I always find myself a little depressed the last week of the year. It's hard for me to pinpoint why. This year for instance, I'm looking forward to the fresh start that a new year brings, and I really can't think of any wonderful reason to hold on to 2012--doesn't feel like it's been an outstanding year. In fact it seems like we were struggling most of the year. So I should be like, uber excited for a new year to begin, yet I'm depressed.
Maybe it's cause I know that I'm going to blink twice and it's going to be New Years Eve 2013. Time just rushes by so fast these days. I really don't know how it got to be the last day of the year already.


I've been kind of thinking about resolutions. I'm still debating what I want to resolve, if anything.
My resolutions typically go unfulfilled, so I figure, why bother?
I'm also thinking maybe I'll make one resolution. I already know what it needs to be too. It's kind of all-encompassing, and it's definitely something I REALLY need to work on.

But, I'll save that for tomorrow maybe.

I kind of wanted to review 2012, if only for the sake of taking note for my family; especially since I didn't do much blogging this year. 

BUT, I'm sitting here trying to think what happened this year..... and honestly, the only thing I can think of is that this is the year my littlest ones started school.

 

First day of school shots...

 Jaosn

 

 Justin

 

 Haley

 

 Justin and Mrs. O.

 

 Jason and Miss B.

 

Ashley

 



My boys turned five this year. Haley turned ten, and Ashley....fourteen. Fourteen!!!

     Justin hasn't quite embraced school yet. He likes his teacher, and he likes the homework; but he doesn't look forward to going to school. I think it's just 'cause he's so shy. I say this as he's on the couch making a TON of noise with his sister. It's so hard to believe this same little noisy boy is the one who doesn't make a peep as soon as we enter the schoolyard.
     Jason seems to like everything about school. He likes his teacher, his friends, the homework and just going. He's a lot more social.

They're both doing really well regardless. Justin received an academic excellence award the first trimester and Jason received the "coolest Kid" award, which means he's excelling in multiple areas.

Ashley and Haley also continue to do really well. Ashley has her sights set on attending a really good magnet high school next year. It specializes in the arts. She's currently working on getting her portfolio together for her audition in a couple of weeks. She wants to major in art and photography.
    Haley is looking forward to middle school next year. She wants to take band and learn guitar. We got her a guitar for Christmas, so now she just needs to learn to play. I hope she takes to it, she'd be the first musical person in the house.

Jon broke his wrist in September. Six weeks of annoyance ensued as he tried to deal with the cast.
He was very happy to have it removed in time to play the latest version of Call of Duty that came out in November.

We had to put our sweet kitty, Friday to sleep this past Saturday. It was a sad day for us. She's been a member of our family for fifteen years. She'll be missed.

As for me, these days I feel like I'm constantly twelve steps behind.
I can't seem to get caught up with anything, not that I'm trying as hard as I should be.
My job continues to disappoint. The hours are not steady enough to grant us any finacial security tnd things have been a real struggle this year. I hope to find a better, or additional job in the new year.

I really am looking forward to a fresh start and yet I'm leary. I'm concerned it's going to be another rough year. I'm not pleased with how things are going in the world and I'm not feeling much hope that things are going to get better any time soon.

I feel like the voice of DOOM & GLOOM right now.
Sorry guys.

I really do hope for a Happy New Year for all of you.
And for the world.
And for my family.

Need to boost up my faith a bit.

Unfathomable

I don't post much these days, but I felt like I had to mark what happened last week, specifically Friday, December 14th, 2012. A very dismal day in American history.
Twenty beautiful little lights were extinguished that day. Six more beautiful lights taken as well when they tried to protect those little lights.
A gunman entered a schoolhouse and began shooting. This he did after first taking the life of his mother, and before finally taking his own.
I don't understand it.
In my mind I know there are only two possible answers. Either he was just evil, or he was extremely sick. Evidence is pointing to the latter.
I can't understand what kind of logic leads a person to take the life of a child as payment for some injustice rendered.
I suppose there should be no understanding, because things like this just don't make sense. They're not supposed to.
I'm glad that there is one who knows exactly where that young man's mind was, and He will execute appropriate judgement, whatever it may be. I pray for all the families affected by this horrible tragedy, including the family of that young man. I can't even imagine what they're feeling.

I've always loved this image, but even more so after Friday. Looking at it and knowing each of those sweet children got a hug from Jesus that day gives me some sense of peace. I hope their families find peace.

