Where is your haven?

Do you have somewhere you like to go where you feel safe. A place that no one can do you any harm? Many people have a haven of their own whether it be a room, place or even in the arms of a loved one. A haven for our kids is Mommy and Daddy's bed. It is a place where they feel safe and comforted. Last night, or actually more like early this morning we had 2 visitors join us in bed. A lil before 2am our lil man woke up screaming and went back to sleep in our bed. Then around 5am our middle child had had a nightmare and ended up in bed w/us as well. Now, if we had a King size bed you probably wouldn't even notice 2 adults and 2 children in the bed. A king size bed is a nice size if you want a lot of room, which sometimes my hubby would like, but we don't have a king size bed. Our Queen size bed gets a lil cramped for room when there are the 4 of us in it. This morning I woke up clinging to the side of the bed so my son wouldn't push me off. Although I tease I would never send my children away from our bed, their haven. After my hubby and I had started getting ready we left the two kiddos in bed. I walked back into our bedroom and found this:

Our lil man is such a bed hog!

White Corn Salsa

This weekend my family and I went to a family camp that our church has each Memorial Day weekend. It is a time of learning, fellowship, fun and food....lots of food. Normally we take the normal snacks jerky, licorice, popcorn, candy and things like that. But this year I decided that I wanted to try something different. I have made a chip dip that my family has loved and wanted to share it with our friends. Let me give you a warning, if you make this dip your friends, party guests or family might start fighting over it and if you run out you better watch out. It is a highly addictive dip that is very, very good. So I decided to share it with all of you so for your next summer get together you can be the talk of the party.

White Corn Salsa

2 cans of Original Rotelle (drained)

2 cans of Del Monte Fiesta Corn (drained)

2 cups of Mayonnaise

2 cups of Sour Cream

2 cups of Shredded cheese

1 bundle of Green onions

Mix all the ingredients together and then chill for 15-20 min before serving.

It is very easy to make and the recipe calls for a bundle of Green onions but I end up only using about half the bundle but you can use more if you like. Also it makes a good amount and can be cut in half very easily for smaller get togethers. So the next time you have people over or are going to a party make this up bring the chips and enjoy!!

First Haircut

Our lil man has very blonde hair. And for the longest time I was afraid he was not going to have much hair at all. His hair has grown in pretty well and even though it is very light it has been getting long. Long enough that it would need to be tucked behind his ears and when he had a bad hair day it was a mess. So we decided that it was time for a trim. At first my wonderful hubby said he would do it. Which made me a lil nervous. After going and getting his hair cut this week and him telling his hair stylst what he was planning she talked him into bringing him in. So today was the big day. At first he wasn't too sure of what was going on, but he did great. He didn't cry or scream and sat pretty still for the most part. Daddy did have to hold him because he wasn't wanting to sit by himself but he did great. Although there isn't a big difference and most probably can't even notice a change. Mommy can and that makes me happy :) Here are some pics.

Before

"Hey Mom look at me!"

"What are you doing?"

"This isn't so bad"

All done!

What a big boy!

Whirlwind

What a whirlwind of a weekend. First of all I am glad to say that we have a brand new yard that has grass!! I'm so excited. I can't wait for us to be able to get back there and play. After laying sod you have to water it all the time and make sure it takes root so it will grow and look good. Which is what we want so of course we will stay off of it like we need to. I meant to take some before pics but it somehow slipped my mind w/everything else going on in our life right now.

After my hubby and some wonderful family and friends laid sod we had a graduation party to go to, going away party and Riverfestival fireworks. It was a very busy but fun day. While the guys were laying sod lil man and a couple of our friend's kids went over to my sis in law's and we had a play date that was a lot of fun. It is so fun the stage now where lil man is getting to where we can have play dates.

In between all the parties the kids played outside since it was such a nice day. Our lil man thinks he is a pro at the Razor scooter and loves doing it. With Daddy's help of course. It was cracking me up how he stood there on the scooter while Daddy pushed him around, just thinking that that was the greatest. It is fun all the new things he is trying.

