Happenings

I promised you last night I would finish up that post so here I am. It is currently 3:30am so I am hoping this makes sense. A lot of things have been happening with our family over the past month. Where to start...

Pepper: We took her to an eye doctor for her cross eyed problem and his diagnosis was Congenital Esotropia. If she was just far-sighted then she would just need glasses to correct her cross-eyed-ness but unfortunately that isn't the problem. We will be taking her down to Primary Children's to see a specialist on the 15th, and we're told it's very likely she will need surgery to correct the issue. I'm a little nervous, I won't lie. We've had Pepper evaluated by an early intervention team to help her develop her gross motor skills. She will be 11 months old in a few days and has yet to roll over more than once let alone sit up or crawl. Her fine motor skills are right on schedule for her age group, and her social skills are actually above average. Her muscles are very stiff. We were assigned a physical therapist who will be coming to work with her every week or so. The team hasn't given us an official game plan yet, so far they have just been to our home to get to know Pepper and do a few tests. They told us there are a couple of red flags, she failed her hearing test and obviously her eye test, and then the stiff muscles. We're hoping that her lack of gross motor skills are just an effect of her depth perception being off, and that she doesn't have anything more serious going on. She also had a very gunky nose on the day of the hearing test, and I was told that she may just have an ear infection, thus failing the hearing test. I'll be taking her to the doctor soon just to be sure. Other than those few things, she is doing just great. She has two cute little bottom teeth now and is eating most everything we eat blended up a little in the Magic Bullet(LOVE that thing!). She says Dada, Mama, Baba, and glurg(my personal favorite). If you say No to her she shakes her head. Cutest. Thing. Ever. She's kind of like having a little puppy.

Ashton fed her his fun dip lik a stix. 

 Jared is so incredibly cute and sweet and such a good boy. He is fascinated with all things having to do with the ocean. We purchased "Sea Monkeys" at the store on Saturday and yesterday they finally hatched. He is very very excited. He loves our aquarium. I put it on the bar so that the kids can watch the fish while they eat.

Dave bought me 6 new baby angelfish for Christmas!  

We just got a 55 gallon tank with all accessories off of Freecycle (! I know, right?) and he is DYING to put the fish into it as soon as David finished the stand he is building for it. Actually we are all really excited about it. It is double the length of the one we have now!
Anyway, Jared has really been struggling with his homework. It has been such a nightmare for him. He just hates it. He can do it, and doesn't struggle with understanding it, it's just "sooo booorrring!" and he tries everything he can to get out of it or put it off. I've done reward charts, toys, treats, basically every positive incentive you can think of but it only lasts a day or two before he loses interest. He'd rather go to bed at 5:00 than have to do his homework. It seems like every night there is yelling from Daddy and tears from Jared and I don't know how to handle it! I spoke with his teacher about it last week and she told me she had no idea he was struggling with it so badly. I've told her a couple of times already. She did tell me that he is really behind the rest of the class in reading and that she literally has to sit directly in front of him and keep telling him to stay focused just to get him to do his schoolwork. She is concerned he may have a form of ADD and wants to have him tested for special needs. I very much disagree with putting him into resource. I told her to go ahead and test him, but he doesn't need to be put into the special needs class. When I told Dave he just about lost his head, he was put into resource as a kid and he said he felt like everyone had just given up on him. Jared is very intelligent, he just really struggles staying focused. I am considering taking him to his pediatrician to have him checked and then go from there. I know there are several people in Dave's side that have dealt with it. I'm hoping there is some kind of behavioral therapy that can help correct it, we absolutely will not be medicating our child.

Ashton is doing so great. I love that kid so much. He is very very friendly. Everyone at the grocery store we go to knows us because of him. He invites everyone to his birthday party in November. He already has it all planned out, and everyone is going to bring him Transformers. This is his usual dialogue when he meets someone new:
 "Hi, my name's Ashton, what's yours? Oh, cool. Hey guess what, you can come to my birthday party and we live in a gray house and we have a blue car and a red truck, but if they aren't in the driveway you can't come over."

Currently we are working on boundaries and listening skills, and not interrupting people. He is extremely talkative, a lot like his mother was at that age:) His new favorite thing is playing Plants VS Zombies and I have to limit him to 15 minutes or he would just sit and play it all day. Funny kid. Most of the day he just plays Legos by himself in the livingroom. I'd really like to get him into preschool, but it's not the budget currently. He is so ready for school.

As a family we have been playing more games together. We just got Jenga and Candyland and they are huge hits. The boys are super excited to make paper hearts for Valentine's Day and hang them all over the house. I made this bunting out of old pillow shams and fabric scraps. I love VDay, if only for the reason that it's the one holiday I can get away with filling my house with tons of pink decor!!

My front door really needed something so I took an old chocolates box from last year and used only the bottom, pulling off the raised part, painted just the middle with a mixture of black & white craft paint, added a little scrap of tulle, and one of Pepper's felt flowers I messed up on. "Chalk" is actually a white colored pencil. Can you believe I don't own a single piece of chalk?? Neither could I. 

I got adventurous last week and colored my hair dark. I LOVE it. I get so sick of boring old hair all the time. People always tease me and say I'm never "happy" with my hair, but the truth is, I get bored. Life is too short to be boring. Hellen Keller said "Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing."

Here are some random pictures I took down at the river banks. The top two are straight out of camera, not edited at all. That is just how colorful it was. Moss is so cool.

