I have had what I call "the yuckas", which really is as accurate a name as any other for this particular ailment. The yuckas start with a little dribbly nose that can easily be dismissed as seasonal allergies.

Maybe spring is beginning to bud, I always think.

But then by day three or four everyone starts feeling pretty run down and fever's begin to spike. Then before you know it we're spending half the day in our jammies watching Spongebob and nursing bottles of Robitussin like its liquid candy.

And It's not like I'm a big baby or something. I can handle a cold like any other normal person,

but this junk doesn't want to go away!

By day six and seven I'm so sick of wiping thick snot from the kids' faces and listening to their raspy little whines I could just strangle myself.

But alas, there does seem to be an end in sight. We're going on day twelve or something like that and the runny noses seem to be slowing down, coughs are settling, and we're all slowly emerging from our cave little by little.

If you do come into your own case of the yuckas I suggest Mucinex. Its a life saver.The humidifier's seem to be helping the cough's a lot too. The kids went from those dry "croopy" sounding coughs a week ago to a nice wet cough within one day. (Wet cough's are better than dry. I'm not being sarcastic here).

And hang in there spring is almost here!!

Good Human!

A friend of mine, while taking classes at the university for journalism/writing, was required to write a profile of herself as seen through the eyes of her pet.

This sounded like a deliciously interesting writing assignment and I wanted to attempt it myself. The following is an attempt to describe myself from the view point of my cat, Mr. Kitty.

I bounded up the stairs to see what the humans were doing up there today.

The humans keep strange hours, awake and wandering through the house while I'm trying to sleep on one of my many beds. And when I am feeling active, they wish to sleep.

The gate was closed again so I sat on the top step and stared through the bars.

The smaller, red haired one was making that noise again. The one that sounds like desperate meowing.

I believe he wishes for food.

He was in strange disguise again. This time he wore a green covering over his body and his head as well. Only a small amount of red fur could be seen peeking out from under the covering on his head.

The female, the one the other's call mommy, is carrying the smallest one on her hip.

She carries the small one a lot, even though he can now walk on his own.

Humans tend to over-care for their young.

The large female does not see me staring at first. Her back is turned and she is busy preparing something for the littlest one to suckle.

The female turns around and sees me, we make eye contact.

"What do you want, stupid?" She mutters to me.

She does not seem to think I understand that she is insulting my intellegence.

I meow an insult back to her and she doesn't seem to understand that either, because she opens the gate and lets me through to the upstairs portion of the house.

I like it up here, its much warmer than the downstairs.

I follow the female human to the large bed where she lays down with the small one. He is now suckling on the container that has a sort of teet attached to its top.I jump up to snuggle in close to her, but she pushes me, and I tumble to the floor despite my attempt to claw in to the soft cushion.

She makes no sense, this female, petting me and giving me food one moment then pushing me off the bed the next. I would throw her out of my house all together if she weren't the only one to clean out my litter box.

Later, I think I shall hide around the corner of the downstairs, wait until I hear her coming, then jump out at her suddenly, and give her my nastiest yowl.

She will probably jump back and yelp like she has done in the past.

This will be my revenge.

For now, I think I'll wander to my favorite spot in the hallway and stretch out on the floor. This way, the female will have to step around me to pass to the other parts of the house and she will then know that I am dominant in this territory.

Ahh, yes she comes. She bows down closer to me and rubs my head.

It seems I have finally made her understand who is master here.

She is a good human. Not so bright, but she is good.

I'M BACK!

And feeling like my self again.
Sunday night I was a mess. But this is my recipe for a quick self rejuvination:

Sunday, after work, I had a good long cry followed by a good long chat with my incredibly supportive and caring husband, Nate in which he assured me that I am not a terrible person, mother, wife etc. etc.
I then endulged myself in a good long cuddle session with said awesome husband.