After all the excitment we went down to the river for the fireworks. Since lil man was only a couple weeks old for the 4th of July this was his real first taste of fireworks. He did great. He watched them for a lil bit and then was tired and fell asleep. I couldn't believe he slept through it even the big loud finale.

Then after our busy Sat on Sun we had a picnic w/our group at church. It was a lot of fun to have at the park. I have a few pics from the weekend to share. Enjoy.

Lil man riding the scooter w/some help from Daddy



Sis and lil man

Lil man watching the fireworks.

Lil man at the park enjoying the swing. He loves to swing!

Changes

For the last few weeks, probably months, my hubby and I have talked about getting rid of the satellite television. We were thinking of ways to cut back on things that we really didn't need and the tv is definitly one of them. Even though I agreed that we didn't need satellite I continued to drag my feet to actually making that call. I'm not really sure why either, because we don't watch that much tv as it is, and I definitly don't have a show that I will just die if I don't watch. But for whatever reason I continued to drag my feet until my hubby told me in a kind, loving, encouraging way, obviously you aren't going to make the call. For some reason I made the call that afternoon after I got off work. Having him tell me that I wasn't going to do something made me want to do it, funny how that is, isn't it.

So, after making the call and trying to disconnect the nice lady on the other end tried to help me. At first she offered me other packages that would lower my monthly charge and after I refused she gave me the option of putting the satellite on pause. Where we would keep all the receivers and everything just not be able to watch current shows. We could even order pay per view (not that we ever really use that option). So, I agreed to the pause option. She explained that way you are trying out not having tv. After I explained to my hubby everything he suggested we get the local channel package.

So, after all my dragging of feet we have what they call "the essential" package which gives us our local channels and some other ones. I told my hubby it was designed for him it has most of his favorite channels such as Discovery, The Weather Channel, The History Channel and The Documentary Channel.

I think it is funny though that even though we rarely even watch tv, I feel like I don't want to go completely without. Silly I know. Something about human nature I guess.

Better Late than Never

I realize that it is Tuesday after Mother's Day but I have wanted to post this since Sunday so I decided to just do it. Our preacher on Sunday talked about mother's as most would suspect since it was Mother's day and all. He had 2 options for mom's. Option 1 in Proverbs 31:10-31 or Option 2 Titus 2:4-5. See I have always enjoyed reading Proverbs 31 where it describes the character of a noble wife. Except for the fact that by the end of those verses you can feel overwhelmed and discouraged. As our preacher stated, that is like a "Super Mom"! And although I want to be the best wife and mom possible "Super Mom" is kind of a hard example to live up to and can get you down on yourself pretty easy.

Now let me write Titus 2:4-5 for you "Then they can train the younger woman to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God." See I have read those 2 verses several times and I even have them underlined in my Bible, but I never really put it together that, that was an example of what a wife should be too. These verses to me at least are a lil more encouraging to me. Now I know that with God all things are possible and that he could make any of us "Super Moms", but until then I think I will look to Titus 2 and strive to be the wife and mother he talks about there.

I hope that everyone had a wonderful mother's day, especially all the new mom's or mom's to be!!

Isn't it Amazing?!

Isn't it amazing how much we depend on certain things. We depend on electricity every day, if the power goes out and we have to use flashlights or candles some people thing the world is ending. Or how we depend on convenience stores to be open whenever we need something. If a store is closed and we need something now, that store is being inconsiderate of others...or so we might think. And one thing I found that I depend on more than I knew, is a phone line.

