How do you get 18 boxes of crayons for $.09

It was pretty simple really.

The kids were excited to go buy crayons for a penny a box, the sale they have at a popular office supply store right now ( I won't mention where to protect the innocent. Although, I am sure Office Depot wouldn't mind since it is their competition.) Well, Riley, Kate and Andrew each have their penny's and crayons and go to the counter and they guys says "oh, if you are all together you can only get one of the offer, which has a limit of 3 boxes." I said "They are paying separate with their own money so it shouldn't matter" He wouldn't budge and I didn't want to get ugly with the kids there so we left and the whole time the kids keep asking "Why can't I get crayons, mom" especially Andrew was so sad. He said "why won't they let me get my own Crayons?"

We are talking about crayons for a little kid here people!!

So, we go to the car with all the kids bummed out and I call the toll free # on the sale flyer. I asked them if the sale was per family or per customer and if there was an age limit on who qualifies as a customer is?

The girl on the phone checked with whoever in her office and told me that there shouldn't have been a problem with each of the children getting their own. She was so nice and called the store we had been at and let them know what the policy is on that particular sale. She also told me that the store manager was aware of the situation and had already talked to the associate about it but I had already left the store and he couldn't do anything for me.

Which I don't really believe that he tried real hard to stop me cuz let me tell ya, getting three kids in the car buckeled up while looking through the sale flyer and calling the customer service number took quite a long time and I was sitting in the parking spot until after I was done dialing.

But at any rate, the customer service rep informed me that we could go back to the store, and the manager was going to give us the crayons for free! The kids were so excited!

When we got back to the store the manager was outside and could tell who I was as soon as I pulled up, or at least it appeared that way by the look on his face and mannerism with the person he was talking to.

He apologized for the inconvenience and said that not only would he give us 9 boxes of crayons for free but that if the kids wanted to take part in the sale they could each still purchase 3 boxes of crayons for a penny a box.

So we really got 18 boxes of crayons for $.09. The kids were excited and it was a great lesson to the children that if you think that something isn't right, don't go all ballistic, just call and check it out and solve the problem in a way that won't make anyone look like an idiot.

Whew! All that for some crayons!

A very adventerous summer.

This summer has by far been the busiest in many years. We have done cub scout day camp, playgroup, playdates, sleepovers, drove to TX, drove to NY, had my nephew here to visit for a week at the same time one of my sisters was in town, went to Carowinds, bowling, an indoor water park, a spray ground, 2 zoo's, The Science Place and Discover Zone. Whew!! It's not over yet. The three oldest have another day camp next week and I plan to do some yard work while they are gone during the day.

Since John works from home it makes it easier to just go out for the day instead of trying to keep the kids quite in the house but quite honestly I am kinda getting tired.

I will try to post pics of some of the great stuff we have done. You can see lots of it on my Facebook page.

Check it out if you are FB! I don't know if I did the link right..if not I will try to fix it later. I barely had enough time to write this...LOL

Ian is 1 1/2

And everybody can tell!! What a pill this guy is. He is into everything, is teething like a mad man and it makes him crabby, and he can climb and open anything he wants!!

He is extremely smart. He doesn't really say a lot of words but he can understand anything that is said when he is in the room. He loves to play with cars and blocks and he loves to 'read' books while he sits in his crib waiting for bedtime.

He won't eat without utensils. He can take off and put on clothes. And he LOVES to put on shoes.

He walks, yes walks, up and down the stairs. He has never crawled down the steps and it sure does drive me crazy.

He likes to grunt into the amplifier mic and listen to his voice. He loves to sing to himself and clapp for himself when he is done.


A few days ago he discovered a new fun activity. He climbs onto the changing table, yells for someone to get him and then when they get close enough.....HE JUMPS! He is crazy! He is going to find out the hard way that Andrew just isn't big enough to catch him.

The Worst Blogger Ever!!!

That is me!!

I just don't think blogging is as much fun without pictures and since I have been working off my laptop ....forever... I don't have the accessibility to my pictures like I used to.

We are excited for summer. I am done with the routine of getting up and getting to school. It's not so bad when the little ones have school but when I am at home with the 3 little ones anyway, it's really just too much effort to get the big ones up and out the door. I don't get to do as much with the 3 at home so I don't think I should have to get up early and get movin'.

I will try again to blog more even without the pics but I can't make any promises!!

Happy Mother's Day

I wasn't sure if I was going to blog about Mother's day this year because things didn't quite go as planned. Then, the more I thought about it the more I thought this is for sure a Mother's Day that needs to be blogged.
On Friday afternoon I left for SC with 5 wonderful, awesome, funny, sweet, caring friends. Anita, Jessica, Julie, Audrey, and Tiffany. We drove down in my van so that we would have plenty of room for all our stuff. The ride was so fun! We picked up Jane, Jessica's sister when we got close to our destination and then our gang was complete.
We went to "Time out for Women" which was a day and a half of inspirational music, great speakers and time to bond with the ladies. I enjoyed Michael McLean the most. He was soo funny and real. Anyway enough about that, this is a Mother's day post not a "Time out for Women" post.
I got home about 9:30 Saturday night. Sunday I woke up to John's alarm going off about 7am. He was going to make me breakfast in bed, but that didn't work out as planned. we go to church so early now that by the time he got breakfast made I didn't have time to eat it . We then ended up being late for church. That made me sad because on Mother's Day the kids always get up and sing and I couldn't see them.
After sacrament I teach the 9yr olds. I forgot that my co-teacher, Shirley Tinkim wouldn't be there and I didn't have a lesson planned. I had to find a manual and read the lesson as I was teaching it. Turned out OK I guess, the boys were pretty well behaved and that's really what makes for a great class.
The young women taught sharing time this week so I got to go to Relief Society. Nellie Johnston our Relief Society President taught a wonderful lesson on Self-Reliance. Afterward, as we were walking to the car the kids ate all my homemade treats that I got at church. boo hoo for me.
We came home and I was bummed about the events of the day so I went upstairs and went to sleep, got up around 3 came downstairs and had a snack. John made dinner about 5 and the children did nothing but bicker with each other the whole time and it didn't stop during dinner I didn't even eat because they were arguing so much.
After dinner John was going to make a cake with the kids. It got late so all they had time to do was make it and put it in the oven. At this point I was sitting on the couch sulking because my day hadn't gone the way I had planned when I heard a crash and John yell. I knew before I asked what had happened. While he was taking the cake out of the oven the pan slipped, burnt his forearms and when he jumped the cake when flying out of the pan onto the kitchen floor.
So now I didn't get breaksfast, I wasn't able to eat dinner and now I don't even get to have cake because it was on the floor. AAHHH!!
Well it's the end of the night and now all I can do is go to sleep and try to have a better day tomorrow. But of course not before I hear the sound of glass shattering in the kitchen. John had wanted to make another cake for me but wasn't thinking that the glass pan was so hot, probabaly becuase he was concentrating on the 3rd degree burns on his forearms, when he turned on the water it was so cold and shattered the glass pan in the sink.
As I talked on the phone with a friend and explained how the day was just a big flop I realized that it was Mother's Day and my children had done so much for me. They made me cards just like I asked and they wanted to sit with me and hang out. They made me coupon books of nice things to do for me whenver I need a little help or a little hug. And if I had just stopped whinning about how I didn't get a gourmet meal, I might have seen that sooner.
I had a wonderful realization on Mother's Day this year. It's not about the breakfast in bed or the gourmet dinners or any of that. Mother's Day is a day for me to be thankful for my wonderful children. They are so good to me. Noone could love someone more than my children love me. No matter what I do they always forget the bad stuff and of course remember the good stuff. They are so forgiving, unlike adults they don't have the ability to hold hold a grudge.
They think I am the best mother that was ever put on the earth. Boy, what they don't know!! They only know unconditional love and that is something that I don't know if I deserve but I know that I have.

