Denial

While I was on my way to pick up my kids from school today, I was pondering on what a beautiful spring type day it was . It wasn't until I was pulling out of my subdivision that I first started noticing the travesty. Someone had decided to play a wide scale prank! They had scattered white powder all over a field running down the side of our subdivision. "That's terrible!" I thought as I wondered who would spend their time ruining someones field. As I continued to drive, I soon realized that this abominable crime was more widespread than I originally thought. All the yards on the way to the school had also been sprinkled with this strange white powder. "Wow! I thought, "I sure hope this is just a simple joke and not something dangerous!" Normally on nice days like today I let my kids slowly get in the car as they say goodbye to their friends, but today, just to be on the safe side I told my kids, "HURRY up and get in the car and shut the door!" As I drove home I was happy to enter my home, safe from crazy "white powdered" grounds. I hope by tomorrow whomever played this joke has undone it and we can return to our regularly scheduled spring type days!

Just Trying....

In an attempt to be young and hip I am changing the look of my blog. I am not sure that I like it and I am still searching for just the right background for me, but in the mean time (this project has sucked up WAY to much time already) I will leave it like this. PLEASE let me know what you think, should I go back to the "old" blog? Hmmm.......

**This is a work in progress...those that left comments Wednesday night saw a different background. Sorry, the longer it was up the more I didn't like it. Not sure if this one is better. Let me know what you think still**

8 Things Tag

So there are a few things I dont understand about this tag, such as, why do you have to post the rules? And why are there only 6 questions instead of 8, wouldn't it make more sense to have 8? Anyway, here goes:


8 Favorite Shows:

1. Biggest Loser (the ONLY show that we work our schedules around)
2. The Office (although we sometimes have to turn it off mid episode)
3. Numbers (I guess the math nerd inside me lives on)
4. The Amazing Race (which they moved to Sundays so I haven't seen the last 2 seasons)
5. Eli Stone (I hear this one might get the ax though)
6. Ellen (I actually NEVER watch this show because I NEVER watch TV in the middle of the day, but the few times I have seen it, it was pretty funny)
7. PBS specials (we dont have cable or I am sure I would be a discovery channel junkie, so PBS specials will have to do for now)
8. The Bachelor (NOT!! We were watching Sleepless in Seattle which was on TV and near the end they played a long sneak peak at the new season of the Bachelor, who happened to be a single dad...just like in Sleepless in Seattle! We were appalled when we realized that the only reason the movie was on was to pimp the new bachelor. That show really makes me ill.)


8 Things I did yesterday:

1. Made German pancakes for breakfast for the entire family (for those of you who know me well know that this is a MAJOR accomplishment, not the cooking part, although that is pretty major too, but the getting up before Bryan leaves and making breakfast part)
2. Cleaned my ENTIRE house AND my Van (that being said, and realizing that it took the whole day the rest of this list will be quite boring)
3. Got Dressed (no comment)
4. Got my kids dressed
5. Downloaded some podcasts (I have not had an ipod for very long but I am hooked on podcasts, they are GREAT!)
6. Made dinner AND did the dishes afterwards (isn't January great, I get so much more done in this month with all my new goals than any other month of the year)
7. Had FHE (it was fun, Trevor gave the lesson out of the new nursery manual which is SO worth getting to have in the home, he didn't need any help at all it was great)
8. Put my kids to bed on time so that I could go to bed on time so that I could get up again in the morning and make breakfast for the whole family, but ended up staying up late to watch True Beauty which was REALLY lame, therefore I slept in this morning and everyone, except Bryan, had oatmeal (grits for Ashton) for breakfast before running out the door)


8 Things I look forward to:

1. Bryan's days off
2. The rest of my family moving here (or at least their visits)
3. Bryan's days off
4. Painting my house
5. Bryan's days off
6. Speaking in Church....Just kidding
7. Did I mention Bryan's days off?
8. Family Road Trips


8 Favorite Restaurants (this one will be REALLY hard because we dont go out often and these are NOT in any order)

1. Sizzler (we dont have one here)
2. Golden Corral (we dont have one here)
3. Olive Garden (only for the lunch special)
4. Most any Chinese place (we dont have much here to choose from)
5. Applebees (I can use my Discover card cash back here)
6. IHOP (kids eat free after 4)
7. (now we are pushing it....) Mexican places (so long as they have fresh made tortilla chips and salsa it will do)
8. Um......would at a friends house count??


8 Things on my wish list

1. A Grand Piano (with a grand piano room in my house to put it in, otherwise a nice electric keyboard that is weighted like a piano would do)
2. A new minivan with the fold down seats
3. A self cleaning garage (and car, and house, and kids for that matter)
4. An enclosed porch with a hot tub (and a nice enough body to go get in it!)
5. A personal interior decorator who supplies all the need decor items
6. A new computer that will record TV for me
7. A personal jet that runs on water
8. A bag of caramel chocolates (or any chocolate for that matter)

8 People I Tag
1. Um...
2. Um...
3. Um...
4. Um...
5. Um...
6. Um...
7. Um...
8. Um... (guess I am not good at tagging, plus everyone one I know has pretty much done this already)

So there you go 6 questions with 8 answers each. Have a GREAT day!

Happy Birthday NATHAN

Here are some facts about my sweet little Nathan:

He was born in Florida, and became so used to the sun, that he has NEVER in his life had a sunburn. His skin is just as pale as the rest of ours, but he does not burn.

He HATES sprinklers. You would think that with his first year of life being spent at swimming pools and the beach 3 or more times a week he would LOVE the water but no. He could actually swim when he was 18 months old. He would go between Bryan and I, but now he will not get off the steps of a swimming pool, and HATES getting wet by sprinklers.

