Oh my!

We've been so busy around here so I haven't had a chance to update the blog. Sorry! Our Christmas was completely wonderful! All four of us were spoiled beyond belief! The kids got a million new things and are having a blast with them all! Among the favorites are: Fisher Price SmartCycle, Jasmine outfit, Buzz lightyear laser gun, new trains, new clothes for the dolls, Elmo garage and a huge stuffed pony. They are having a blast every day playing with new toys and we are still struggling to find places for everything! Here are some pictures of our holidays.

We've been enjoying time with family while Colin's been off of work. Brett, Luna and Tavid are all in town for a couple of more days so it's been fun hanging out with them. We also got to hang out with Joel and Kelly for a couple of days which was fun too.

My laptop died this weekend...the laptop itself is perfect, but the screen is shot. I may use it hooked up to our monitor as a desktop and get rid of our desktop, but I really needed to get a new laptop. I did a lot of looking and today ended up at Circuit City buying a new laptop! I'm typing on it now and it runs beautifully so far. It has Vista on it, so that will take a little getting used to, but so far I think it's going to be easy to get used to.

Let's see...what else? Colin has this whole week off yet, so we'll be getting some family time in. Tomorrow we're headed to the mall for some returns and sales. Then at night we'll go to a New Year's party. The rest of the week is up in the air, but will probably included the Aquatic Center at some point. It's fun having him home!

Happy New Year everyone!

What fun!

We had such a fun night with the kids. It was so fun to watch them go crazy this morning when they saw their piles of presents that Santa had left...wrapped in Princess paper for Abigail and Mickey Mouse for Henry. We let them each open one this morning since they were dying waiting! They did a great job waiting until 5:00 when Grandpa and Grandma came over. They were so hilarious while they opened gifts...saying thank-you tons, getting so excited over each one and then tearing into the next. We got them a lot of little things, so they had a lot to open and loved it. After gifts we let them play while the adults had Lou Malnati's pizza that our friend Mike had sent us. He does that every year, so it's become a tradition to have that on Christmas Eve...yummy! Now the kids have been bathed, are wearing their new jammies and are watching the Grinch for like the hudredth time this holiday season! Fun night! Here are a few pictures for you.

On another note...we've had three friends have baby boys in the past week or so!

Our friends, the VZs welcomed baby Brody on Dec. 13...their first boy - yeah!

Our friends, the VDs welcomed baby Jacob on Dec. 23...their third child!

Our friends, the Ls, welcomed baby Jack today, Dec. 24...their third son - yay!

Congrats to you all!

Sending warm Christmas greetings and love to you and your families!

Ahh...much better!

Man, that was tough...really tough. I don't remember that last time I was that sick. My back still hurts from throwing up so much. Though not quite 100%, we are feeling better here at the Mulder house. Thanks for the prayers, comments, emails and well wishes!

We have been busy, busy with Christmas parties already. Last night was the party with my mom's side of the family and today my dad's side. The extended family parties are fun since we get to see cousins, aunts and uncles that we don't see a ton. We had a fun time!

Tomorrow (Christmas Eve) is for our family, my family, the Mulder Four. We began this tradition a few years ago and I really like it. We usually have my parents and Colin's parents over (though just my parents this year) and have pizza and let the kids open their gifts. We don't get them a ton because they don't need it and because they get a ton of gifts already! It's fun to have the Christmas Eve time together though. It does mean that Santa comes tonight though. That's how it was for me growing up and I don't think we ever questioned it, so hopefully Abigail and Henry won't either. :) Here are a couple of pics of the cookies, milk and note for Santa.

Christmas day is packed from morning until night. We'll be at the Mulders bright and early. We'll have breakfast there and then head to my parents' house in the early afternoon where there will be more presents and a Prime Rib dinner (YUMM!!). It will be a busy day, but the kids are used to being at those houses so they should be okay.

Merry Christmas!

Just stopping in

Just a quick post. We've been hit by some strand of the flu and it isn't fun! Henry threw up on Saturday night, Abigail was unable to move and really sick on Tuesday, Henry threw up Wednesday night and Thursday morning and I've been incredibly nauseous since yesterday. Not fun at all! It's NOT a good time of the year for this! I'm busy. I'm stressed. I'm exhausted. And I want to puke.
ETA: I typed this last night to publish it today. Well, I was up all night voilently ill and feel like death this morning. Abigail was up last night and threw up once again as well. PLEASE pray for us!

So...you get no more of an entry that this. My guess is that there won't be much of an entry for a few days. Please pray for us to get better!

I'll leave you with our Christmas card...for those of you who didn't get one. :) No...this was not staged AT ALL.

13 Days...

Wow - I haven't had a real blog post since December 1st! That probably tells you how busy we've been! I just feel like every day flies by with me not accomplishing hardly anything that I had hoped to that day. And stress...oh, lots of stress right now. I mean Christmas is 13 days away! That's so soon! I have pretty much been done shopping (besides a couple little things) for awhile, but I have really nothing wrapped! I hate that because I love the look of presents overflowing under the tree. Hopefully I'll get a few wrapped tonight.

--------------------------------------------------------

When Henry went to DeVos a few weeks ago they recommended an "Oral Motor Movement" test/exam to see if they could get to the bottom of his drooling issue. It's been absolutely terrible again. It's not unusual for him to go through 4-5 shirts a day. He had his evaluation with Katie, his speech therapist from this Summer, this past Monday. She concluded that his lips and cheeks have poor muscle tone at this point, hence the drooling. We also discussed his nutrition (and lack of good nutrition) and she really stressed to us that we have to offer him bites of food that he doesn't like (any meat or veggie mostly) and they reward him by giving him something he does like. Oh yeah, that went over great the other night...or not. We'll see how it goes. He will be seeing Katie 30 minutes a week for the next 12 weeks or so to work on muscle tone and nutrition. My little guy is in "school" 3 times a week now!

-------------------------------------------------------

My foot is doing fairly well. I still have pain, but I can handle it. Work was really rough last Friday, but a little better on Saturday. Last night was okay again...I definitely feel small improvements each shift and that's all I can ask for right now.

--------------------------------------------------------

Abigail and I have the annual Northouse (my mom's side) ornament exchange tomorrow night. This started about 15 years ago with cookies. We spent the first couple of years getting together on a Saturday and baking together all day. The it evolved to bringing cookies and trading. Then it was strictly an ornament exchage and now it's still called that, but we bring ornaments or other Christmas decor. It's fun to do each year and fun to have Abigail joining the tradition. There are 15 girls, including the little ones, so it's great to get together each year.

--------------------------------------------------------

The rest of the days until Christmas are crazy busy. In the next 13 days I work 5 of them (which isn't too bad), but have two Christmas parties with Abigail's classes, have to get all the gifts together for Hanks' speech teachers (5 of them), Abigail's teachers (1 teacher, 1 aide), wrap a bazillion gifts, bake, etc., etc. But I know you all are in the same boat!

Have a great rest of the week. Hopefully we'll see Santa soon and I'll have some pics to show!

Colin has brainwashed them...

My memorable conversation of the day...

ME: Abigail, what do you think we should get daddy for Christmas?
ABBY: Hmm...I don't know
ME: Well, let's think of what daddy likes.
ABBY: I KNOW! Protein Powder!

Seriously...

Chicago

When we were trying to decide when to go to Chicago it all depended on my foot. If I was having surgery, then I would have 2 weeks off, then Friday and Saturday would make sense since I wouldn't have to ask any time off work. If I wasn't having surgery we would go Saturday and Sunday so I'd only have to take one night off work. Thank goodness I had surgery. It took us 6.5 hours to get home from Oak Brook, driving at a max of 40 mph the whole way home. But...enough about that - we had a great time!

We left right after school on Friday and got downtown Chicago at a reasonable hour. We went directly to American Girl Place. It was so much better than last year when it was crazy, crazy busy and wall-to-wall people. We came earlier in the holiday season and on a Friday night this year and we will for sure do that again. Abigail had her heart set on a crib for her dolls so we looked at that immediately. She also looked at the Trundle Bed, but ultimately decided on the crib to get. My mom got her the crib, bedding and canopy. It really is cute and both babies fit in their perfectly.

After American Girl we went for dinner at Grand Lux. We had to wait awhile to get seated and awhile for food, but Abigail really did well. We had met up with Joel and Kelly and it was great to hang out with them for a bit.

After dinner we drove to our hotel in Oak Brook. We were put in a smoking room (Ewww!) and did end up getting another room and moved everything and were settled well after midnight central time. Abigail was hyper as can be and so excited to set up her crib (which Grandma had promised earlier in the night), but we needed a screw driver. We got one from the front desk and got everything set up and all was well in Abigail's world. She probably didn't fall asleep until almost 1:00 in Chicago (2:00 am Michigan time!!) and kicked me all night.

