Missing

I just realized that I haven't put anything on my blog in something like a month! And what a month I tell ya.
I wish I could just forget a lot of it. But with the very bad has come some very good so I'm trying not to complain.
We started out the month nearly done with our Christmas shopping and preparations and it was a blessings because December got really busy in an instant with the death of my father.
With the shopping done however all that extra dough was spent so of course the water heater broke. No biggie, (except its never fun to buy appliances) we knew it was going to happen eventually, it was as old as our house and had given its time.
That week my dad passed away. The next two weeks were the weeks of lists a mile long which included getting everything for primary ready for the new year. I sat at the computer for hours fixing lists, making signs etc. and I was just about done when...my computer completely stopped working. I had back up from October but none of it would work on my old computer. So a lot had to be redone completely. I could have just died. The computer is still on life support in georgia of all places and I'm considering buying a gun for the sole purpose of using my computer as target practice.
To top it off, Ezra woke up one morning sicker than sick. He couldn't keep anything down. Marisa had a school program and a ballet recital in just three days and I was determined to keep her healthy. Meanwhile, I was doing everything I could to keep a looming head cold from dragging me under.
All the while trying to help my mom prepare for her 7 children to swoop in for a funeral and Christmas. I wasn't much help.
Needless to say I was more than willing to leave it all behind and hop on a plane on Christmas morning to come to Ohio where I don't have a care in the world. Which is where I am now. Typing this on my iPod.
I've got so much to catch up on and I have no way of doing it till I'm home and my computer is back together with all new, hopefully functioning, guts.
So in the mean time, I'm still alive, grateful that nothing else expensive or tragic has occurred and just recovering from a rather crazy month that I'm sure you'll catch up on the good pars just as soon as possible.

This Man

This man

was one of the kindest men I knew.

Was quiet and calm and strong and thoughtful.

Passed all of his genes down to Roman. I'm pretty sure he's going to look almost exactly like this at the age of twenty.

Was brave and always rolled with whatever life gave him.

Was an excellent example.

He bought a 2 bedroom rambler and turned it into something that would comfortably hold 9 people and two businesses.

Then he went on to build his parents a home and a beautiful cabin among others.
 

He was an extremely hard worker and always had a project...or ten.

He rocked the matching suit look.

And the Seventies mustache look

Finally made his family perfect when he had me at the age of 46.

Understood me in my extremely shy childhood. Would let me sit on his lap while he read the paper, taught me to swim, brought home a little yellow bike when I was five, and fixed when it broke in half.

Took us camping, put up with my many pets, watched the 10:00 news every day of his life, ate anything and everything and stayed skinny as a pole.

Taught me that just about anything can be fixed, and to try lots of things. He taught me to work hard...he worked SO hard.

Quietly supported me through everything I tried. Gave me money every time I asked for it.

Hiked Diamond Head with me in Hawaii.

Cared about his grand kids and would never scold them, only give gentle suggestions on how to behave.

Was silly and fun when no one was looking.

Lived the gospel so patiently, always served in any calling he was given and served two missions.

He built my current home, then helped us make it even better. He answered all our building questions and let me borrow his tools.
 

He connected with Roman and understood him.

He held a special place in my heart and I have always felt like I am so much like him.

My dad passed away on Friday and left a hole in my heart. While he has been sick on and off for five years, he was hit hard with pneumonia and went fast, leaving us all a little shocked and a lot sad. I'm happy he doesn't have to be sick any more and deal with any more chemo treatments, doctors or a barrage of medications. I'm sure he's building...whatever needs built in heaven but he will be missed and I'm sad for my children who are young and will have only a few memories to hold on to.

For over five years now he has quietly battled valley fever, a heart valve repair, lymphoma and three cases of pneumonia. I never heard him question why, or even complain much. When he felt good (and sometimes when he didn't) he went about his business taking care of his family, his callings,  his cabin and his busy life. He's a good example to me and I want to grow up to be just like him.

We will miss you dad!

Thanksgiving

What? Thanksgiving was over a week ago? No way!!!! and by no way I really mean it. I swear it's only the middle of November and I still have two weeks to find a night to go to the temple. Yes, that does mean that I totally forgot about going to the temple in November. SIGH!

So because of the lightning fast November I haven't posted in who knows how long (I'm not going to look) and I can't even recall what had me so busy.

I'm sure there are more events, silly words and silly pictures to post but I'll just get to the big stuff. Thanksgiving weekend!

This year, we stayed home and had our own little Thanksgiving meal. I wanted to try having something different than the traditional meal. In fact, I would have preferred to just skip the holiday all together. Not exactly sure why, I'll spare you my theories. Marisa was just so excited to have turkey that I couldn't let her down.

So... I made us our own little meal and I was really just wishing we could have gone to Chuck-o-ramma or cracker barrel and trust me, if next year is a repeat situation... we just might.

