When I grow up.

Well, summer has been really good so far. We are enjoying the warm weather. Other than the Flood of 2008 which shattered the previous flood crest it has been a very nice time. We have enjoyed the swimming pool, golf, playing at the park and I am sure there are some other fun activities that we have done. We are not going to be going up to Canada this year. We were going to go but with gas prices and the way I am feeling with the pregnancy and how tired I am, I just don't know if I can do the drive. I am excited to stay home and just enjoy our summer together.

There have been a couple things this last week in which is really hard for me to let my children go and grow up. Austyn (11) was invited to go to Adventureland in Des Moines with a friend of hers. She worked for her money that is cost for her ticket and was great. She left at 7:00 a.m. and all day I just had to think to myself that everything was fine with her. I stayed up until Midnight in case she called because she would not get home until then. She stayed at her friends house and they had so much fun. She came home safe and that is great. We just took Madison this afternoon after church to Camp Wapsie. It is a 3 night camp with the YMCA. She is with her Best Friend who is wonderful and I know they are going to have so much fun. It will most likely be harder on me than on her that she is gone but I am okay. I am not looking forward to teenagers because of the worry that I will most likely have. But I guess I will use baby steps to try and feel better about letting them go out in the world without me by their side.

Anyway, things are going good. Neil has his flight booked for France next sunday. He will be gone for 3 weeks. It will be hard not having him around. One good thing I get the bed to myself and I can lay out have pillows all around me and hopefully not be waken up by kids coming in so I can have a great sleep. We will see. It is also nice not to have suppers ready for him when he gets home. We are always excited when he gets home. He will be going a lot in the next few months. I think he is lucky.

Well, I have a child pulling on me so I will run for now.

Times at Walmart.

I had a friend that blogged about her experiences at walmart and I was laughing today as I was there with my experience. I took the girls to golf which is 1 hour and thought I would run to walmart, take some pop bottles back and get a couple of things. Well, I drove up and got to take pop bottles and realized everyone had the same idea. There was quite a line up of people. I checked what people were taking back and got in line to put plastic bottles in. There was someone in front of me that had quite a bit so I sat and waited. There is another plastic bottle thing but it was full so you could not put more in. So I waited. Luckily Regan was happy. Then, we waited more and when she was almost done it was full so there were two full ones. A guy was there and he emptied it so she started again. Then something happened and it said not working get staff. Dang! So instead of waiting anymore there I went to customer service and returned them there. Great, one thing done. Then I went a got a couple of things I needed and by this time it was almost time to get the girls. I ran to the gas station to get my pop that is always cheap in the summer. (It is 32 ounce fountain pop for .69 cents) It makes my summer. I would love slurpies with ice cream more but since they do not have good slurpies here at all I get the fountain pop and it is great. Anyway, I ran and got the girls. MISSION DONE. We got everything done and came home.

Austyn and Neil went last night and shoveled a basement out downtown and they did say it was quite aweful. I feel so bad for the people that were affected and since we are not going to Canada we will have lots of opportunities to do some service. I know they would not even allow me to be down there being pregnant and they would not allow anyone under 12 to be down but Austyn has wanted to help so bad and so Neil went down with her. They were saying that there were teenage boys who were to cool to where masks that were throwing up after for a while because of all the toxic stuff they were breathing. Austyn and Neil wore a mask and I think Austyn was very happy to help out. Ridley was crying because he wanted to help out but I told him there would be other opportunities to help out.

Well, we are not coming up to Canada this summer. We have done a couple of trips, we went to Georgia for a nephews baptism during spring break, we went to Fargo, ND for Neil's marathon, and it all seems to add up. We love our family but I am somewhat relieved not to drive for 23 hours by myself with 5 kids and 6 months pregnant. I did do it last year but I was not pregnant. I think I am getting old and they are harder on my body. We are going to go to Nauvoo and go to the pageant down there one day this summer and the kids are in Swim lessons until the 1st of August, but we have a family pool pass and we do a lot of swimming. We will have a great summer it just won't be the same to be around our family. I hope they come and visit us sometime. Hint Hint!