In the morning we had breakfast at the hotel and then went to Oak Brook Center to shop. We didn't do a ton because Abigail really wasn't into it (can you blame her?). By about 12:30 it was starting to snow, so within the hour we got ready to go. We left and from the minute we left until the minute we got home it was terrible driving. We saw so many cars in ditches and accidents, but my mom's a great snow driver, so that put us at ease!

We had so much fun! It's really fun to do these kind of things with "the girls." Abigail is at such a fun age where she enjoys and appreciates so much!

My mom asked her what her favorite part of the trip was. Her answer? "When I said 'Hurray! The man brought a screwdriver!'"

Oh...I got 3 of my photobooks and all my Christmas cards from Shutterfly today! Wow, can you believe that??

I hope you all stay warm!

Answering Some Questions...

Okay...time to answer a couple of questions I've had from previous posts.

First, my free Shutterfly codes come from various places: I've traded them with people, bought them on ebay (rarely), but mostly they are from a little hard work. :) Every once in a while Shutterfly runs contests. These contests are great because basically you always win. Their "consolation" prizes are things like free photobooks, 12 free photocards or a calendar. Can't go wrong there! Most of the time you can only win once per email address. I don't have only one email address. I won't say how many I have, but I have A LOT (most temporary). I also participate in a thread at http://www.slickdeals.net/. It is there that I have traded codes and found out about new codes and contests. The direct link is HERE. If you go to the first page you can find some codes that always work, for any account...like $10 off $40 or something like that. Shutterfly is AWESOME because they stack all these codes, so usually you can use a bunch of them! I placed my order today...here's what I got and what I paid:

62 5x7 Photo Cards (reg. $61.38...paid $1.98)

1 Greeting Card (reg. $2.49...paid $0)

5 Custom Calendars (reg. $99.95...paid $0)

Desk Organizer (reg. and paid $29.99)

2 11x14 Prints/Collages (Reg. $19.98...paid $0)

3 5x7 Books (reg. $38.97...paid $0)

1 Thomas the Train 8x8 Photo Book (Reg. $34.99...paid $0)

2 8x8 Photo Books (Reg. $83.98...paid $24 because of extra pages)

Total would have been... $371.74 plus like $50 shipping, so over $400!

Total that I paid with above discounts, plus free shipping discount and 2 other discounts...$27.95

I LOVE Shutterfly!!

----------------------------------------------------

I also had a couple of requests for the Brownies I made from the "Deceptively Delicious" cookbook. Here's the recipe (you can right click, save as, if you want a copy) :

-----------------------------------------------------

Thanks again to those asking about my foot. It's healing nicely and except for a couple super sore spots, I'm really doing well. I can't put a shoe on yet, that hurts too much, but hopefully I'll be able to by next Tuesday since I have to work! :)

----------------------------------------------------

I'm not sure if I'll post again this week...we have a small-group Christmas party tomorrow night and then on Friday my mom, Rebecca, Abigail and I are headed to Chicago. Why? Because we are CRAZY to go to the American Girl Store during the Christmas season! :) But it really is fun!

Have you Elfed Yourself?

This is freaking hilarious...

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=9605616185

I missed a Thanksgiving post. I missed a Black Friday post. So, I guess you get a "Saturday-After-Thanksgiving" post.

Abigail had a Thanksgiving Feast at school on Wednesday. They had turkey, popcorn and corn muffins. They dressed up as Pilgrims...so cute! I didn't get to go because of my foot, but Colin and my mom stopped in to see the feast. Abigail thinks it was the best!

We had a great Thanksgiving and have so much to be thankful for! We went to church in the morning and then to my parents' house for a Thanksgiving feast. It was nice to have my whole family around. We are so thankful that they all live reasonably close and that we can see them so much.

We stayed there until early evening and then headed to the Mulders for another Thanksgiving Feast...this one with around 25 people. It was Colin's immediate family and then two of his aunts, 4 cousins and then Lily, his cousin's daughter, and Miles and Marcel, the 6 week-old twins of his other cousin. It was another great dinner and again, we have so much to be thankful for!

