My Dirty Little Secret...

Ok, so you know how some people have a little secret like the don't make their famous "Grandma's Apple Pie" from scratch, its actually from a box and a can.... Well, my secret is not nearly as dreadful as that. But it is a juicy one. Ready...

I rarely have my own creative ideas. Really, its true. Sad, but true. I can take someone else's idea and tweak it, but to come up with something completely my own is not something that happens often! I am actually super jealous of people who are able to create the things their brains come up with. I acknowledge that I have been blessed with many creative talents, but actually coming up with something unique is not one of them.

Well, there it is, now you know. On a side note, I'm going Black Friday shopping this weekend and I'm SO excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Bring on the deals!

Halloween

I've got so many thoughts rolling around in my head right now, but for this post I'm just going to focus on Halloween. I'll get my thoughts together and write more later!

So to start, Halloween was really fun! On Friday morning, we had a party for the kiddos at Amanda's house. She had her dayhome kids, we invited our cousin and her girls and Amanda invited a few of her friends and their kids. We had mummies (crescent wrapped hotdogs) with blood (ketchup) to dip them in, monster eyeballs (grapes) and pumpkin juice. Sorry, no pictures of our lunch, but the mummies were super cute and the kids ate tons! We also did some halloween crafts and watched The Great Pumpkin. Here are a few random pics of the party...

Then Friday night, James and I went to a murder mystery party at our friends place. It was SO fun, but there were tons of people and it got SO hot and I got pretty sick. I didn't get to do nearly as much as I wanted because I was outside cooling down a lot, but it was still fun! It was called an "Immortal Murder" because it dealt with a bunch of immortal beings from around the King Aurthur story. James was a "watcher" who is a mortal that protects the secrets of the immortals. I was the lake fairy. There were also vampires, werewolves, and wizards.

(You can tell in the picture that I was super toasty cause I'm all red!)

Saturday, we took TJ trick or treating at the mall and to his Grandma & Grandpa Gilbert's house. That evening, our ward did a trunk or treat and we took him there. Amanda brought Adi out and helped "guard" our trunk! Ok, blogger won't accept the rotated version of this, but Manda had Adi propped up in a chip box in the back of the truck!

Soon...

I will post about halloween and other stuff soon, but for now, just know that this last week has been crap and to top it all off, I've now got a head cold. If I knew how to make a tounge sticking out face/noise in type-ese, I would. Oh well!

Help!

Ok, so I am almost 100% computer illiterate. I know how to use word processor, the internet and thats about it. Its sad, but true. I would really love to be able to touch up my pictures, but have no idea what program to get. Suggestions? Remember, the more user friendly, the better!

And since I've posted too many times without a picture, here's one that cracked me up the other day. This is what happens when TJ dresses himself....

Thankful

I wanted to post sooner, but life happened! Oh well. Yesterday was a really big day around our house. After everything with my Mom happened, things got pretty testy between her side of the family and us. A few weeks ago, my Dad suggested that we invite Grandma and the rest of the family for Thanksgiving. I will admit, I was hesitant. Not because I didn't want to see them, but because I was afraid they would say no. Even when Mom was around, getting together at our house didn't happen. I was super happy when they all said yes! I love any excuse to throw a party and Dad and James were nice enough to let me take over and plan it. So, the last week, I made some of these...

Some fun little jars for the kiddos...

Some little turkey finger puppets to entertain the kids (sorry about the picture, I didn't take one of just the puppets!)...

Drawing on the kids table (fear not, it was covered in paper) so they could use the crayon bundles in the picture above...Making a centerpiece (I actually got the idea from U Create)...Yesterday I did some cooking and a little bit of last minute cleaning. Then it was time to set the tables...

For the adults...

And for the kids...I'm afraid I don't have any pictures with everyone here. I put James in charge of the camera (something I should know by now not to do!) All in all, it was a great day! Hope you all had a great day, too!

Movin' Right Along

Ok, so again, I will have a post with no pictures. Super boring, I know, but my computer is, again giving me attitude. Fortunately, this time I was able to get everything saved onto memory sticks before it started acting up again. Unfortunately, those memory sticks are still over at my house and we are now officially at Dad's house. James got a lot done today. Next week, I've got to pack up the kitchen, but other than that, its pretty much all packed! Then its just a matter of moving things to the storage unit and doing the final clean up. