A Blogger's Work Is Never Done

I think what I hate most about blogging is that as soon as I finally get around to blogging about something, it is old news and everyone else keeps posting new blogs daily. A blog a week is really really good for me but even with my 1 blog/week I am still always near the bottom of everyone's blogger's list (thanks mom for keeping me from being at the very bottom. Your sacrifices are never ending.). Most people will blog about whatever happens during their day and it is not usually exciting but I am always very entertained reading it. So I will try to blog about my day and I am sure you will all be very entertained.

Today Morgan and I took Teddy and Wini geocaching. (For those of you who don't know what geocaching is, it is when someone hides a little box of treasures* using gps coordinates and posts it on the internet. Then you can go find the "treasure box", take something out of it and then leave something behind for the next person) I absolutely HATE geocaching but Morgan, Teddy and Wini love it. Teddy and Wini think they are searching for treasures that pirates left behind and Morgan likes to collect the traveling coins that are in some of them. Ususally when we go it involves four wheeling-which I HATE, hiking-which I HATE, and then we only find the geocache maybe half the time. Today was another flanktastic adventure. Morgan first tricked me into going by telling me he had to go into Boise to pick up his pay check. He invited me to go along and since I only had about 10 loads of laundry, 3 messy bathrooms, floors that needed to mopped and vaccumed, toys that needed to be picked and 5 beds that needed to be made, I decided I could take the day off and go along for the ride. As soon as we pulled out of the drive way, he pulled the geocaches that he had sneakily printed off. I told him I didn't want to do it but since Teddy and Wini already heard him, I was out numbered. The first cache was out in the country. Morgan and I had our usual fight about how he loves the georgous scenery with it's dried out weeds and broken down cars and hopefully someday we can live there and me having to disagree. We finally got to the first cache and it is rocky and on the edge of a very scary cliff. Morgan is wandering around looking for it while I am trying to keep both kids at my flank and stumbling around the rocks in my very unstable and unsupportive sandals. We finally found the treasure and Teddy got a dirty old broken compass, and Wini got a tiny dirty plastic frog. Now on to our next destination. This one was in the same general area but instead of walking around a rocky cliff, you had to actually climb up the cliffs, holding tightly to the rocks. Morgan says, "Oh you and the kids can just wait here in the car and I will go up, find the box, and bring it back down to you gize." Of course I agreed, I was going to climb the rocks with my kids at my flank, just to get a plastic toy. So the kids and I sat in the car. And we sat. And we sat. Thirty minutes later, Morgan shows back up with no box. Typical but at least I didn't have to hike around looking for it. I just had to sit in a hot car with two very bored kids who nothing to play with except a dirty old broken compass and a tiny dirty plastic frog. After that adventure, we had to head home to get kids off of buses. The whole adventure was flankishly annoying and hopefully it will be at least another week before I am tricked into it again. But at least we got a dirty old broken compass and a tiny dirty plastic frog out of the deal.


*Pieces of crap and old toys people found while cleaning out their cars.

Photogenic

My sister, Amy left this comment about how un-photogenic she is. I think she is way off. Every photo of her is perfection. As I was looking through Wini's birthday pictures on my mother-in-laws facebook, I found yet another picture-perfect-picture of Amy.



See! Georgous!

Wini Penny

Today is Winifred's birthday!!!!! She is 3 years old. I love her and am so glad I had her. She is super funny and way smart. She has lots of creative ideas. She is a chunky little girl and so much fun to squeeze and squoosh. Wini and Teddy are best friends and play so well together. Wini is the kind of kid that can sit and play with toys for hours by herself. She is pretty well behaved and I am so pround of her. I love her sweet little voice and all her speech impediments. Here are some recent pictures of her: Wini and her BFF, Teddy.
My little rag-a-muffin at Jump Creek.
Three years ago I had my baby girl. As soon as I found out I was pregnant I instantly loved her. Morgan was quite annoyed that I was pregnant and even more annoyed when we found out it was a girl (he wanted only boys so we could form a football team. Seriously.) The second I had her though he was in love. She has been the apple in his eye ever since and he spoils her. Here she is 3 years ago:

The first time I "held" her. One arm was still tied up and I was still being sewn back together.
Morgan being happy even though it was a girl.
Her first bath.

I am looking HOT!
Her nose was so cute and big.

The beginning of their friendship.



Just had to throw this one in of Wolfe because it makes me laugh.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, WINI!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!