I had a rough time staying awake all day (so I didn't...I napped) because the pain in my foot was pretty bad, so I took my pain med, which makes me sick, so I took a pill for that and that makes me drugged-up sleepy. I fell asleep at a very reasonable hour in order to attempt to get up for some Black Friday shopping.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I LOVE Black Friday, shopping (sorry, Manda!)! I don't love the materialism surrounding it, but I LOVE the hustle and business of it. I have no problems standing in line...I love it! I was seriously almost in tears about my foot this year and having to miss it. However, with the help of some great friends, I was able to go out for a while. I just took it real easy. My friends, Lindsay and Kim, both picked things up for me and that helped so much! We aren't after any of the big ticket items, so it's not like I had to race around or anything. Just a fun day for me. I was home by mid-morning and then took a pain pill. I enjoyed a four hour nap later. :)

Every Friday night Colin and the kids come to 84 with his parents and sister to visit me. Since I'm off work for two weeks I wasn't sure if they would still go. They decided to still go, so I got to go too. It was nice to be able to enjoy a dinner out! We came home and the whole family was exhausted. Kids both went right to bed and Colin and I fell asleep on the couch around 10:00 before heading up to bed. Boring, aren't we??

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I have so much of my Christmas shopping done, just a few things to go. Hopefully we will get our tree up soon so I can start wrapping gifts and getting them under the tree. I have a HUGE Shutterfly order to place in the next couple of days that includes more gifts and our Christmas cards. Here's what I'm ordering so far (no specifics because some people who read my blog are getting them!)...50 5x7 Christmas Cards, 5 Calendars, 3 5x7 Books and an 11x14 picture. For the grand total of...$0.00. I have codes for everything, so it's all free...$200 worth of stuff! I may end up paying shipping, but at $30, that would still be a steal!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dinner again with Colin's family tonight. Brett and Tavid head back to Boston and Ann Arbor tomorrow so we have one more "Mulder Meal" before they leave. Lamb will be served...I just had a little dinner here...not so fond of lamb (but they don't know that!). Tomorrow will be church and we've talked about going to Rivertown with the kids. Monday, back to normal...I always get a little anxiety with Colin going back to school again...love, love having him home.

Feeling it...

Definitely feeling the pain today, but it's still definitely tolerable. The dressings fell off last night while I was sleeping, so I took a few pictures this morning before I put them back on. I definitely did NOT expect that long of an incision!

Recovering...

The surgery went well this morning. I don't remember much about it, especially in the half hour leading up to it, the surgery itself and the initial recovery. The procedure took around 45 minutes. I guess the nerve didn't look terrible, but definitely had scar tissue on it, so he took that out. He also found a bone spur that he took care of. He said that could have been causing the pain more than anything.

I took a great nap this afternoon and have been fairly pain free until recently. The area is numb, thus the lack of pain. It's starting to wear off though and I'm definitely feeling it. The area is all wrapped, but I took off some of the dressings at least to see part of the foot. It's all bruised. Here's a pic that doesn't even really show how bruised it really is:

Thanks for all the support: visits, help with kids, meals, emails, etc. I really, really appreciate it!

Surgery Day

I'm sure I'll pop in here soon again to let you know how it went. I mean, what else will I do on the couch for 3 days???

Spinach/Carrot/Chocolate Brownies and Surgery

First...thanks for the comments and emails regarding my last post. Glad to see most of you think it's humorous that my kid doesn't love me.

Secondly...maybe I never did say what the the surgery is for. Most of you know, but for those that only see our lives through this blog, I'll give you a quick summary. Basically I've had foot pain for well over a year (maybe two??). After trying a ton of different things, they've decided I have a neuroma in my foot. Basically it's an inflamed nerve, making it like a little tumor on the nerve. Of course that's going to hurt when I walk and get worse the more I walk (i.e. why it's hard walk after a long night at work). So...they are going to take a good chunk (for lack of a better word) of my nerve out. If you want to see pics of what the procedure is like, you can click here. WARNING: It's a little gross. I'll be completely off my feet through Wednesday, then starting limited activity. I'm DYING that I took Black Friday off from work this year and won't get to shop like I love to do on that day. Thanks to my friends at work for suggesting a Hoveround.

Thirdly...I've owned Jessica Seinfeld's book "Deceptively Delicious" for a couple of weeks now, but I haven't had a chance to use it until tonight. I steamed and pureed carrots and spinach, then roasted and pureed squash. I then made brownies. They have 1/2 cup of spinach puree (which is half a bag of spinach!) and 1/2 cup of carrot puree among other things. They are low-cal too (for a brownie). I just tried one (sprinkled with powdered sugar) and they aren't bad. I'm not like oohing and ahhing over them, but pretty dang good. They'd be really good with ice cream and hot fudge on them! :) Not on my list are "Blueberry Oatmeal Bars (with spinach)" and "Lemon Blueberry Muffins (with squash)." Is my Dietician friend, RAK proud of me?? :)

Have a great weekend!

Hang on Folks...It's going to be a LONG one!

Ahhh...do you hear that? It's me breathing! I feel like I finally get to take a breath after going NON-STOP since Friday. To celebrate the fact that I got a chance to breath tonight...I treated myself to one solid hour ALONE (don't be jealous all you moms out there!) at Target tonight. I think I went in every single aisle. I got to use a ton of coupons because I had time to study them/find the best deals, etc. I only spent a little over $30 and the total was like $70 before the coupons!



I needed that after today. Today, my sweet, beautiful, love of my life, 4 year-old told me "I don't love you." Wow. I was going to pretend to be sad so she'd recant, but then (in about 2 seconds time) I thought about that and decided I didn't have to "fake" being sad...I was devestated. I cried a little...she doesn't love me. Of course I know she does. Of course I know that in ten years she'll be saying much worse things to me (unless she's like me - I was only ever perfectly nice and respectful to my parents). It still hurt. She didn't recant. After school I mentioned it to her. She continued to insist that she didn't love me. After a few minutes of telling her my heart hurt, Jesus' heart hurt yada yada she said "I was just kidding, mom." Yeah, right. Later Colin talked to her and she came downstairs crying really hard saying, "I DO love you, mom. All the time." Ahh...another milestone met...my daughter hates me. Oh...why did she say this, you ask? Because I brushed her hair. I deserve no love.



What else do I have for you...oh, Henry ran away at Meijer when I had the S-L-O-W-E-S-T cashier on the face of the earth. Picture this...me with a 35 pound 2 year-old on my left hip, kicking and screaming (because I wouldn't let him run away), pushing a huge-ass (sorry, but it is!) cart to the exit. This is a full-size cart with a HUGE bench behind it for the kids to sit on. I don't usually get one of those carts, but I did today. Back to the story...so Henry's screaming, I'm holding him tight, Abigail is saying "Leave my brother alone!" and I'm pushing H.A. cart outside into the windy as heck day. Now are you all jealous of me? Oh, and to top it off Abigail says "Mom, can I ride the horsey?" No. For a million reasons, #1 being that you don't love me.



------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Let's change gears, okay?



I had my pre-op appointment today. All looks good and the surgery is set for 9:20 on Monday morning. Pain could be minimal or intense...we shall see. :)



We got the results of Henry's blood tests yesterday. Everything looked good except for one level. Hi prealbumen level is quite low. That is basically a protein level. Normal range is 20-40 and his is 13. They were worried about his zinc level, but with normal being 0.65-1.05 his level is at 0.89 so that's good. They are going to have us keep a diet record to see where we can add protein into his diet. The trouble is that he doesn't eat hardly any meat, no pasta (where it would be easy to add meat), doesn't like many beans (okay, maybe none, depending on the day), doesn't like peanut butter, etc. etc. So, for now we are going to try to introduce new foods to him (ugh) and also slip him some of daddy's protein powder whenever possible. The longterm effects of a low level are not good so obviously this is something we will be working on.



I was looking back on this blog and last year, on Oct. 25 we began this journey with Hanks and his development...wow, over a year already. He's doing great!



Okay...I think that's it...for now! :)

Seriously...

Where has my week gone?? I feel so busy...ugh!! Here are a couple of quick thoughts for the days:

~Congrats to really close friends of our's who just told us yesterday that they are expecting in May! Yeah! We couldn't be happier for them! You know who you are...I don't want to post their names because I know they are making the rounds telling people and I'd hate for some crazy way for someone to find out via this blog.

~Prayers for the people who are really close to me struggling trying to get pregnant. Again, you know who you are. It WILL happen and I pray for you daily.

~Busy weekend...work tonight, craft show or mall tomorrow, work tomorrow night, Church on Sunday, Baby shower for my cousin's wife in the afternoon, family dinner at night. Then it's Monday already!

~Next week is even busier.
~Monday: Meeting with someone from church in the morning. Lunch with friends in Hudsonville. Work at night.
~Tuesday: Speech for Henry, Work for me
~Wednesday: School for Abigail, Little Hands for Henry, Staff meeting for Colin after school
~Thursday: School for Abigail, Speech for Henry, Work for Colin
~Friday: Another busy weekend begins!

~I have my foot surgery set up for Monday, Nov. 19 and the stress of that and the preparations is getting crazy!

