Everything comes to an end

Today is the last day of High School for TJ and Sam. This year has really just whizzed by. Actually the last 16 years have whizzed by since TJ is going to be a senior next year, I have no idea where the time has gone. I know there is no going back, but there is such a thing as cramming. That is exactly what I am planning on for his senior year. Cramming all the things I have yet to teach him in this last year. I hope we both survive. Sam will be in 10th grade next year and she is probably counting down the days until it is over already. She does not like school at all. She would love to be in a performing arts school if they had one. She is really good and being the little engine that could and does her best and keeps trudging along.

Jess and Wyatt are out of school next week. I look forward to making new rules for the summer. I do not want to spend the whole summer cleaning up after messes, so new rules will have to be enforced.

I am still hoping to get a trip to Kentucky in very soon. Hopefully in the next few weeks if I can get my kids situated while I am gone. You would think it would be easy at my kids age but I hate asking for people to look after them and let's just face it, I am a control freak and will stress about it until I am out the door.

This will be a very fast summer. The kids should be busy most of the time and hopefully have some free time too. We are taking them to California in September so that is going to be the fun trip of the year and we are really looking forward to it.

I just found out that the end of June there is a birthday party for my grandfathers 90 birthday so maybe I can squeeze a small trip to CA for that.

So here is to summer starting and things going exactly how I plan.

Taylor Swift

We finally went to the Taylor Swift concert. It was so fun and better than I even expected. My girls were so excited to go and I have to admit, so was I. I can't even remember the last concert I went to. I planned this to be a girls night with my girls and it was a night I think we will not forget. We went with my sister and my niece and then met up with some other friends when we got there.

girls before concert

The whole gang.

walking around trying to find someplace to eat

and decided we would eat inside

saw the guys from the radio station we listen to in the morning

so we had to get a picture with Ben & Matt

up the escalator to find our seats

eating and waiting

and waiting

the coolest mom chaperone's ever

stood almost the whole time our whole group

after concert with new tshirts as we were leaving we ran into one of the

girls friends in our ward. So of course we had

to get a picture with Emily.What a fun night.

Thanks Bonnie

Ok I just think these are so cute and look so fun to make.

My friend Bonnie put some really cute craft ideas for Mother's Day (sorry it's now to late for that) and girls camp up on her blog. This washer one is one of my favorites. If you need girls camp ideas or just looking for some from craft ideas go see Bonnie and she will show you how.

mid 2009

I cannot believe we are almost half way through 2009. 2 of my kids will be out of school next week and the other 2 a week after that. Just like everyone else with kids in school, May is a jammed packed month full of activities. I am lucky in the fact that alot of my kids are not involved in a ton of school clubs right now and not one of them has any kind of graduation. So I am sure it could be worse than it is with the little bit we do have.

Tomorrow is our Taylor Swift concert. We are getting so excited to finally get to go. I am still having camera issues so I am hoping to borrow one of my kids camera's for tomorrow night.

Thayne is coming home on Friday and that is always the best part of my week. He is home for the long Memorial Day weekend. He needs the break so bad even if he thinks he doesn't. He has been working so many hours and doesn't take breaks very often. I just hope he doesn't try working in the yard the whole time, he loves being in the yard working and I think this weekend we are going to have some family time.

The cell phone thing is still a thing in our house. My kids just don't know what to do with themselves without them. Detox can be a good thing I think. The kids think we are the meanest parents ever and our rules are way to strict. I am totally convinced that they will survive and they will not have any long lasting permanent effects from it.

Thayne has been saying for a few years now that 2009 would be a good year for us and I will say that sitting her mid 2009, this is a good year, and I only see it getting better.

and so it goes

There is nothing super exciting to blog about, but with 4 kids I should be able to come up with something.


I know it is said that every generation is different than the next. My kids are experiencing many different things than I did when I was their age. Alot of the the convinces are because of the advancement in technology. I remember when I was in High School this is how I called home....

We had this little beauty at the back of the school and it was gross and always broken.

My kids have this little goodie to call home with.

Well I should say they did have this to call home with. Both of my girls dropped their phones in water "on accident". I think they were hoping to get better ones since theirs were broken. Well that didn't work for them. They are now saving up their own money to buy a new phone at the full price since their dad will not extend the contract so they can get the cheaper price. So maybe they will take care of the new phone when the actually get it. TJ had this little red beauty in the picture and it works just fine. Well in works fine in my closet, because that is it's home for now. I don't want to rat him out completely but let's just say his text messages exceeded what we and the rest of the world thought was normal. We also thought texting at 1am was alittle extreme.

Our lovely responsible (for the most part) 10 year old child is the only one who still has possession of his phone. The sad thing is, it is his dad's old dinosaur of a cell phone.

It looks something like these phones but old, dirty, and it has a screen that is completely unreadable. The funny thing is that when he can't find it, it is because the other kids have taken it to use because they no longer have one.