My New, Old Computer

Well, our computer (lap top actually) finally gave out a few weeks ago. We had stopped using our desk top computer a few years ago because we discovered that with a lap top we could just "barrow" our neighbors internet FOR FREE! Anyways it finally gave out so we broke down and bought internet again and our using our old computer. It is very nice. The screen is gigantic. The only parts that really suck is 1) My itunes account is on the other computer and I didn't back it up and 2) Sims is WAY slower on this computer. The good part about it is all the old pictures I found of kids from a couple years ago. They changed a lot. Here are just a few for you. Teddy probably around 18 months.
Teddy almost looks fat there and Wolfe looks exactly the same except shorter.
Our poor dog. Wolfe still treats him like that but now that he is bigger, the dog is actually getting hurt. Duke loves Wolfe though and never runs from him or growls or snaps.

I wish I could show side by side pictures of how much they changed but all my recent pictures are on the other computer. Oh well. More pictures to come!!!! Stay tuned!!

Bring It On, Mark!!

Top of the List

I just realized today that if I post more blogs then I will be at the top of Katie's list. That is motavation. Katie, are you there??

Smart Remarks-----Breaking Dawn

******WARNING!!!! IF YOU HAVE NOT FINISHED THIS BOOK, DO NOT READ THIS POST!!!!!***********








Well, I finished reading the book a few weeks ago and have been waiting for the book club to give my review. When I read Twilight, I was instantly in love with Edward. I couldn't eat or sleep and was very dissappointed that Morgan was not a vampire. I quickly read New Moon and Eclipse and when it was all over with I was so depressed. The only way to get over the depression and to start all over and re-read them. After 10 days I had read all three books, four times each and the depression was over. I was starting to feel okay about the fact that I was married to Morgan and he has to sleep at night and can't hear thoughts and doesn't have super strength...and then Breaking Dawn came out.


I was feeling hesitant to read it because I didn't want those feelings to come back. Fortunately this book wasn't as good as the others and when it was over I was okay with it. What I liked about the book:

I liked that Bella and Edward got married right away and that it wasn't all dragged out. I liked that she had a baby and became a vampire and I liked that the Volturi came and ruined everything. I also liked how it ended and I liked Bella's powers. I liked that Jacob finally got over Bella so that she wasn't constantly leading him on. And of course, I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this guy:

What I didn't like about the book:

The entire book of Jacob.

I didn't like all the boring filler stuff. I felt like it went on and on sometimes. I didn't like that Jacob imprinted on Reneesme and speaking of Reneesme, I hated that name. Way groovy!!! I was also getting a little annoyed by Bella and Edward's love for each other. Yes yes we all know that you are in love. I was slightly annoyed by the fact that she was willing to sign her 3 month old baby over to a 17 year old teenager who had a crush on her because she couldn't live without Edward. She needs to take care of her responsiblities and live to raise her baby. I was also annoyed that she was only giving Jacob enough money to get by for a year!! He is raising your baby!! He is needing child support for the next 18 years.

Anyways, I enjoyed the book but out of the four, it was my least favorite. On a side note, I have been writing this post for 3 days now so if it sounds a little choppy, that is why.

Can't Sleep

Well, it is 5:30 in the morning and I can not sleep. Since nothing good was on t.v. I decided to come downstairs are check out blogs. Everyone is doing a great job updating so I decided to go ahead and update mine. I know everyone has axiously been awaiting this.

Wolfe's therapy ended. He was in IBI (Intensive Behavioral Intervention) for the past 3 years and since the state will only pay for three years of private therapy it ended. Unfortunately, that meant we had to lose our therapist who we loved. The first two hears of therapy were wasted on very very VERY crappy therapist until we got Chris. The last year he got Wolfe to be able to understand and to start communicating. He is also starting to learn how to spell and because of this his behaviors are much better. We are sad to lose him. I think I am the most sad. Wolfe likes his new therapist but I am still having a hard time adjusting and miss Chris so much. We had him over for dinner a few weeks ago and we will have him over again. His new therapist (Alora) is nice. She has been doing developmental therapy for awhile and I hope together we can get Wolfe talking more independantly. The other night I was watching Judge Judy and Wolfe came out of his room and got right in my face and started saying, "Backa!" I was just like, "Yeah yeah, backa, go back to bed." He was persistent and kept saying "backa". I was starting to lose patience and so I said, "Wolfe! What do you want?!" I was totally shocked when he said (and signed),"I...want...BACKA!!!" As he yelled Backa he did the bubble sign. I figured out pretty quickly that he wanted popcorn. I was so impressed that I turned the t.v. off and spent the next little while working with him to talk more. I can ask him if he is happy or sad and he can answer. It is very fun.