Charlotte Bacon, 6

Daniel Barden, 7

Rachel Davino, 29

Olivia Engel, 6

Josephine Gay, 7

Ana M Marquez-Greene, 6

Dylan Hockley, 6

Dawn Hochsprung, 47

Madeline F. Hsu, 6

Catherine V. Hubbard, 6

Chase Kowalski, 7

Jesse Lewis, 6

James Mattioli, 6

Grace McDonnell, 7

Anne Marie Murphy, 52

Emilie Parker, 6

Jack Pinto, 6

Noah Pozner, 6

Caroline Previdi, 6

Jessica Rekos, 6

Avielle Richman, 6

Lauren Rousseau, 30

Mary Sherlach, 56

Victoria Soto, 27

Benjamin Wheeler, 6

Allison N Wyatt, 6

I don't seem

Slacking with a capital P

I am such a slacker.

I frequently wonder why I've received the calling to be primary president. I know it's cause I have something to learn...well, lot's of somethings.
My biggest problem I think is that I'm a slow learner, and that I'M LAZY.
I'm a PROCRASTINATOR with a capital P.
It's not good.
A few weeks ago, I was supposed to give the spiritual thought during ward council.
{The previous day was a baptism I had been in charge of pulling together. I'll just say that the baptism nearly didn't happen because I had neglected to find out who had access to the Stake Center and I had to make a last minute call to someone to get them to come over and open the building for me so I could get in and get the font filled. It wasn't exactly convenient for this sweet lady to stop what she was doing (juicing pomegranites) and come to my rescue.  Needless to say, this is all something I should have dealt with in the weeks leading up to the baptism, instead of scrambling at the last minute to find out who I needed to get a key from.}
Anyhow I overslept that Sunday morning and arrived late, so I didn't get to give my spiritual thought. Of course, I hadn't prepared for it anyway.
Because I'm a Procrastinator.
I sat in the car for a moment, "preparing" my thought before I headed over to the church.
I was thinking about this problem of mine...procrastination. So I looked it up in the topical guide.
What I found, kind of startled me.

"Procrastination, Procrastinate see also Apathy; Idleness; Slothful. "
There was also some mention made about making excuses.

Idleness? Slothful? ME?
Well, I looked up idleness too.
I looked up a scripture referenced in the Doctrine & Covenants.  D&C 68:31:

 31 Now, I, the Lord, am not well ^apleased with the inhabitants of Zion, for there are ^bidlers among them; and their ^cchildren are also growing up in ^dwickedness; they also ^eseek not earnestly the riches of eternity, but their eyes are full of ^fgreediness.

Um, hit a little close to home, I gotta' tell ya'. And I've got a whole pocketful of excuses. Excuses why my children are growing up in wickedness.
I have terrific kids.
They are not by any means wicked.
But, they're not the way I imagined they would be. They have their own thoughts, and I'm not sure their testimonies are as strong as they could be.
Because I haven't helped them build them up. 
Because I have to work nights. I'm not home to do family scripture study, and family prayer, and family home evening. (excuses)
Beause Ashley has to get up early (4 in the morning early) to get ready for school, out the door by 5:15---it's too early to get the other kids up for family prayer and scripture study. (excuses)
Because I'm tired. (excuses)

It's because I'm lazy. It's because I'm idle. It's because I'm slothful. 
Plain. and. simple.  
And the Lord is not pleased.

But He loves me. And he sees fit to chastise me. And I'm SO grateful that he does.

I just hope I can live up to His expectations and overcome this shortcoming of mine.

A month in pictures

Holy Hannah! October has come and gone.

Another year is flying by. It's just crazy to me how quickly the time gets away.

Thought I'd recap our month in photos just for the fun of it.

Gotta' do something with this here blog once in a while.

 

We have had some glorious weather this month!

October brought nice cool temperatures and a bit of rain. So nice for a change!

Some pretty sunrises....

I had to buy a can of pumpkin puree and make something yummy out of it.

This was a pumpkin bundt cake with pumpkin frosting.

It was pretty yummy!

I also made bread from scratch for the first time ever.

Ages ago, I had a bread maker and made bread that way, but I've never actually made it the old fashioned way. It was delicious--a huge hit. These two loaves were gone before nightfall. There were requests for more. Definitely needs to become a monthly treat.



More fabulous cloud coverage.

Jason and Justin both got rewards at school for the first quarter. They only passed out two of each reward per class, so I was extra proud of these two boys. Justin got  an academic excellence award and Jason got the "coolest kid" award---only one of those passed out to each class. It was for excellence in both his grade and his classroom behavior. He's supposed to get to attend a pizza party with the principal in addition to the award.
Haley also got an award that week, unfortunately I didn't get a pic with her. Poor middle kid syndrome. Her reward was for citizenship. I have awesome kids. Teacher conferences were the following week, and they're all doing fantastic at school. :)

We had a birthday girl in da house this month.....Miss Ashley turned fourteen years old!!! I canNOT believe that! We celebrated twice. This is her cake from her acutal birthday. The next evening she had cupcakes and ice cream and a sleepover. Thank goodness for me, that only one friend slept over. It's amazing how much noise a couple of girls can make!

