UGH-ust

It seems like just yesterday I wrote in my blog. Well, since May I have been back to MN for a two week stay in July. I brought the family this time and we all had our own agenda while in the land of 10,000 lakes. James earned his sailing certificate, I think he is now a Captain, so refer to him as such. Kaleb burned new trails through my parents yard on the 4-wheeler, I know they loved that. Sydney and Harley ran, filled lotsa diapers, swam, cried, made huge messes everywhere, and had a great time. I just wanted to spend family time with my siblings and parents. We all went up to Duluth for a couple days and it was amazing. We spent the night in a fun waterpark hotel, went on a 2 hour cruise around Duluth Harbor-it seemed more like a 2 day cruise but it was memories and we even ate in a restaurant featured on "diner and dives".
At the end of June we went to Idaho for a family reunion on James' side. It was an amazing cabin rental north of West Yellowstone. We had everyone under one roof for one full night and it was great. It isn't often that all the kids get to see each other. We walked, talked, laughed, rafted, cooked, and played a game of "minute to win it". Lots of effort went into making this a great weekend and it turned out wonderful.

One more honorable mention as we work our way back to early June, is we spent two days in a couple local funneries. One was Lagoon and the other was cherry Hills water park. I am glad we did this, the kids had a great time. James' eyeballs were about popping out of his head when I pleaded with him to take three vacations in one month. It turned out to be wonderful memories.

Since our June and July months were filled with so much excitement you can see why August seems so UGHHH.
We are excited to start school (kaleb especially is thrilled) He gets to start a new school and is honestly excited to be the new kid? I guess he wants to know what it feel like to have everyone stare at you and wonder if you can talk or are just super shy? He will make friends fast and has always been such a tender heart. Seriously, not just because I birthed him (NO BIAS) it is hard not to love him. Sydney has now learned some new fun expressions, "No-way, you can't make me, I don't want to, and my favorite 'leave me alone'. I love how they grow up. Harley is running around trying to keep up with his brother and sister. He calls everything a ball, and laughs when Sydney pushes him down. I still give him one bottle a day 'cause I love him so much. I also still let Sydney have sippy cups and she isn't potty trained. There.... PHEW... I got those monkey's off my back. Hope your summer was a ball of fun and cracker jacks.

September: State Fair and Cirus

Also: recent prayers include: selling house for alot more than my neighbor's next door, keeping my transmission for another year, and just one dinner of green beans from the garden. So if you are particularly good about getting answers can you please add these to your list.

Namaste-

Sure Sure

Trying to find my blogger shoes again. I am officially done with school until the fall. This means time for a list. I love making lists they make me feel like I am on some kind of good path. My mom is a lister, she lists out groceries, meal planning, what to bring, what to do, what to buy, who to visit and how much to spend.

"summer list".
-refinish my cupboards
-fancy-up the kids bedrooms
-sew new curtains for all the bedrooms
-repaint my room
-get sydney officially potty trained
-plant garden, and more important take care of garden
-read several super smart books
-read several super non-smart books
-clean out basement
-go through baby clothes

EASTER
For Easter this year the kids had to find their baskets by solving clues. Each clue card led them to a new destination with eggs to find and a new hint of where to go. Kaleb got a big kick out of this.
"Clue One. Clue one is fun, but clue two is hidden under poo" (I hid this under the cats liter box). Well, you get the idea. It went on like this for about 12 clues.

SYDNEY"S BIRTHDAY
We celebrated Sydney's 3rd birthday on April 1st. She loves birthdays. I think singing her the birthday song was the highlight of her night. I spent about 4 hours and WAY to much on a home-made barbie cake. I had the only piece of cake.