~Henry went to DeVos today. Here's the appointment in a nutshell.
~Even though he's in the 90% for weight, they still wanted to do some bloodwork on him for his nutrition since he really doesn't eat vegetables or meat. That was a blast...doing the bloodwork. Imagine a pissed off two year-old screaming his lungs off...it was worse than that! :)
~They are very happy with his speech and how it's coming along. Yeah!
~He has started drooling again in a serious way, so they ordered an oral movement test where they will check his mouth and tongue and how the muscles do and do not work. Luckily he can have that done in Holland with the therapist he saw this summer.
~Overall, I felt good about the appointment. I mean, he is definitely making huge strides in many areas. I did kind of expect to go today and have them tell me "he's doing great, see you in a year." I wasn't really prepared for the nutritional stuff (which I'm not overly concernced about really) or the oral test, but I'm also very thankful that we have the resources available to do stuff like that.

~Guess that's about it for today. Sorry for another boring post...I promise to be more fun next time!:)

~Oh...one bit of enabling for my digi-scrapping readers...RUN to The Lilypad and get THIS from Nancy Comelab. It's only $2 for 48 hours only and I cannot believe everything in there...wow!

The Damn Wind

I blogged about the wind and cold bothering me. I blogged about being annoyed by the wind and it whipping my hair around. That was annoyance and nothing else. Today my friend had her life changed (at least temporarily) by that damn wind.

She was leaving her house, going in and out putting stuff in her car. The wind whipped the door and slammed her hand in it, crushing her hand and breaking her wrist. She's a friend from work, a server. She works 5-6 nights a week and brings home a big part of her family's income. Her life changed today...that damn wind.

My heart breaks for her. I know that the pain must be immense in her hand. I know that the pain mentally is probably worse...worrying about finances. I need to help her, but I'm not sure how right now.

The damn wind.

One of those days...

Just one of those days today. I hate, hate, HATE this weather. It was freezing today and the wind is brutal. Just going out to do errands was annoying because I was so cold and hated having my hair whip in my face. I know, I'm being a baby, but I hated it.

I have too many things going on in my life. I say "yes" to too many things. I'm done with that. The latest one is for church...I said I'd make some phones calls...I HATE making phone calls asking people to do things. Why did I say yes? I don't know...now I am super annoyed with the whole thing.

The house is a pigsty, the kids' clothes need to be sorted (still have summer clothes up here since it was HOT like a week ago!), I have to figure out all the logistics for my surgery on my foot in a couple weeks (childcare, work, etc.) and we are just TOO busy! I am feeling the strain of being gone every single morning during the week. On Fridays we are home, but by then exhaustion has set in and nothing gets done!

So, I'm pouting. I'm crabby. I'm freezing. Are you feeling nice and uplifted after this post?

I'm about to sort through my sock and underwear drawers...this is a daunting task...will probably take me all of "The Bachelor" to finish it.

I promise a more positive post next time! :)

There Once was a Princess and a Cowboy...

What a night! We went to Dorr to see Bec and Brad and Daisy. Yes, Daisy was also Snow White...it was hilarious!! Then to YoYo and Papa's and the neighborhood. Later Grandma Rita and Grandpa Bill came over. The kids were bouncing off the walls. It was a blast!

Happy Birthday, Colin!

Happy Birthday to the most wonderful, most handsome, most loving and caring father and husband in the world. 29...only one more year until you are really old! :)

Halloween Morning at Teusinks Farm

We went to the Farm this morning with our Little Hands group. It was a little chilly at first, but the kids had a blast. They each got a pony ride, then we took a hayride, saw the birds, saw the animals in the barn and then fed the goats. What a blast! Henry had a great time - his favorite was feeding the goats. It was a great time with a great group of people - we love our Little Hands group!

Just Catching Up...

Not much going on here, but I haven't blogged in a couple of days, so it's time to catch up.

Saturday Colin and I took a much needed day away. We left the kids at home and headed to Ann Arbor with my parents to watch the U of M football game. It was a cold, cold, rainy day, but during the game it only misted for a couple of minutes and was dry the rest of the time. We were pretty cold by the end, but it was still a ton of fun! Crazy to sit with 110,000 other people cheering for the Wolverines. We went out for dinner afterwards which was wonderful to do without the kids. We missed them, of course, but also really enjoyed having a day away.

Sunday was church and then lunch at my parents' house. I ran and got a couple of groceries in the afternoon so I could make dinner for our friends. Our friend, Kim, is sick with pneumonia and is like 8 months pregnant...poor woman! We kind of celebrated Colin's birthday at the Mulder's that night...I say kind of because he got a cake and singing, but presents will really come on Wednesday.