Teddy and Wini have been having a very good summer. They are bestest friends and play so cute together. A couple nights ago (everything happens at night around here) Teddy was running down the stair and ran into Wini. He was screaming and there was blood everywhere. It took awhile to calm him down and figure out what was bleeding (it was the inside of his lip that his tooth cut up). The whole family was gathered around him giving him sympathy and asking if he was okay. Once the bleeding stopped and everyone was calmed down, I noticed that Wini was giving me the dirtiest look. I looked at her forehead which had a big goose egg and I vaguely remember her crying in the background during the commotion but since she had no blood, she got no love. She was pretty mad about it. I took Teddy to the doctor the next day to have his lip looked at and as soon as the doctor walked in the room Wini said,"It's okay, my head feels all better." If you knew how much attention she normally gets, it is funnier. Teddy's lip was fine by the way. His mouth just looks like the joker and it will take a week or two to heal.

Our PCS kid is doing well. She is very dramatic but I guess that is a 16 year old for you. She has been grounded for the past 6 weeks and gets ungrounded in less than a week. I am dreading it because I much prefer her at home where I can keep an eye on her. I don't think she thought I would seriously be able to stick it out this long but it was surprisingly easy to follow through. I don't think this will be the last time she gets grounded but maybe she will be able to stay ungrounded for a little while at least.
A month ago we took a second PCS child. She had a history of aggression due to her disability so we only would take her on a trial basis. We agreed to one month. We got her June 29th and so far everything was going well. She was very helpful and loved the kids. She was only 12 but she was big. Last night things went bad with her and I had to have her removed from the house. I don't think I am aloud to go into detail so all I will say is I am fine, she is fine and none of the kids even saw what happened. Morgan and I have decided to not let her come back which is disappointing because we really liked her and I am sad about what is going to happen to her. That is the reason why I can not sleep. I have to go to court in four hours for her and I have to tell her mom that I can not take her back. Her mom is a wonderful lady and I really hope she can find a home for her daughter. She deserves to be raised with a family. I now have an opening for a child but right now I feel sad about the one I could not help so I think I will wait awhile before I accept another. There are so many children out there that need a home. No child deserves to be raised in a group home or hospital because of a disability. If anyone is interested in becoming a PCS provider feel free to contact me to get info. There is a huge need for it.
Well, Morgan and I decided to start going back to church when we got PCS kid #1. It had been a few years since we had gone regularly. No particular reason for not going except just being lazy. Anyways, our second Sunday back, they pulled us out of sunday school and asked us to be primary teachers. I thought it was a little premature of them but we accepted and now I have to go to church. The kids all love it and I am glad we are going again but I sure do wish I could go to church and get a break from kids. I am really looking forward to school starting again and having a routine. Summers in Idaho are frustrationg because it doesn't get dark until after 10:00. When I was younger I LOVED it but now that I have little kids, it is annoying. So we all stay up too late and wake up late. School keeps us in a regular routine and I am missing that.

To Jenny, Happy 31st Birthday! Love Sara

Thursday (the 12th) was Jenny's birthday. I meant to post something earlier and have not had any time to do it. Fortunately no one else has gotten their post up either. Jenny and I were bestest friends growing up. We always hung out together and since she liked to be in charge and I just liked to follow, we got along quite nicely. She is very creative (if you don't believe me, then go look at her post) and can always get stuff done. She is a great mom, student, homemaker and she is very good with a microwave. We always had so much fun growing up. We were never bored. When I got married, my mom gave me 3 books that were filled with all my school work, my church stuff, my essays from when I got in trouble and other odds and ends. My favorite thing in the book is the contract Jenny wrote up and had me sign. It pretty much sums up our relationship growing up. Here it is, unedited:

I, Sara, promise never to break the morning rules whitch are the following: 1 must be totaly ready for school before finishing unfinished homework 2 be dressed before going to breakfast inless it's an emergely or if we both agree not to be dressed 3 we can't leave until the room is clean 4 hair must be done after we are dressed 5 put pigamages in laundry when your done - or you'll have to make the bed by yourself 6 no playing Netendo. and if I follow these rules Jenny won't boss me around, but if I do break these rules Jenny may boss me around me around about breaking the rules. But if Jenny bosses me around about something else, I can break one of the rules.

My favorite things about this contract are:

1. I never did homework so it was not neccessary to include the part about unfinished homework before getting ready for school.

2. Our room was always a big mess and I wore my p.j.'s to school.

3. The fact that Jenny can't spell.

4. I was 12 and she was 15 when we wrote this contract.

Anyways, Happy Birthday! I love you!! Below is a little tribute with all the pictures that I have of you. I hope you enjoy it.

Sorry, this is the only picture I have of you on my computer.

The Gradute

A year ago, Teddy had qualified to go to developmental preschool. He was a little behind on his speech but he mainly he qualified because he was so shy during the testing that he wouldn't say anything. After a very long year of him not wanting to wake up, being too cold after his bath to get himself dressed, and not eating his breakfast quick enough because of that drop of milk staring at him from the table, he finally graduated. I am sooooooooooooo looking forward to summer time and not having to watch for buses for an hour and a half everyday. Wolfe still has another week left of school and then I am sleeping in for 3 months. Since many of you wanted to be at the ceremony so badly, I decided to post some pictures.
This is him lining up before walking down the aisle.
He is so nervous. He was trying to concentrate on not tripping.
That kid next to him was FUUUUUUUUUUNNY! He was very enthusiastic.
This is him getting his "diploma".

The after party.


This is his teacher, Miss "Mickey". Her name is really Vickey but Teddy can't say it right and since I thought Miss Mickey was cuter, I never corrected it.

He had a great year and is so much easier to understand. He is basically all caught up but still has to do 40 per week in resource room when he goes to Kindergarten but I think it is only for a few months. He is very cute and funny. We like him alot.

It's A Girl!!!!!!!

As I mentioned earlier, we got a call for a PSC child. We went down today and met her. She was super sweet and very smiley. We talked with her and her mother for awhile and after we came home and discussed it, we decided to accept her. She will be coming and living with us as early as tomorrow or as late as Tuesday. We are very excited to have her come.

What You've All Been Waiting For...

An update!
I finally got PCS certified. I got my medicaid provider number last week but then we had no idea what to do. Everyone we called gave contradictory information and I had no idea how to get a kid. Some people said it was so easy to one and others said it is very hard. I also found out that for some reason, they have had a lot of people wanting to be providers. It is frustrating after 11 months of trying to become a provider to find out that no one really knows what is going on. Today, though, as I was lazying around on the couch, watching Judge Judy, I got my first call. I was so excited talking with the lady that my voice was very high pitched the whole time and it took everything I had to not just accept the child without meet her or asking Morgan first. Anyways, we are calling her back tonight at 7:00 and if she hasn't found anyone else yet, then we will meet tomorrow. I am not allowed to give out personal information but she is a teenager and I think it will work out having her live with us.

Two weeks ago my friend had a baby. I got to go in the delivery room and watch her have it. It was very slimy and not nearly as sanitary as a c-section. I was impressed with how quickly she was up afterwards and she got to instantly hold her baby for a long time (I can't hold my babies until recovery). I think I still prefer c-sections because it was gross (sorry Katie) and I like my nice long vacation in the hospital. He was a very cute baby, 7lbs 3oz. She named him Fintin. Now when we go to the movies I have a sweet little baby to hold the whole time.
Isn't he cute. He should keep my desire to get pregnant down for a little while.

As I mentioned earlier, Wolfe is in baseball. It is more for Morgan and me then for him. He gets really bored.

He is so cute in his baseball cap, missing his front tooth.
Here he is about to bat.
I love this picture. He is alittle slow and needs Morgan to help him swing to actually hit the ball but we still let him try a few times by himself before we interveen.
Outfield is pretty boring so he just beats up on us the whole time. I don't know this lady in the picture, she just got in my way.
I know it looks like Morgan is handing him his bat but really Wolfe was trying to hit Morgan and he just caught the bat. It made a good picture though. It is fun to go and cheer him on. We have had a lot of supporters (mom, dad, Bailey Grandma, Amy, Steve and Katie) so Wolfe always has the biggest group cheering him on. Thanks guys for coming.

Wini has been wanting to potty train. She doesn't get how to do it but she loves to sit on the potty and sing songs. I am not very good about staying on her to go potty so nothing much has come of it. With Teddy, I just waited until he was old enough to get me saying "stop peeing your diaper". She is so funny. I love having a two year that can talking. They are so wierd.

Isn't her black eye precious.

Teddy's birthday was on the 9th. He turned 5 and was so excited about it. He had a very Iron Man-y birthday. He got lots of Iron Man stuff, costumes, action figures, cars. He was a great time. Amy and her family came, Jennifer and her family came, Grandparents and aunts and uncles were there too. It was a great time. I love him tons. He is too funny.