Yesterday morning I went into work only to find that our phone was dead, no internet, no fax, no phone line of any kind. After some calling around on a cell phone (by the way another thing I depend on too much, what did people do before them, haha) we found that somewhere our line had been cut and it would be fixed by at least 10pm the next night! So, my day consisted of answering a cell phone, explaining that our phones were down, taking their name and numbers and then running the message to whoever. Not only could we not use the phones but the internet was down so we couldn't file deals electronically. Our fax was down as well so we couldn't send anything out except for old fashioned mail. And we couldn't run any credit cards either. It is amazing that one lil phone line can cause such a mess.

Needless to say that when I walked into work not knowing whether the phone line was up yet or not and found out it was back to normal I was relieved. We depend on lots of things, and when they aren't around it causes our day or life to be a mess.

Today was a much better day and thankfully tomorrow is Friday!

Being a Mom

Being a mom you have a lot of emotions that run through you every second of the day. You feel love, excitement, hurt, pain, and the list goes on and on. One of the things that I dislike the most is seeing my kids hurt. Whether it is emotionally or physically. As a mother I want to make it where they don't have to hurt. But I know that those moments when they hurt they grow. I don't like to see my lil man fall down and bump his head, but I can't catch him every moment or he will never learn to walk on his own. I don't like to see my middle child cry because she has friends drama, but I know that if I keep her isolated from everyone she will never learn to socialize and work out problems with other people. And I really don't like when my oldest hurts because of someone else's bad decisions, but I know that through all these hard times God is molding her into the cup he wants her to be. As much as I want to wipe away all my kids problems, I know that God wants me next to them to wipe away their tears and let them grow.

I feel very honored that God chose me to be a mom to these 3 beautiful children. Even though everyday is not a cake walk, I wouldn't change it for the world. As we look to mother's this weekend let your mom or mother figure in your life know how much they mean to you. And if your mom wasn't a great role model and you have or want to have kids someday, be the best mom you know how.

Much to do in May

I'm sure that some of you are like us and have a busy May. I was telling my wonderful hubby that we have something every Sat in May. He looked at me like I was crazy. Then I kindly explained to him that w/graduations, graduation parties, a housewarming, family camp and our daughter's recital the month gets pretty full. Not to mention the girl's last few weeks of school. May is always a busy month for us. And since we have a full calendar all ready we don't like to add to it.......or maybe we do.

My hubby and I have wanted to redo the backyard for sometime. It isn't really a nice yard it is more of a home for random weeds and a few blades of grass here and there. So, he made the comment about putting sod back there. I said that I agreed we needed to do something but if we were going to do it I wanted it done before our lil man's 1st bday which is the middle of June. I would like to have people over and hang out in a nice backyard. So, he bit and said ok well we will get the yard ready this weekend, the sprinkler system in the next and the sod the next. Which is great it just adds to the madness already. But I don't think we would know how to do it if it wasn't crazy.

This weekend my hubby borrowed a skid loader from my family's business, to move some dirt around to level the backyard. I'm pretty sure he was done about an hour before he finally got off the skid loader. He definitly had more fun moving the dirt around w/the skid loader and not having to take a million trips w/the wheel barrow. I have to admit though 8 tons of dirt doesn't look as much as I thought it would. When he told me how much dirt was being delivered I imagined 8 tons taking up our whole drive way. But it didn't.

Lil man had fun w/daddy on the skid loader he was making the sounds to go along w/it. Here are some pics.

New Do!

For those of you who don't know I love long hair!! I think that long hair is so pretty and you can do so much with it. You can wear it straight, curly, down, up, halfway up.....you get the picture. I just love long hair. And from the age of 5 to 15 I had long hair because I had to. When you take dance especially ballet you have to have long enough hair to but up in a wonderful bun. Then when I decided I was done w/dance I cut my hair just because I could. And ever since my hair has never been long. For a couple of reasons the main one is I am impatient. My hair takes so long to grow out that when it gets to the in between stage I can only take it for so long and finally I break and cut it all off. Yesterday was one of these times. My hair had got to the "ugly" in between stage and I couldn't take it any longer so I chopped it off. Here is a pic of me and my new do.