I was a little excited to make pumpkin pie from the pumpkin I grew in my garden this year. It wasn't pretty but I was sure it was going to make a delicious pie. Until I cut it open. I cut it and was overwhelmed with the smell of tomatoes. What? Then as I looked closer, the insides resembled something more like a cucumber with the seeds all nestled neatly in rows. It was the weirdest thing and it smelled nothing like a pumpkin.

All those yummy ingredients for pie were scratched from my shopping list and replaced with a simple.... "PIE"

I wasn't really in the mood for any of the food so I tried a new turkey prep method that was just OK. I tried a new potato recipe for creamy garlic mashed potatoes and they were not worth all the trouble. I was really just so happy to have it over with. We should have had nachos.

Anyway, with the meal behind me I geared up for black Friday by taking a nice long nap.  I LOVE shopping on black Friday. Even when I have nothing to shop for I enjoy the excitement, the anticipation and the deals on garbage products produced only for such events.

Well, we did actually find a few deals that were worth going out for and I planned my shopping strategy for the rest of the evening.

I ended up going to Sears for some new tools. After finishing our basement, all of our tools were toast. I mentioned replacing them when we were done so that we would have drill bits that would actually drill a hole and screw drivers that weren't completely stripped out. So, I went a few hours after they opened and picked up some bits.

Then, I went to wait outside of Hollister in the mall. You see, they have these hoodies that actually cover the vast real estate that is my monkey arms. Never mind that it's in the men's section because their women's clothes are tiny.  I LOVE their sweatshirts and if you would recall, some punk swiped mine last summer. But the hoodie I had picked out only days before was $70! I don't spend $70 on any piece of clothing but I was about to. I decided to go to their sale and as I sat there waiting for them to open I could not have felt more out of place. I was a foot taller, a foot wider and about 12 to 15 years older than everyone else.

I tried to pretend I didn't care by pulling out my not so smart phone and playing a game called "delete the text messages from two years ago". They finally opened their doors at midnight, revealing the scantily clad male models and the racks that held my precious hoodie. I was out of there in a flash... after paying of course. Two hoodies that don't make me look like a frumpy man (ironically from the men's section) with bare wrists, for the over priced price of one. SCORE!

I rushed home, trying to ignore the surge of adrenaline pulsing through my veins and slowly drifted off to sleep. The last time I looked at the clock it was 1:30.

At 4:30 the alarm rang and I was off again, this time to Home Depot to snag a cordless drill and some poinsettias. This crowd was more my type and there were no half naked models.  I was in and out in about 5 minutes and back to my bed. This time I had no trouble falling asleep. I'm so old!

Everyone let me sleep in. HEAVEN! I was given a new shopping list and I headed to Ace hardware and Costco to finish off the day.

I usually hit JoAnn's but they really didn't lure me in this year. Maybe next year... that's really my crowd right there. 

The thrill of shopping behind me, I came home and started packing up our car to head to my parents cabin for a day.

My sister was in town and my kids just adore her girls.

The kids played outside in the warm sunshine, then a few games of sardines inside. Marisa enjoyed playing with Peyton and they would hide in the bedroom playing with dolls and stuffed animals quietly. Ezra would convince Adison and Roman to pull out a board game and I chatted with my sister. I sure wish we lived closer together.

We went to the local campground to play basketball. My sister and I dominated completely... something about two 6'-1" women against all those kids.  They didn't have a chance.

That night after tucking my tired kids in bed, Junean and I talked about movies and food and kids etc while I was sure my kids were asleep. WRONG! All three of them stayed up until 11:30 a full four hours later than normal. I will give them credit though, they were pretty quiet the whole time. I really thought they were asleep until around 11 I started to hear some doors creak open.

The next day was a little more rough. They were tired and I was tired. Not the best combination.

We still had some fun though. Walks, deer and turkey hunts (looks like I found a red one), a few more games of sardines and hunting for acorns.

That evening we went to town and enjoyed the Old Time Christmas party they had on main street. The local businesses had booths with games and prizes, Santa came and Roman and Marisa told him what they wanted. Ezra sat on his lap and scowled. I told Santa what he wanted.

The local hospital had a fun game where you had to surgically remove m&m's with tweezers from a fake leg and arm. It was hard but really fun to do and watch.

They lit main street with lights and even had a few fireworks which scared Marisa who had just gotten a full cup of hot cocoa. Her coat got a sip too.

We went to the local diner for dinner and then to the ice cream shop for a treat. Then it was hugs and good byes and we drove home.

It was a nice little trip and everyone had fun. If only we cold get a good nights sleep. I guess that's always the trouble of leaving home.

The Night Roman and I Decided We Are CRAZY!

We signed Roman up for the Cosmo kids club this year. Mostly for the football tickets that it comes with. Anyway, Roman and Shane went to a game in Early October and then we had tickets for last Saturday. Roman wanted me to go this time because I promised to cheer (something Shane doesn't do).

Anyone who lives around here knows how much snow we got on Friday so we were really questioning our idea to go through with the game but since I'm not scared of anything (yeah right), we bundled up and headed out for the 8 p.m. game (stupid ESPN).