As you can tell, (since the photos above were only taken a couple days before the ones below) the weather has been all over the place. It's cold, then warm, then snowing then raining, then sunny. I'll take any of it, I like variety. The boys got these adorable hats from Dave's sister and her girls for Christmas. Aren't they adorable? Where's mine I say? I want one!!

PHEW! I'm all caught up! Remind me to never go that long without blogging EVER again! I know some people think that blogging is a silly waste of time, and I had questioned that myself. But I lost everything on my hard drive in December, and all photos from 2009-Dec 2011 are GONE(let's not even talk about the videos we lost), so I am so so incredibly grateful that I have been such a faithful blogger and photo-poster. All the important photos are on here. I'm printing this entire blog into a series of hardcover books soon, so the kids can look at them whenever they want to. From the age of 12-18 I was a very faithful journal keeper,  and I recently pulled them all out and spent a good 4 days reading them from beginning to end, and holy smokes. I learned so much about myself, and it felt so good to see how much I've grown and how my life is so much more awesome than I could have ever hoped. I haven't been very good about journaling since I got married, but this blog has been the closest thing for me. Of course I don't get very personal or talk about problems very often, but maybe that's a good thing. When I look back through the blog, I only see the happy memories, and the bad things slowly fade away in my mind. Happy Wednesday everyone!

Flowing

My mind is so full of things tonight. I'm going to warn you, this is a novel. I sat down intending to post and get caught up on this blog but I checked the news on KSL.com first and now I cannot stop crying. I am so incredibly sad and devastated by the murder of those two innocent Powell boys by their father..ever since I heard the news yesterday I've been on the verge of tears and sick to my stomach. (story HERE) As more details emerge, it just gets worse. Charlie and Braden were the same ages as Jared and Ashton and the mere thought of it all just breaks my heart! I'm so upset by today's findings, which I cannot even write on here because it's so horrifying. My prayers are going out to the family, especially the grandparents, UGH I cannot even begin to fathom the pain and devastation...

            Well, this is officially my first post of the year, and for me, 1 month is a long time to go without posting. 2012 has already been loads better than 2011, mostly due to a new resolve and new attitude. It has just felt so good, like a fresh start. I had several resolutions and so far have been keeping most of them, there are a few that just haven't been serving me so I let them go. Something I have learned about resolutions is that it's ok to mess up. It's ok to miss a day, just do better the next. I used to mess up or miss a week and then just get discouraged and give up altogether. One of my favorite resolutions that has been amazing for me is to eat mostly fruits and vegetables and cut out processed foods. I got a juicer off of Freecycle and my favorite thing to do in the morning after getting Jared off to school is to throw in 2 apples and 2 carrots and drink it down. I honestly feel so much better, my energy levels are great, I'm more regular(yeah, I blogged that!) and I feel good about myself because I'm eating the way I know I should be. Another resolution was to get an education. I have been feeling really lame the past 9 years because I know how much potential I have yet I haven't made an effort towards a formal education. Growing up I was an honor student and loved learning and yeah, even homework. I love learning. I soak it all in and it feels soooo good! SO, after applying for WGU and passing their admittance tests with flying colors, they decided I needed to have some college "experience" before they would accept me to their online program. So, after twidding my thumbs for a while and trying to come up with all sorts of reasons to just say "nevermind", I decided I needed to do something; anything. So, I am taking a math class at Bridgerland Applied Technology College. Yeah, I said MATH.                          Math is my weakest subject, and I have always been terrified of it. But after reading a chapter on overcoming fear from my favorite book , I decided the only way to overcome it, is to look it straight in the eye. And guess what? I am actually doing very well at it! Today I took 4 quizzes and got 100% on all of them! Granted, I had to start way back at long division and decimals, but I'm doing it! I think the left side of my brain finally turned on! I even won 13 out of 15 UNO matches with Dave last night, that never happens! (and if you think UNO isn't a game of strategy, you can go suck on a pickle because I was in the strategy zone!) I'm so glad I am going to Bridgerland though, because now I know for sure that I DON'T want to do school online. I work from home, which already takes enough attention away from my babies, if I was trying to fit in 4 hours of school a day from home everyone would suffer. It has been so nice to leave around 11am and get home the same time as Jared does. Dave doesn't have work yet, so for now, he is home with the kids. I just registered for the Interior Design program at BATC, and I am so excited to begin!

                Moving along...New Years Eve Day was awesome. We went to visit my Grandma Grundvig(my Dad's mother)at her home in Kearns and ended up there all day. David got to fixin' stuff for her and one thing led to another and before you knew it Dave blew a fuse and the power went out! HAHA! He got everything fixed up for her and she was so grateful. Half the light bulbs in her house were burned out and she is having a hard time getting around and can't get to them. Her kitchen light/fan wouldn't turn on, her railing to her basement was about to fall off, and her two ginormous cat litter boxes in her basement were quite full, so she needed a little assistance. It was so great to spend some time with her, I got to know her a lot more and I asked her a lot of questions about her childhood and her family growing up. I learned a lot of things I didn't know. I love that my kids have a great grandma and that they can know her! 

That evening, we went to Springville to spend New Year's Eve with our friends Ben and Rebekah and their boys, Braden and Ryan. We hadn't seen them in a very long time and it was so great to catch up and enjoy their friendship. We played games and ate TONS of awesome snacks and got tummy aches, the kids banged pots and pans outside at midnight, and spent almost the entire next day playing games and chatting. It was very refreshing. We really missed them!

That's all for now, my eyes are burning because it's now 2am and I'm just a little tired! I'll catch up more later, I have so much to tell you!