Monday I did some self reflection and discovered that my biggest problem is the feeling of being lost. Lost from what I should be doing in life, as a mother, in my career, etc. etc. I concluded after some soul searching and some recall from all the fabulous lessons I've learned over the many years of going to church that I needed to get myself back in touch with God.
I had a good prayer session with Heavenly father on Tuesday and read some scripture. I opened my Book of Mormon randomly and ended up in 3rd Nephi. I've never really read 3rd Nephi much, usually I start reading at the beginning of the book and get lazy by about 2nd Nephi. (I know, I'm terrible at being spiritual.) But I feel I was inspired to read these verses of 3rd Nephi yesterday for good reason.

"Ask and ye shall recieve, knock and it shall be opened unto you..."

The faithful Nephites asked for immortality. What did I ask for?

I asked for a way to be made that I can stop working on Sunday. I asked to be closer again to Heavenly father.
But mostly I was reminded of how much I am blessed. I am very blessed. Right now I am mostly grateful for healthy, happy, kids. I also am very greatful for such a good husband.

Today, I got back to my workout routine. The Firm. I also read my scriptures again. Its amazing how much the word of God helps. Everything just seems less overwhelming. I can see a clear path to better our situation.
Why do I ever drift?

God is great.

Remember

I recall, quite clearly the last time I felt lost, probably a lot more lost than I feel now. It was almost ten years ago-almost to this day actually. I had been given a second chance at life, to do it right. (Okay, who am I kidding, this was like my one-hundredth chance). God gives me lots of chances, because I guess its important that I get it right. The path was there. I saw it clearly. I knew what I needed to do. Then, instead of doing it, I ran the other way and right into my wake-up call.

Jonah had his big blue whale. I had my big huge car crash.

It was past mid-night. I was too tired to drive. I was visiting a friend in Salt Lake City. A friend I met in an unsavory club. He had cooked me dinner that night and we went for a walk in the park with my baby. It wasn't like I was hanging out with the devil himself, just a boy, who didn't have the values I knew I should have had.

He could tell, as I packed my diaper bag and bundled my baby, that I was much too tired to drive. He asked me to stay the night. I knew I couldn't. I knew I shouldn't have been there to begin with and I couldn't stay another minute longer. I didn't make it very far.

I remember seeing the stop light and I remember seeing that it was red, but in my dazed condition I couldn't remember what red meant. Was is go or stop?  I sailed through the State street intersection. Four lanes on each side.I don't know why I remember that the radio was set to classical music, soothing so Ashton could sleep. I vaguely remember seeing the lights of the other car coming right at my window on the drivers' side, and hearing the loud blare of its horn. Then there was impact.

When I opened my eyes only minutes, maybe seconds later, I was laying with my head on the passenger's seat. The driver's side window was completely shattered. I could hear my baby crying hysterically in the back. A good sound, because at least it meant she was alright. I tried frantically to get out of the car, but the door was smashed in too far. I scrambled over to the passenger's side and jumped out. Within seconds, Ashton was in my arms and I was telling her it would all be okay.

A young hispanic boy and his father came up to where I stood next to my smashed car, eyes wide with horror. The man looked into the car and asked where the driver was. He thought I was a bystander, who had come to help the baby in the back. When I told him I was the driver, he couldn't believe it. He wasn't the only one to find it impossible. An ambulance showed up a minute later, and the paramedics asked the same question. They had expected to have to cut the victim out of the vehicle.

The cop who was on the scene motioned to where the driver of the other car stood on the corner. He looked to be a young boy, probably a teenager. He was alright, but very angry about his banged up car.

I felt fortunate to make it through that crash, and completely unscathed. I felt extremely relieved and grateful to Heavenly father for my baby being completley fine.  I felt God had given me another chance to stay on this earth and to be a mother to my child. I saw things in a different light after that.

Writing this, helps me to remember that second chance. Now I have four children and a loving husband. Why has God chosen to bless me so? I am not worthy of it, but I need to do the best I can with what I have been given.

Thank you God, for reminding me of my responsibilites. Thank you Natalie Norton and the Staker family for reminding me of what is truly important in life and the here-after. If only my faith and stead-fast could be like yours.