Before the game,  Roman wanted to go to Brick Oven because that is where Marisa got to go. We had some yummy pizza and some super yummy root beer.

Then, we bundled up some more because it was 20 degrees outside and headed for the stadium. Imagine my surprise when we got to our seats and saw this:

I don't know why, but I hadn't really imagined that our seats would be covered with 12 inches of snow. They had shoveled the lower half of the stadium but us nose-bleeders were left to fend for ourselves.

I planned on waiting until the game started to move to a better, more shoveled spot, but once we got our seats cleared I didn't feel like doing anything but stay put.

Man, I need some cuter warm clothes (I think I say that every winter). Can I just say that those hand warmer and toe warmer things are the best inventions ever! I stayed reasonably comfortable for the entire first half.

Some steaming hot chocolate helped too. Who needs a cup holder when you have 12 inches of snow?

I told Roman from the beginning that we were only staying for the first half because there was no way we were staying up so late and it was FREEZING!

He was bummed but by the time we got to our car after the first half, we were both done with the cold and BYU was up 48 to 7 so there wasn't much by way of excitement. I couldn't even concentrate on the game and Roman, the stinker, wouldn't cheer! He seemed more interested in sculpting and pushing around all the snow.

Anyway, it was fun, and interesting and I thawed out by Sunday around noon so I'm glad we went, but if we do the cougar club next year, all tickets will be used at the beginning of the season. And, if we can help it, not at 8 p.m..

BYU Soccer with Marisa

Marisa came home from soccer practice one day with tickets to a BYU girls soccer game and she was super excited to go.

She was even more excited to have a night where she got to stay up late and have no stinky boys around.

We went to Brick Oven for dinner before the game.

She was so excited she could not stop talking.

After dinner we walked over to the field and found some seats.

I thought I hated watching soccer. But I thought it was really exciting.

Marisa was having a hard time staying excited about the game, but she found other things to be excited about.... like the overpriced candy we bought at half time and one player who I guess she thought looked like Jasmine (Disney princess from Aladin) and was always keeping track of her.

It ended up going into overtime because no one scored (I didn't know they did that), and still no one could score. The other team played dirty though which made it a little exciting and the BYU goalie stopped a shot that was AWESOME! I don't know how she did it.

Marisa loved it and wants to go again. I liked it too and next time we'll be smuggling in our own candy.

Halloween 2012

Halloween YEA!

I took about 10 pictures the whole day because I just keep feeling like none of the pictures are different. It's just the same thing over and over again only with a different costume. I guess that is what holidays are about but Thanksgiving is on it's way and it is going to kill me to have another traditional Thanksgiving dinner. I'm such a holiday scrooge this year.

Anyway, lucky for my grouchy self, my kids had easy costumes this year that took next to no effort on my part.

Marisa wanted to be Belle, which would put her Belle dress-up birthday present to good use. Already done! YES! Well, I did sew her a skin colored shirt to go under her dress. She HATED it, threw it at me and basically threw a big diva fit. The next day however, she felt bad and ended up wearing it anyway. Gotta love girls.

Roman wanted to be a football player. He got a BYU jersey for his birthday so we just needed some pants and a helmet. I was going to  borrow the helmet from the neighbors but they didn't have it anymore but lucky me, Walmart had a BYU helmet for sale. Not the cheapest thing, but not out of the ball park either so I just bought it. I sewed the pants in a matter of a few minutes a couple nights before Halloween. They weren't perfect but none of us cared.

While we were browsing the costumes at Walmart, Ezra spotted the sock monkey costume and never wavered. I could have made it just fine, but honestly? I didn't want to. So we just bought it the next week and were done with it.

I'm such a sewing bummer lately, I know. I've actually been sewing quite a bit. There are sequins and purple dye from crushed velvet all over our house to prove it but the "sewing for fun" has been all but sucked out of me. It will come back...I'm sure of it, but no one is hurting in the mean time.

Costumes aside. We (I mean I) carved our pumpkins on Sunday night. I roasted the seeds. YUM! Hello Kitty was a big hit with the girl trick-or-treaters.

The kids were excited to share their costumes at school. Marisa in her parade:

Roman in his parade:

Marisa was beside herself with excitement this year. She was so fired up that as soon as we got to our ward's trunk-or-treat, she was off like a rocket. She didn't wait for her siblings or nothing. She made the rounds in record time and put all her inhibitions aside and approached and talked to people like they were her best friend. She was on a mission.

A neighbor dressed up pretty spooky like.

Trick-or-treating was a breeze for the first time in years. I didn't have to carry anyone, bring anyone home for a potty break or drag any tired kid along. Ezra slowed down only a little bit at the end and the weather was BEAUTIFUL!

Now we have three FULL buckets of candy as well as a couple bags leftover that we need to get rid of ASAP. I hate being the candy police.

How was your Halloween?