Happy Birthday Teddy!!!

Rude Rude Rude Rude Rude

I would just like to say that my blog is not slow...my life is. Not too much has been happening. As far as I go, nothing has changed. I am still waiting to get my kid. I did get my foster license and finished all my courses to be a child care provider. I turned everything in about 2 weeks ago but when I called on Thursday to see how thing were going, they still hadn't turned in my paperwork and needed me to sign a few more things and get more paperwork. So I took care of all that on Thursday and my paperwork got sent out the same day. I am a little nervous because the lady doing it was brand new and my application is the first one she has ever done. That is my typical luck. I have been working on it for 10 months now and I feel like it is never going to happen.
Morgan is doing good for anyone who cares. Real estate is picking up a bit but I still want him to get a job. The main reason for me wanting him to get a job is so I can get pregnant and have insurance (and also so we can pay bills). He likes selling real estate but we both hate how inconsistance the pay checks are.
Wolfe has had a very exciting last couple of weeks. He lost two teeth (one being his front tooth) and he looks precious with it gone. He is funny when we pull them out. He is flipping out until we finally get it and then he is totally calm, spacing off like nothing ever happened. He mood changes so instantly. He is also playing baseball this year. He started a couple weeks ago. It is challenger baseball so it is only disabled kids. It is more for mine and Morgan's enjoyment than his. He gets really bored because every kids gets to swing until they hit the ball and every kid gets to run through all the bases. Plus baseball is just a boring sport. It takes a long time to get through all the kids. It is fun to go to his games and help out. Grandma Bailey is here right now and she came to his game today.
Teddy is very obsessed with Iron Man. He draws iron man on everything and talks about him nonstop. He is turning 5 next week and he is very excited about that. He thinks his face is going to changed and he will look like Wolfe. He is nervous about hair growing on his face when he turns five though. He thinks if he puts baby powder on his face it will make it so no hair grows out of it. Maybe it will work, I don't know. He is quite funny. He is very excited about having another Grandma (Bailey Grandma, as he calls her). He calls my mother in law "Tracker Grandma" and my grandma "Bailey Grandma" and then calls my mom "Other Grandma". My mom isn't too happy with her title. We are trying to teach him to call her Candy Grandma or Movie Grandma.
Wini is a holy terror. I thought having a girl would be so easy. I imagined her just wanting to sit at the table and color in a coloring book but no. She is a boy trapped in a girl body. She is so dirty and wild. She much prefers dinosaurs and cars to baby dolls. When ever she does play with her barbies, she just makes her dinosaurs eat them. And the emotional break downs. Holy crap! She has an emotional break down every day at 1:00 p.m. and again at 5:00 p.m. She is super pretty though and when she is being a good girl it more than makes up for the naughtiness. I love summers because she looks so good in shorts. She too is obsessed with "Ailey Grandma". She saw a lady in the store with white curly hair and started screaming because she wanted her grandma.
So that is what has been going on with us. Do you see why I haven't been posting anything??!! Is this post everything you have been hoping for??

Time For A Change

Some of you may be a little confused. I am sure you are thinking something is different about my blog. Well, I won't keep you in suspense, I changed my template. I went ahead and just used one of the generic blogger templates but since I just had the plain black before it is quite the change. As you may be able to tell, I have sacraficed a Saturday night to go through the different template options and try out different ones. It is a very important job that requires the entire evening. If you happen to pop by earlier in the night you may have been lucky enough to see one of my choices. It is almost bedtime and I must go take care of other important tasks that need to be completed before the end of the night. I am behind by 2 episodes of Judge Judy and need to be all caught up by Monday at 3:00 p.m. I hate to procrastinate so I really have to go.

Our Last Home Inspection

We just finished our last home inspection and we are all finished for the year. We have to get rechecked every year and do an extra 10 hours a year of continuing education but we are done for now. On Monday we will be licensed for foster care and in a week and a half I will be licensed for PCS. FINALLY!

Morgan is packing up right now to go camping with a friend. It is a little nice every now and again to have the house to myself for a day. The kids and I are going to go rent a movie (Enchanted) and get some cookies and have a fun night. They will all sleep in my room tonight because I get scared at night by myself and I need to blame every noise I hear on one of my kids. Other than sleeping I am looking forward to fun with the kids. Last time Morgan went camping I got the crazy idea to go roller skating. I won't be making the same mistake again and will be spending as much time as possible safely in my house.