SISTERS WEEKEND
In April I went home (MN) to have a much desired first-annual-sister's-weekend. We had reserved a really fancy 5 star hotel for one night and a Hampton Inn the next night. The five star hotel is nice, but the refrigerator was filled up with complimentary liquor so there was no place to put water or leftovers. The spa didn't have a pool only a very large hot tub. There was no ice machine down the hall you had to call for room service to bring up ice on a silver tray. The worst part was I wanted to wear a 5 star hotel robe, they advertised this and there was no robe to be found. The best story from this weekend involved my mom and older sister. We all went down to the spa area. Amanda and I went into the steam room, my mom and Amy went into the hot tub. They decided to shower off before getting in and entered this room sized shower. The controls were on an LED screen. Amy is manning the controller my mom is standing on the other side of the room, letting Amy know "I don't want to get my hair wet, it would take forever to fix again." Just then all the button pushing on the LED screen kicked in. My mom was sprayed with force of 2 elephant hoses in the face and head. Her glasses and Amy's glasses are all steamed up and they cannot read the controller on how to shut the water off. My mom comes stumbling out of the shower and enters the steam room. "Alesia, Amanda...are you in here?" All the steam at this point as left the room, people are hushing and sushing her. We relunctuntly answer...."yes we are here". I think the sight of her looking more like a drowned rat was funnier than anything. Luckily we were able to fix her hair up and make it to the first talk of the Time out for Women's conference.

The Hampton Inn
Lets just say some highlights
-Empty refrigerator in the room
-Big breakfast bar with that belgium waffle maker along with juice, fruit and yogurt,
-Pool with extended hours.
Yes indeed,Hampton Inn people we are.

The bad side to the sisters weekend was my Dad had a 5 night hospital stay the beginging the first night in the fancy hotel. Amanda and my Mom left to go to the hospital in the middle of the night. Thank goodness it only ended up being a gangrene gall bladder. WHAT, gangrene you say. Yes, apparently this little bugger has been no good for awhile.
Seeing my family was great, I had a chance to see my Grandparents while I was there.
Grandma C who is now a permenant resident of the Curtis Hotel and Extended stay AKA my parents home. She keeps my family on their toes. She has dementia probably from alzeheimers but that is just a guess. She wears clothes backwards, hates getting in showers, and is mostly confused about why people are living in her house. It is sad, but keeping a sense of humor is a must in this situation. We all are trying to be supportive but it is hard to see someone who is normally very dignified behave so out of character. She is 93 and had a sister live to 102 with the same condition. It is hard to know what to wish for in this situation.

The humorous side of Grandma C
-decorating a meatloaf with rice krispie treats
-eating a whole bag of oranges
-Asking Amanda how long she has worked there
-Waiting for the bus to town, in my parents living room

Zions Park
After my weekend trip to MN, James, I and the kids jumped into the truck attached was a 24 ft camper trailer. We headed down to Zion National park for a few days of R&R. We stayed in a RV resort right on the Virgin River. The kids had a great time, we only officially hiked one day in Zion and one day in Red cliff recreation area. James had the unfortunate task of hauling Harley around. He is weighing in around
25 lbs these days and would rather walk than be hauled around. So he was a little wiggly in the hiking pack.

May is bringing in Harley's first birthday and Kalebs 10th birthday. We are looking forward to a great summer with a few more trips planned, lagoon passes bought and ready to play.

Cirque DUH soleil

I was feeling so good the other night I thought I could attempt a yoga move. I have only seen one person work this position in real life.



I almost broke my neck.

Spring Fever

Only 2 weeks before Spring official begins. I am so excited to see and feel the warm sun I hope it heals all the nasty seasonal depression floating around. Let me start this by saying, I am a health nut (AKA Hypochondriac) but who cares about a label? So anyway, I love going to the Good Earth store. I feel healthier just walking around in there. I usually find some new food, drink or herb that I have to try. I think there are so many vitamins, minerals, and herbs at our disposal to help make us feel better we are foolish to not take advantage! Here are a few that I love!


Vitamin D is an amazing little vitamin. I take Vitamin D3 for immune support and maintaining a healthy body weight. This is the one I use.

FOR MORE INFORMATION,
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/161618.php


Coconut water from Naked and Kefir smoothies have worked really well for calming acid reflux. I also have been taking a fish oil softgel daily. I think if I eat smarter then I will feel healthier, and liver a happy long life(liver, ha ha.)