Monday was busy - Abby to school, Henry to daycare and then I did a bunch of errands. Abigail and I took it easy in the afternoon though, which was nice. At night I got to go for dinner with my mom and Kristina...a partial (minus Kelly) reunion from our walk in August. I came home, had plans to watch "The Bachelor," but fell asleep on the couch at 9:30. Went upstairs with Colin at 11:30 and slept until 8:30 this morning...I needed that - I feel much more rested this morning!

Today's busy again...at noon I have a conference for Henry for his speech class. At 1:00 Abigail has a little Halloween party. A little boy from her class invited all the kids over and included parents and siblings. So, we will all go. Henry will be missing a nap, so we'll see how well that goes. Add that to the fact that he REFUSES to wear his halloween costume and this could be fun! :) I work tonight, so Colin will deal with the crabbiness I'm afraid.

Tomorrow morning we are going to the Farm with our Little Hands group. I can't wait! There will be 17 adults and 26 kids coming! It looks like low-mid 50s and no rain when we go, so that will be nice! The kids get to see the animals, ride a pony and take a hayride...they will have a blast! At night we'll do the trick-or-treating thing around our neighborhood a bit and then go to the grandparents' houses. Since it's Colin's birthday too (29!!) he'll get a few goodies too.

Sorry, no pictures and kind of a boring post...but that's all I have today for you!

Beautiful Day, Beautiful Girl

Abigail and I went outside for a little photoshoot today when Henry went down for his nap. I just love these two pictures of her...

THIEF!

Oh, do I have a story to tell...

Last night Colin had to take the kids downtown to the library to return books and movies. He told them if they ate a good dinner, then after they went to the library he would take them to the Peanut Store for a candy treat. Abigail told Colin that she had some money in her piggy bank and she would pay herself (she's really into that lately). Colin agreed and went with her to get her piggy bank. Here is the piggy bank (isn't it cute? You can't see, but it has a tutu) that she got for her birthday. I think it usually has a few bucks in change in it:

Colin pulled the stopper out of the bottom and shook the bank to get a quarter. He felt in there and pulled out a dollar bill. He looked in the hole and saw more bills so he started pulling them out...he counted $170 and there was still more money in there!!! He put the money back in, put the stopper on and decided to mention it to me.

Tonight he got a chance to tell me about it. I went in her room and got her bank. Here's what I pulled out:

Guess how much money my dear four year-old had stashed away....

$313

Yes, $313. WHAT?!?! We often have cash around because of our jobs. I have a place that we keep the cash until I go to the bank. Apparently Abigail knows that place. I checked there and there is still money from the past few days there, so this very well could have been from days or weeks ago.

So...thanks to my daughter's Princess Piggy Bank...I am now rich. Well, I can pay a bill or two at least!

yuck-o

That's how I feel...yuck. We skipped church yesterday because Henry has such a bad cold. I also woke up with a stomach ache. Colin let me fall back asleep (this was at like 8:30) and I finally got up around noon. I went downstairs, read a little of the newspaper and then decided that I felt too sick, so I went back upstairs, read for a bit and then fell back asleep until 4:00!! Had a terrible stomach ache all night and again today. Just feel nauseous and everything. Not fun. I finally forced myself to eat a little bit tonight. Yuck.

I might just have the stomach ache because I'm sick about my laptop right now. There is some kind of virus(es) on it and I have been in tears about it. I keep that baby as clean as can be...hardly anything on it, defrag it all the time and run Clean-Up at least once a week. I'm frustrated because my McAfee software is up to date and obviously did not catch it. I'm running Norton now and hopefully can get somewhere with that. If not...I may have to bring it in and lost some stuff. Luckily 95% of my pictures and scrapbook stuff is on my EHD, but all my documents and stuff are not. Seriously, I do NOT do well when things like this happen...right on the edge of a panic attack currently.

On another note...Abigail had her last tumbling class this past Saturday. She got a blue ribbon and certificate and thought she was HOT stuff!

Abigail had school today and I was the helper. We had a fieldtrip to the pumpkin patch. It was a fun time. The kids each got to choose 3 gourds in the gourd patch, 1 pie pumpkin and 1 ear of popcorn corn. Abigail can't wait to have that dry out so she can pop it in the microwave! It was a beautiful morning for the trip and we had a blast!

We have a normal week during the day, but busy nights...no family nights this week. :( Colin works tonight, I work Tuesday and Wednesday nights, we have small group on Thursday night and Friday night I work. I'm ready for Saturday...we are headed to The Big House in Ann Arbor for the U of M game - Colin, my parents and I. We're ready to get away for the day, should be fun!

::Titleless Thursday::

I'm feeling tired today. Abigail didn't have school yesterday or today and I'm feeling it. I love having her home, but I really don't like having our routines screwed up. It's a strange thing and I'm not adapting real well! :)



This week I got my hair cut and colored on Monday and Henry got his cut today (so cute!). We both went to Jordan here. She does a great job! She was cheap to cut Henry's hair too - we'll be back! It feels good to have that out of the way!



I went to get paint for our front door tonight as well as for our three-seasons porch. The porch just needs to be painted on the outside, so it will be white. The front door will be "apple-a-day red." Whoa! I'm not 100% sold on it, but Colin is terrible at making decisions so I had to come up with something!

Not much else to report...just sitting here typing in a thunderstorm. I am admittedly an idiot for doing that. :)

A Good Read

Got this in an email today...


A lot of truth in this

The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.

My confession:

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are: Christmas trees.

It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, "Merry Christmas" to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu . If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him? I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we knew went to.

In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.

Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her "How could God let something like this happen?" (regarding Katrina) Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said, "I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives. And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?"

In light of recent events...terrorists attack, school shootings, etc. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found recently) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK. Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.

Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about. And we said OK.

Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.

Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with "WE REAP WHAT WE SOW."

Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell. Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says. Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing. Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.

Are you laughing?

Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for sending it.

Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.

Pass it on if you think it has merit. If not then just discard it... no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in. My Best Regards.

Honestly and respectfully,

Ben Stein

Blog Action Day

Today is Blog Action Day. You can check it out a little more here. This is going to be a very short post, but I just wanted to post a little about the environment. Being a mom with young children, I have lately been talking about littering with them. Just the other day at the Aquatic Center Henry decided to throw his juice box on the ground. What in the world? Where did that come from? The good thing about the moment was that it became a great teachable moment for the kids. We talked about the Earth, God's Earth, and how He wants us to keep it beautiful. Abigail had a million questions (of course) wanting to know why we had to keep it beautiful, how we keep it beautiful and what happens if we don't. Henry just kept mimicking his sister, saying "why?"

My reminder to you today...keep God's Earth beautiful...so we can all continue to enjoy it!

P.S. I've said it before, but...if you haven't watched "Brothers and Sisters" you MUST...it's so good!!

He'll wear shoes!!

Today was about shoes. I had to mentally prepare myself this morning (read: Take a xanax). Henry has only realy worn Crocs on his feet. He didn't walk until about 17+ months and wore Merrell Jungle Mocs for awhile, but since April has only worn Crocs (or what he so lovingly calls "Cocs"). I've tried putting shoes on his feet...doesn't go over well. So I decided today that we would go to the nice shoe store downtown, have his feet measured, splurge and get some good shoes. He actually did pretty well! He's an 8.5 extra wide, so it's a good thing we went there to get some Stride Rites because you just can't get cheap shoes in wide, let alone extra wide! Here's what we ended up with...Stride Rite Groov'n Shoes. Henry actually thinks he's pretty hot stuff, so I guess I had anxiety over nothing really!

I have also been in desperate need of new work shoes. I'm really picky though. They MUST be comfortable. They must have good grips on the bottom. They can't be flat without a thicker sole because my pants are a little long (shocking, huh?), but I don't want a heel either (not so practical). They must be all black per work rules. Hmm...it's actually the hardest thing for me to shop for. I've been wearing Merrells to work forever. The same pair I mean. The insides are so worn that I keep buying the Dr. Scholls pads to put in them just so I can have a flat surface for me feet instead of torn up fabric. Anyway...I we went to Outpost and I saw one of the new styles of Crocs. They were made for winter, so the sole is a little thicker and they are enclosed in the front. Yeah! They were/are everything I've been looking for. I don't have any Crocs (the kids have 7 pairs, or is it 8?) so hopefully they will be as comfortable as everyone says. I'm just glad that I got some work shoes! Yeah!

That's about it for today. I had a fun "mail day" today, getting 5 Shutterfly Photobooks that I had ordered. They were all free (with free shipping) so I saved almost $200 (I got some other little things too). Yeah! 5 Christmas gifts done, for free!

Time for a little quiet time (for me) before work. Bye!

Fun Times

We've had a fun day so far today! This morning we all got to sleep in a bit, not long enough for me but a little bit at least, and then we went to the Aquatic Center with Anita and the girls. The kids had a blast! I got a couple of pictures, but not real great ones. But since I had a pictureless post last time, here are a couple pics to check out. Have a good day!