Charlotte Children's Museum

This was taken a while back at the Charlotte Children's Museum. The kids have lots of fun here but it is really expensive for what you get so we have only gone twice. I thought this picture was great! I bet they all were only on the stage together for about 45 seconds (at least without fighting for an instrument) so, I am glad I got a shot of it!

The Earring Saga

About two years ago, I can't remember when but if you do please comment and let us all know, the girls got their ears pierced. After many painful ear cleanings, many infections and one of Riley's starter studs even fell out and closed up and I had to pop a new whole in. We found out that they were most likely allergic to the nickel and maybe with nickel free earrings they wouldn't have had those problems. They finally decided to let the wholes close and maybe try again another time.

That time came about 6-8 weeks ago. Samantha took Katie first and she got her's redone. And then the next week Riley had her's redone!! Yeah!!! They were sooooo excited.

Well, this Friday night Katie comes to me and says that her right ear is sore and hard. AWW MAN! WAS IT EVER!! It was so infected and there was a huge abscess on the back of it. I don't want to get to graphic, BUT as I was cleaning it there was soo much blood and puss that came from there it was amazing. I hurt her when I would move the earing to get the fluid out but she said it felt so much better afterwards. She says "Now that its squooshy again, it doesn't hurt at all"

Unfourtunatly, it took more than that to fix the problem. I had to get back to it Saturday morning and see what the problem was and I found it.... Hair had gotten so wrapped up around the back of the earring that it was actually going inside the earring whole! It was horrible. I had to take tweezers and try to unwind the hair. After about 45 minutes of messing with it I realized that it was going to take more than that.

John had to hold her arms down and hug her while I pried the back of the earring off. I was so hard and she cried REALLY loud. Even after getting the back off, there was still more hair wrapped around the stud that the earring couldn't come out. So, I had to continue to get little bits of the hair off the stud and it was actually coming out of the inside of the earring whole.

I finally got it all off and we were able to take the earring out. That night Sam took all the girls to Claire's to get new earrings and they got a whole bunch.

Kate got nervous so she called me to put the new one's in and long story short, it hurt and she didn't want to. She was sad, I was sad but she thought we would wait for a day or so and see if the whole wasn't so sensitive.

On Sunday she was really bummed because not only could Riley change hers but she was changing them like every 20 minutes and they didn't hurt at all.

By Sunday night Kate worked up the courage to try again with a "Do or Die" attitude. These earrings were going in and she didn't care how much it hurt. Ok, well she really did care and that is why it took here like 30 minutes to let me get started. I got the front of the right earring in and halfway through she says "oh wait, that hurts!" So I said "Ok, I'll stop but let's not pull it out. Just rest for a sec and we'll try to finish." That's what we did! It did hurt a bit because there was a scab that I had to push out of the way but once it was she said it didn't hurt one bit!

Now we had to do the Left ear, which remember had no previous problems so it should be a breeze. Yea, right. It not only had formed a small absess in the back, I couldn't tell which whole was the new one. There is one slightly higher than the other from the repiercing. AND, the back had started to close. This time I had to pop the earring through the back of her ear and practically repierce it with the earring itself.

She was such a trooper! The right ear still has some healing to do so we will continue to flush it with peroxide and put antibiotic ointment on it for a while. This of course goes for ALL ears that were pierced in this house to prevent any other unforseen problems. Her left ear is sore a little but we didn't expect much else.

Hopefully, This time things will go well and they will just heal and be like regular pierced ears that you can change the earring without excrusating pain!

Oh, yeah, I know that she has dangley earrings in and that's not the best choice considering they have to stay in for a while but they had the easist shape to manuver getting them into her ear and with this kind of earring I can get to the earlobe easily to clean it real good......we'll see what happens!!! Wish us luck!

We'll get a picture of Riley up here soon.