He is AMAZING on the computer and other electronic devices. At the age of 2 he could not only navigate simple websites like PBS for hours without help, but he could also pull down the past URLs and find different websites to visit, not just random ones, but he would say, I want Nickjr.com and he would pull down the options and pick Nickjr!

He is a medicine junkie. Once he drank an ENTIRE bottle of children's Tylenol. I called my doctor who said I had to take him to the ER. I did, where they asked his weight, called poison control, told me he would be fine, then charged me over $300. ERGH! So the next time when he drank an entire bottle of ibuprofen, I saved myself the $300 and called poison control myself and had them tell me he would be fine. (I swear I keep my medicine out of reach, he is just VERY smart and can open child proof lids!)

He is SUPER observant. Nathan will not only notice when I buy a new shirt, shoes etc, but will comment on how nice it looks on me when I wear it. He will also notice if I change my make up and ask if it is Sunday. Not only that!...but he notices when other people like his Aunt Andrea has on new clothes too. When we go shopping together Nathan will tell me "Oh MOM!! You HAVE to buy that shirt it looks SO good on you!"

(this was what the men (and bunny ear addict) did during the party)

This is a video of his favorite present, no joke. He actually did not get any toys for his birthday, (other than webkinz) He really does not play much with toys, I spent a long time walking around Toys R Us and found NOTHING that I thought he would like, so he got other things, like Cars sheets, a singing Mario toothbrush and his own toothpaste and of course a Wii game.

I LOVE my Nathan and could not imagine life with out his funny comments and his sweet smiles..HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Christmas at the Davis'

(in case your wondering...yes it is spelled Davis' not Davis's or Davises, it is also easy to just say the Davis family, which is what I do most often)

I had a WONDERFUL Christmas. I think it was possibly the most stressful Christmas season for me, but turned out to be a wonderful Christmas day. Bryan worked a lot but was able to get Christmas day and the day after Christmas off. I think it was one of the first times that we just stayed home and didn't do anything. It was peaceful and fun. I usually take some pictures, but was not feeling it so we didn't end up with much, but here is what we have:


On Christmas Eve everyone opens one gift (PJ's of course) The kids finally caught on this year and knew what it was before they opened it (it is about time, we have been doing this for 10 years now) Here is how they turned out:
On Christmas morning the kids woke us up around 6:45 (not to bad, although it is getting earlier every year) They get to break through a paper wall that blocks off the room with the presents (a Davis family tradition that my kids LOVE)

At the last minute we decided to go ahead and wake up Ashton so that he could join in the present opening....he was not to happy about it:

This is the only picture I took during the present opening....at least it was a cute one right?

Here are a few of the themed presents that we got. They got matching pillow animals, hand made from Grandma and Grandpa Tucker:And Matching aprons, hand made from Charlotte and Peter Later. (and yes, that is my awesome vacuum in the back, I figured it was in the blog enough to be in one of our family photos right?)Here is a little video of the breaking through of the wall. When Bryan was growing up they used newspaper for the wall. We don't get the paper though and have a large roll of butcher paper so that is what we use. It works ok.


Hope you all had a GREAT Christmas and have a very happy new year!

Begining the Catch Up

So I have several posts to do, what with Christmas and Birthdays and such, and I wasn't sure where to start so I decided to start at the beginning and do them in chronological order, so here goes:

The week before Christmas my kids had their first piano recital. They had been practicing extra hard (I hear the songs in my sleep now) and I was SO proud of how well they played them. Luckily we are close friends with not only the piano teacher...aka Aunt Andrea, but also her other students, so the recital was a small affair at our friends house.

They had some soft cozy lighting, which made for a more intimate setting, but terrible video, but I knew grandparents would want to hear so here are the dark videos:



They did SUCH a great job! I will be glad to go from Christmas music to regular songs (I think) but will look forward to next year when my kids will once again fill my house with the sounds of Christmas!

A Tag and a Story (aren't you lucky?)

Ok, so I knew this tag was out there and I have been meaning to check the 4th picture in my 4th folder to make sure it was something good, but never got around to it and I was just tagged by my friend Alicia so here you have it. It is nothing spectacular, but does go with a crazy story.

We lived in St Augustine Florida for 2 1/2 years while Bryan attended physical therapy school. It just happened to be the worst two hurricane seasons in recent history. Every late summer and early fall the elders quorums would be called out time and time again to do hurricane clean up. Most of the time it was cutting up fallen trees, or patching roofs, but this picture is of the clean up to hurricane Katrina.

Bryan not only had to do regular clean up, but because of the flooding they had to gut houses. He told me the horror stories of cleaning out houses where you could tell how high the water had come because the mold was that high on the walls. He told me how belongings were scattered not only throughout the house but down the street. He told me how the smell was so overwhelming and the sadness of telling people that their homes were not salvageable.

Even through all this loss, he was able to also tell me how grateful people were when they showed up to help, how awesome it was to see members of the church come from all over and sleep on the church gym floor and surrounding land, bringing their own food and supplies because all stores and restaurants in the area were wiped out. He told tales of service, love and gratitude. We did not get hit by that hurricane, but I will never forget Bryan coming home and wanting to get rid of all our stuff, because he had realized that's all it was, was just stuff. He had seen these people lose all their stuff and it made us both realize that stuff does not matter. What matters is family, friends, and faith.

It reminds me of the scripture found in Matthew 6:19-20 "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal. What a valuable lesson to remember during this wonder season.

Here are a few more pictures (sorry they are blurry, for obvious reasons he did not take our good camera with him): This first one is a typical trash pile after cleaning out a house: This one is what all the trees and bushes looked like: And if you look closely at this one you can see some steps that used to lead up to a building, and as you can tell the building is just gone.

Oh yeah and I tag my two brothers, Barlow and Gordon and Brandee G.