 Posing at her party. Two of her friends came over. They had a good time I think.

Ok, this is a Pinterest plug....I saw the idea for this cute garland on pinterest and had to give it a shot. It's just tissue paper. I love how it turned out.

Getting dirty carving the jack-o-lanterns. It's so nice that I don't have to be actively involved in this little tradition anymore. One of the few perks of the kids getting bigger.

The finished products....

(the one on the right is eating one of those cute little tiny pumpkins).

Whle they were carving pumpkins I was working frantically on Ashley's costume. It was a royal pain in the kiester. She's been wanting a traditional kimono for a long time now. Ashley loves all things Japanese. I got her the pattern for her birthday, and wouldn't you know it, she decided she'd like it made for Halloween. The instructions were so confusing, I ended up winging it halfway through.
It turned out ok, althouhg I didn't get the obi belt done yet. I'll have to work on it later, I think it might be just as difficult as the kimono.

 

Here they are all decked out for the ward trunk or treat party.



My little mutant ninja turtles.....

She's turning Japanese.....

The force is strong with this one.....

Not supposed to wear masks to the church trunk or treat, so she painted her face black.

I need to upload the pictures from tonight, she's wearing the mask in those.

Maybe tomorrow....

 

 

Catching up--fall 2012

Just popping in to update my header. I made a bunch of cute headers way back when the picnik site was getting ready to close down but I've forgotten to post most of them throughout this year. Yeah, I've also neglected to blog much.

I'm so happy the temperatures are finally starting to drop here in the desert. I'll be SO happy when the high is 65, it's still in the 90's most days. Hopefully by Halloween it'll be nice and cool.

So, in case you missed it-my big announcement for this year is that I've been called to be Primary President. I have to tell you, I was totally shocked to receive this calling. No way am I anywhere close to being qualified for this job. Stepping into the refiners fire I guess. I need some serious refining! I just feel so grateful that the Lord would bless me this way. I really haven't been doing the things I need to be doing and I honestly think this is His way of giving me the little boot I need to get it together. I'm so grateful for His encouragement.

In the meantime, I'm totally lost. Thank goodness for two awesome counselors and one amazing secretary.  Our program was the Sunday before Conference. It came together really well. My second counselor did a great job of stepping in and picking up the reigns from the previous amazing 2ncounselor, who had been doing an amazing job of putting the whole thing together. I really respect and admire these women. I have much to learn from them.

The boys are doing great in school, they're loving their kindergarten teachers. Ashley and Haley are doing well too. Haley's gearing up for a sweet field trip in November and Ashley is focusing on her courses. She wants to get into a really good magnet school for high school so she's working on keeping her grades up and doing what she needs to do to get there. Such good kids. I'm so lucky.

Jon fractured the carpal bone in his left wrist several weeks ago. He's been going crazy trying to deal with the cast. It's a pain for him in more ways than one. Hopefully it'll come off this week.

My niece got engaged Sunday morning. I'm so excited for her. Of course, I can't believe she's old enough to be engaged. Seems like just yesterday I was babysittiing her. Crazy.

Anyway, that's us updated for now. What's been happening in  your world?

really random out of the blue post

I don't know what the willy wonka is up with my computer (actually it's the hubs' computer, just for the record).
When I'm logged in under my user id  blogger won't let me post or change anything on my blog. I get some dumb error message. When I log in on my hubby's id though, it lets me do whatever I want.
Must have something to do with cookies right?

~~~~~~~
so, hey! Long time no see right? I think I've visited my blog like, three times this year. Pretty sad. Not sure why I'm visiting now, seems  like a pretty desolate place. Guess I just thought I ought to try and update it, since the year is already half over.

