Mother's Day

I feel very blessed to be able to celebrate Mother's Day with my family. Since I wouldn't be a mom without my 4 rugrats. :-)

This year was much like last years Mother's Day. We had 3 people who had colds. So 2 in the begining stage and 1 near the end. So this mom was working around the clock to help take care of my sickies.

But I was still able to enjoy myself.

At church I gave a talk in sacrament. I spoke from my heart about how I try to be a better daughter of God. I was really nervous since this was my first talk EVER in sacrament. But despite my nerves the Lord helped me deliver the message I was suppose to deliver. And from the sounds of it from people in my ward I did a great job. They would have never known that this was my first time talking. That my message delivered such a strong spirit to them that they walked away feeling blessed.

All good things to hear since I was nervous.

When we came home my kiddos all went down for a lovely nap where Mike took that time to vacuum our living room. :-)

Our home teachers came over which is always a nice thing. Our family really loves the messages they bring to us.

But no Mother's Day would be complete without gifts. (Honestly I really didn't want gifts but my kids insisted so Mike took them all to Dollar Tree)
So I was spoiled with a
Diet Coke + silk roses from Mason.
Paper plates +  plastic spoons from Hailey.
Silk orchid + popsicles from Lily.
Fly swatter + socks from Ducati. ("so I can smash bugs".... I love that girl!)
But Mike really spoiled me with a pair of funky socks and a new coupon binder.

                                Now I look like a professional couponer with my handy shoulder strap and dual binders so I can separate my coupons. Yup- I love it! When I transfered everything into this big momma it weighed close to 7lbs. I hate to see how much it weighs now. But that's 7lbs of money saving paper. :-)

Anyways I had a great mother's day. I feel truly blessed to be a mother of 4 amazing and complete different spirits. They teach me more than I think I teach them. They help me grow in more ways than I thought one person could grow. They have helped me become the type of person I always wanted to become... Me :-)

Bubble Gum

So our house has been a mess. Certain things on our schedule have been way more important to us than vacuuming. So today I tried to get the girls in gear so we could put our huge pile of laundry away but instead of working I found them playing this game.

♪♪ Bubble gum, Bubble gum

in a dish

how many pieces do you wish? ♪♪

When Mike asked me why they weren't cleaning I showed him this picture and told him, "They're busy making memories right now." He didn't mind the little delay. :-)

Extreme Couponing/ Stockpile

When Netflix started showing epsoides of Extreme Couponing I knew I was in trouble. I love that show! I told Mike that this show it like my Rocky theme song. He laughed at me..... ALOT!
It's alright though. Over the past 5 months I've been able to grow our stockpile up to now having over a year supply of shampoo, conditioners, lotions, hair care products, and  deodorants. And  feminine items to last me about 3 years! This is pretty good especially since during the month of December I got rid of 90% of our stockpile due to charity donations. But we've been blessed so we need to share with everyone.
As for food I'm on my way there. With the sale cycles I've been able to stock up on tons of GF foods since our local grocery store just had their semi-annual gluten free sale. So now to start stocking up on everything else.
Mike's garage now has 1 fridge filled with frozen items and this shelf. And I'm on my way to shelf number 2.
But to share something I feel so happy to know that we have this stockpile. Mike's work schedule is always changing. Some weeks he gets extra hours and some weeks he's really low. So it's comforting and reassuring to know that I can still provide for my family and all our needs just with a few clips of a coupon.
:)

Unexpected Wind Storm

Since we've lived in our home we've experienced some pretty strong wind storms. But usually we get some sort of heads up. Either a weather watch on the tv. Or a phone call from someone in our ward. But not today. While Mike and I were watching a movie we heard a loud crash. It was so loud that our neighbor next to us heard it and ran over to our door to check on us. And this is what we found. Our next door neighbors trampoline flew into Mike's back windshield and busted the whole thing out.
WOWZERS!!!!!
After I took a few pictures for insurance purposes.....and to blog about. Our neighbor helped Mike pull this trampoline to the gate behind our house and chained it there.
Holy Cow!
The next morning when our neighbors seen Mike's car they knew what had happened since this wasn't the first time that their trampoline crashed into Mike's car. So they quickly cleaned up the glass (he even vacuumed the grass since he knows my children walk barefoot) and replaced the glass within a couple of days. We're so grateful that he did all of that for us.
But this was surely a fun little adventure. :-)

The Zoo Mystery

Hailey's 1st grade class puts on an opera each year with the help from the Utah Opera Dept at some college ( when I find the flyer I'll update this post) 

Anyways the children in this class write their own opera. No help from adults on ideas or lyrics. They do 100% of the work. Then the opera department takes the children's lyrics and makes a score for it. Which they then bring back to the class and help the kids rehearse their parts. Then the students paint their own background set and make their own costumes. To this opera is 100% the students. 

It's pretty awesome to witness this magical opera Hailey and her classmates created. 

I recorded the entire thing so if you want to see if email me and I'll send you the file :-)

Anyways Hailey absolutely loved being on stage. 

As Mike and I knew she would. She played the role of the sister in the family who went to the zoo with no animals. All the zoo animals fell down a manhole and the family called in some detectives to help find the lost animals. 

 It was adorable just like my sweet girl!

  Hailey showed us around the set and the bush behind her she painted. It's a berry bush.

 The manhole which the animals fell down. And the phone that she used to call the detectives.

Hailey had such a wonderful time making this production of, "The Zoo Mystery". She can't wait to get back up on stage again.

Arrow of Light

Mason received his Arrow of Light award tonight. He's been so excited to for this pack meeting that we showed up 20 minutes early. (That's odd for us since we're usually late everywhere)

 Mason was to pin the "Mother's pin" on me but he was alittle confused on where to place the pin so he needed alittle guidance.

  But that's alright. He's worked really hard to meet all the requirements to receive his arrow.

 After the other awards and pins were passed out the den leader had these smoke buckets for the boys to play with. Pretty fun :-)

 To to celebrate Mason's journey from cub scouts to Webelos they took him (and another boy) on a ride on this homemade hoover disc. Pretty awesome ride!

 Then to pass down the memory of all the boys leaving boyhood into manhood each scout signs this bridge; which I seen names from a few years ago all over it.

 Then cross over to the other side. I'm sure each young man feels special about taking this symbolic trip for themselves.

Here's Mason showing off his arrow with his award. Proud moment for our entire family.

Daily Life

This afternoon I mentioned to Mike how I haven't blogged in weeks.

He asked why?

I answered, "Because all our family has been doing is working and couponing."

And he said something that made me think the rest of the afternoon

"Really? That's all..."

And it made me think... what have we been doing for the last 2 weeks.

Lily. She was accepted to an on-line charter preschool that is lead by some professors who have made their curriculum more based on science researched facts than core curriculum  So basically she was tested for entry then based on her tests results they will mold her classes around her. And just a fun fact she tested at above average for children her age. So she's really excited to start that this fall. 

Ducati. Her personality is growing so much that it's finally shining through. She loves to dress herself now a days. Her favorite items to wear are her wellies (rain boots), tutu, shirt, crown (headband), and 80% of the time she'll "borrow" some jewelry from me. It's such a joy seeing my little girl grow right before my eyes. 

Hailey. With the nice weather she's been practicing alot more all the things she's been learning at her tumbling class. Yesterday she landed 3 running cartwheels in a row. She was so proud of herself! She's really stepped up her determination in wanting to improve her skills.

Mason. You know when I said Mike and I are aware that he'll have some bumps in the road on his journey to manhood. Well he's come to a point in his journey where he's making more bumps himself than need be. So here he is doing Hailey's chore of cleaning the bathroom. He's not happy with it but then again- what kind of mother would I be if I only did things that he liked. This was a great teaching moment that misbehavior is not going to be tolerated. 

Mike. He's exhausted. He has a new calling (as well as do I) but I'll post about that later on. He's still working the 2 full time jobs. The burden is still there but it's just easier to bear now. Thankfully Mike now has a Bluetooth so this gives us more time to chat. We still read scriptures, do our check-in's, and talk about our family all over the phone now. So that's really been a blessing for us. 

And me. :-) I've been inspired again to pick up my Extreme couponing. So I've been putting more focus on that again. It's hard to be EXTREME all the time  but when I save 70% on our grocery bill I sort of have to keep it up. So this week I picked up some major awesome deals that helped me bring home $350 worth of stuff for around $50. It's funny I "hinted" to Mike that for Mother's Day I want a bigger coupon binder. :-)

So in all fairness. We have been doing alot this past week. So I guess one never really notices what they accomplish until they can take a breathe and look back at their progress.