So as much as giving the kids cell phones is such a convenience and great to have when they are away from home, they are also a total pain in the rump to monitor and not easy to keep your kids in the land of reality when they have them.

A few weeks ago when I took TJ's phone away and he was not sure what to do. He said "how am I supposed to call my girl friend if I don't have me phone?" I just stared and shook my head and said "we have a phone here at the house. A real phone. I talk on it all the time and it works fantastic. It is the same kind of phone I had to talk to my boyfriends on when I was your age and you can actually hear the other persons voice because you are not typing at them".

He did not like the answer and I think he is now using the computer to talk to people so we may have to monitor that alittle bit better.

Seriously why is it so hard to pick up the phone and call when you want to talk to someone.

Don't get me wrong I love to text just like the next person, but I do it to send a quick message not to carry on a conversation.

It is nice to see my kids can actually survive without these little devices in their hands and a little detox will be good for them.

I am still trying to find out where the Thayne and Heather of last year went. The Thayne and Heather that said "our kids will not have their own cell phones".

Where did we go?

the best part

ME-Jess, how was school today?

JESS- It was good

ME- what was so good about it?

JESS- It ended!

new step

I have come to the conclusion that I am in desperate need of some type of chore system in my home. Lately I have just been asking the kids to help pitch in and do something. They always ask what their chore is so they can do it and then go play. Only they think a chore is emptying the dishwasher and the other loading it, and another cleaning counters and another sweeping the floor. I have 4 old kids and it takes all of them to clean the kitchen and most of the time they do crappy job.

ENOUGH!

I am going to give each child one room for a week and I am printing out and posting a list of what needs to be done in that room to call it clean. If I have 4 grown children, I should be able to have at least 4 rooms in the house that are cleaned on a daily basis. Now I am not sure how well this is going to go over, because just asking them to unload the dishwasher can cause whining.

Wish me luck and let me know if you have any suggestions or advice. You would think by now I would have a system that worked.

May

I cannot get over that it is already May. Where did the time go. My kids will be out of school in just a few weeks. Yesterday was Mother's Day. It was a nice quiet day, just the way I like it. Thayne got home last Wednesday and we love having him home. He has kept himself quite busy. He had some house projects he was working on and he took the boys to the father/sons camp out. I took him to the airport last night and did not want to see him go. Luckily he will be home for a long Memorial weekend.

I finally got some pictures from TJ's prom, I just need to sit down and look through them.

My kids don't know it yet but they have some messy rooms that will have to be worked on if they want to have any kind of funt his week. My kitchen is a wreck. Last night I went to bed thinking I should not be going to bed on Mother's Day with a messy kitchen, but I didn't feel like cleaning it and obviously my kids didn't either. Oh well I may save it for them today if I don't clean it first myself.

get the Camer-huh?

You know if this has to do with my camera than you know it is important to me. My camera is one of my most favorite things I own. It is always charged and always ready to go.

Last week I took the camera card out so I could download some pictures. I set the card next to the camera because something came up and I said I would do pictures later. The next morning when I went to get my card I found it put OH I MEAN CRAMMED back into my camera. I had a hard time getting the card out. After a good tug it was out, but when I put it back in it was a little snug. Not thinking alot of it I just figured I would ask the kids later who thought it was a good idea to cram the card into my camera. It just drives me crazy lately that my kids just get into everything that they shouldn't.

Saturday night TJ and his friend Porter were all dressed up in their tuxes ready to go to prom. Of course that means PiCtUrEs. I turned on my camera and all it said was something is wrong with the camera card. WHAT! NO WAY! I tried a different card, same thing. I was sick and almost in tears. Luckily well I thought luckily TJ's camera was charged and ready to go. I was able to get a few pictures but because it was set all weird the pictures did not turn out very well. TJ's girlfriend Paige looked very pretty and her mom took a ton of pictures and should be sending me some pictures this week.

I am in tears right now about my camera and I hope it can be fixed and not cost a fortune.

Foot Rodeo

When I first heard our ward was doing a Foot Rodeo the first thing that came to my mind was...

A WHAT!

I still can't say I totally understand the concept of all of it except that I think it is mostly rodeo stuff done on foot. But not all of it was, so I say it was a half foot rodeo.

All I can say is my kids had so much fun and I am still pinching myself wondering if I really live in a place that has such an activity.

Here are a few pictures from the evening.

Jess Jess looks like she is participating in a barefoot rodeo.

Sam getting ready to be pulled

Sam holding on

Calm

not so calm

older boys doing????

I am not really sure what they are doing.
Roping.... SAFE! have you noticed he is in his favorite shirt. AGAIN!

Drug by a horse....a little more daring!

Then there is....

BULL RIDING!

Ok really there is no picture of bull riding because TJ was to big for the bulls and Wyatt, well.... Wyatt likes to stay alittle more on the cautious side of things. Or like how I would like to call it, he is a CHICKEN!

It was a fun time and the kids had a blast.