~~~~~~~

I think the kids are ready for school to start again. Summer's getting kinda' boring. I have mixed feelings. I'm going to miss sleeping in.
Jason and Justin start Kindergarten this year. I can't believe it. All my kids are going to be in school! I'm SERIOUSLY looking forward to a couple of hours of ME time every day. We'll see what my emotional status is like the first day of school. I'm thinking there won't be any tears.
The boys have different teachers. They got to meet them on Friday. I think they both liked their teachers. Jason said he has the best teacher ever! Justin on the other hand didn't have a whole lot to say to his teacher. He's so shy. I think he'll be ok though. One of his friends from church will be in his class. I don't know if Jason will be so lucky, but I think he'll do fine. He's the social butterfly of the two. I am a little concerned about how they're going to react to being away from each other. It'll really be the first time for them to be away from each other for more than a couple minutes.

~~~~~~~

I took the girls to get their hair cut today. Ashley's is very funky and choppy. Haley's is shorter than I wanted it to go. We'd made a deal that she either has to wear girl clothes or she has to haved a girly haircut, (short story--she would NOT go into the girls bathroom at Wally world a while back cause she thought people would think she was a boy going into the girls' bathroom--that's when I told her she had to decide----->girl clothes or girl haircut) so she opted for the girl haircut. She picked out a cute hairstyle, and the stylist cut it and well, she still looks like a boy (it doesn't look much like the picture). Oh well, maybe next time.

~~~~~~~

 I'm a little scared and a lot dumbfounded. I think the Lord is so smart. Sometimes he knows you need a real kick in the pants to get you off your duff and doing the things you're supposed to be doing.
Let's just say I recently got a kick in the pants. More on that later.

~~~~~~

I'm saddened by some news about a fellow blogger. Some of you might know of him. He's a teacher who recently passed away. I've been searching for news about his death, and came across it tonight. I was shocked and saddened. Don't even know what to think about it. My thoughts and prayers go out to his family. I'm hoping the circumstances prove better than they're currently looking.

~~~~~
Well, that'll be  a wrap for tonight.

Everybody enjoy your Sunday!

Catching up

Wow! Feel like a stranger over here again. Blogger's been making changes!! I'm gonna have to figure out how to do a post all over again. lol Maybe that'll teach me to be away for so long.

Not a lot going on in my neck of the woods lately. I've been working off and on at the job. They don't give me too many hours currently, which sucks paycheck-wise, but I don't mind so much mommy-wise. It's nice to spend time with my family. Speaking of, my mom came to visit this past weekend  along with Jon's mom. It's nice that they get along well and are happy to take a road trip together once in a while. It was lovely having them both here.

Got my boys enrolled in a little kindergarten prep class at the rec center. They love it. It's crazy how lazy I've gotten. They start kindergarten in the fall, and I feel like I haven't prepared them at all. They can say the alpahbet and count to ten, they know their colors and shapes; but it still feels like there's so much more they're supposed to know before they start. Maybe it's just cause they're actually younger than the girls were when they started (Ashley was almost six and Haley was five and a half--the boys will have just turned five when they start).

The girls are doing good in school. They're both ready for summer this year though. Ashley is now a redhead. I'll have to post a picture. I really like it. Haley got her ears pierced, and it ended traumatically. The earring embedded itself in her ear. Poor kid. She decided she didn't want earrings anymore after we got it out. Can't say I blame her, but I felt bad that one of the first "girly" things she tried ended poorly.

I've been getting accustomed to my new sewing machine. I really like it so far. I've made a couple bags, some cute little baby booties for some friends and I'm currently working on a few projects for our Young Women's camp fundraiser on Saturday. Most of my computer time is currently spent on Pinterest. go figure.
I have tried a couple things. I'll have to do some posts about them.

Well, guess that catches ya'all up for now.

Oh! Before I forget. Keep me accountable guys. I've committed to 30 days of exercise for the month of May. Trying to form some healthy habits. Two days down, 28 to go. I've got to get some of this jiggle off!

Cell Phone Saturday #9

Winco opened here a couple weeks ago.

We were so excited.

Here's our table after our recent shopping trip there.

We spent $300!!!!

This is just some of the junk food.

 Hmmm, wonder why I've gained ten pounds in the last month?

This is kinda gross....

Can you see what it says? My daughter blew this up with her nose.

Seriously.

I don't even know how she does it without passing out.

          I love how my boys line all their little toys up in a row.

Looks like a battle is about to commence.

My money's on the Transformers side.

Cell Phone Saturday #8

My newest toy.....

It has 100 different stitch options--seriously high tech for me.
Hope I can figure out how to work it!

Cell Phone Saturday #7

Joining Gigi for her fun Cell phone Saturday.

Really random pics this week. I wasn't doing much anywhere, including here in blogland. I've been SO lazy.

 Sunrise the other day. So pretty

 I snapped this from a library book about cakes. This is so cute! I think it was made from a suare and a round cake pan. Adorable. I'm going to have to try it out this summer.

Valentines cookies I made. I stacked them three high and made little "cookie cakes". Sorry about the blue hue. Bad cell phone lighting.

Have a great weekend!