Well, Make it a great day.

More gum

Well, it looks like our night was not over with, with the gum. Josie came upstairs with Madison who told me she was trying to get Peanut butter to put in her hair to get MORE gum out. I could not believe that twice in one day she got gum in her hair. Josie is now banned from gum until I think she will not get it in her hair. She has never done this before so it is quite weird. I got some vaseline in her hair gave her a bath right there and washed her hair. Her hair is totally gumless and all cleaned. Hopefully today is a great day! It sure is beautiful out. Hope everyone has a great day!

What a day!

There are crazy days. This was one of them. I woke up actually nice and awake and ready to get the kids breakfast. We ate and then I had everyone get ready to go get groceries. I took them to the dollar store to get a few toys for the summer and then we went to a couple of other stores and got groceries and then hit sams club for lunch. I was so excited to be driving home from our morning of shopping with all the kids and on the way home Josie informs me that she has gum in her hair. I asked her where she put her gum and she said she lost it. I imagine it somehow ended up in her hair. I just had to laugh because if I let it get to me I would have run off the next bridge. JUST JOKING! but I did laugh. When we got home I told her to just wait until I got all the groceries out and I would take care of her hair. There was ice cream that had been sitting for about 1 hour and I really wanted to get things in the house and put away. Well, Madison ran out and told me that Josie was cutting her hair. She was trying to cut the piece of gum out herself. I was not very happy. She luckily did not take too big of chunk off. I am sure if I would have let her have at it she would have. I got the gum cut out and got everyone laid down for a nap which was very nice. I also vaccumed up a WII cord for the sensor which was not great also. It will only cost 10 dollars to replace which is about 100 less then I thought it would cost. Lots of fun. I do love it when summer is out. This has only been our second week. I am still loving summer but it might get old it a bit.

Things are going well with the water. At least it is all going down. So many things are destroyed. IT is aweful to see and watch the news as they show the library destroyed and all the businesses. We will make it. Hope everyone is not in water and stays dry.

flooding.

Well, we are totally flooding here in Cedar Rapids. Luckily we are still dry but down town is totally under water. It is crazy. I can't even believe the pictures are from our city. There have been so many evacuations downtown and I just can't believe it. Anyway, if you log onto www.kcrg.com you can see some of the pictures of what is going on. The KCRG TV 9 studio is downtown and they are without power, water and it totally reminds of a movie when the world is ending and they are staying to the end. Anyway, we are good so far but I can't believe how bad it is around Cedar Rapids and some towns all around. Anyway, hopefully we will stay above water and this will all get better soon.

ITS A BOY!

Well, we are having a boy. We are all really excited, especially the boys because that means 3 girls, 3 boys. Ridley was very excited to have a new brother.

It has been really rainy here. Our spring has not been very nice. About as nice as the winter. Which was really not very nice.

I had a day today to do nothing. But when I say that I would love to just sit on the couch and do nothing all day but my nothing means we just don't have to leave the house. I was very tired this morning. I helped our neighbor to let her dog out on Sunday night around 11:00 and Monday morning around 6:30 a.m. and then Monday night again and Tuesday morning. So those late nights get to me. Also we stayed up until Midnight on Monday night watching the Stanley cup playoff game and went to bed after the 2nd overtime. I was happy to see that Pittsburg had won the next day. Anyway, I got up around 5:00 a.m. this morning because Josie and Regan are kind of not feeling good and kept coughing. So when all the kids went to school I laid down and kind of fell asleep for an hour. Then I was being woken up to much so I just got up and got the kids what they wanted and then started cleaning and then laid them down for their nap and then cleaned, cleaned cleaned. It was really nice. I got the bathrooms all cleaned and our bedroom really cleaned up. It was really nice to look at after it was done. Things just seem to be piled up in a few places. It was all cleaned. ANyway, my children are running around and I am really wanting them in bed right now so I am going to run and do our bedtime routine. Good night all!