Almost done, I have also been taking Resveratrol, this is an anti-inflammatory, that increases energy levels, lowers blood sugar and extends life. I love this product not just because it is my formula but also because it is good for you.











Okay this is my last paragraph, I just can't help it,I need to share the things I find useful and not just make fun of my life.

Something interesting, since children's cold medicines have been found ineffective there is a boom of natural cough and cold medications available, have you noticed? The one that I think works like a champ is from a company called Zarbees. It is a honey based cough syrup.



My friend and fellow formulator has an exciting new product coming out this month called Metabolife Slender Satisfaction; A weight management shake. It tastes great and I am so excited to see this on the shelf.
I love my job!

Brain Gnomes

Lately, at least this past week I have been struggling with my brain gnome. You know that little guy who sits up there in the cerebral areas just waiting for you to need him. His service usually involves finding all that information gathered over the past years and being ready to pull it up at a moments notice. For instance, my friend and I were having a conversation about a dolphin in California, he responds with "an elephant, what is an elephant doing on the beach". Now, its moments like this I am pretty sure a gnome has lost his step. I have deduced that gnomes go through periods of being sick, tired, lazy or plain ol' frazzled. My gnome (lets call him A-2) has been coming up with the wrong words, flipping numbers, hiding the memory of where I put things (especially keys), erasing an entire drive home, and in generally causing chaos. I think I need to find a new one or get more sleep. In the mean time I am going to just make jokes about it until I get picked up by police, naked in some grocery store. My excuse will be, "my gnome made me do it", I am certain that will go over well.



The dictator gnome






Gnome of the future





The look good while gnoming -gnome

Momsense

Some days I just have to sit and stare. The staring usually does not involve rocking but sometimes it just happens. The term "kids" doesn't do them justice. A better word would be"motivational emotional brain enhancers" or MEBE for short.

Lets begin by taking a trip through the world of MEBEs, beginning with a 5:45am brain teaser. This is when I am torn from a peaceful sleep trying to comprehend why a screaming 2 year old is poking me in the face, stating that her "monkey and bwankie are lost and she wants a sippy and cookie". Early mornings with MEBEs usually include many sets of lumbar stretches which involve picking up toys thrown from buckets for the millionth time accompanied with dexterity challenges of quickly removing the latest tool from the baby's mouth that is causing him to gag. You should know a baby's main motive is to try and eliminate themselves and you have to keep them alive or without major injury. The baby I speak of shows his best trick by scaling the stairs and teetering back and forth threatening a fall to a nice hard tile floor, all the while sporting a gummy grin. Next is when MEBEs encourage meditation exercises. This starts by taking deep breaths and centering self when 9 year old child announces, he forgot his shoes, coat, and backpack at home as we are sitting in front of the school
(45 min away). This leads into the daily cleansing/detoxing and adaptation exercises that are best experienced while getting puked on at midnight and/or pooped on while giving the little ones a bath.

These learning moments provded by MEBEs are also found at dinner time with the battle of picky eaters who only want fruit snacks and pringles (at least it makes for easy meals), or who seem to only want food as you tuck them into bed.

Questions do come to mind though. How did my mother do this with 7 kids, how does my sister do it with 4 and her husband working out of state, how does my girlfriend stay at home and school 5 kids without pulling her hair out? How do I bring up kids that know I love them and know I am truly not evil even when I have steam coming out my ears?
My prayers have started to include, "please give my kids short memories and the ability to forgive quickly."
I don't have alot of answers about child rearing, I certainly could not write a book of advice, but I have learned valuble lessons through being a parent-I have no idea what I am doing.

Time

Time is a funny little word, but a word with much power. During my last few months I have been deparately out of time. I haven't been on time to anything for some time. I am stealing time right now to write about how I am wishing for more time. I keep thinking there will be a time in my life where time is not an issue. I think that time will be only when I am at the end of my life and time is up.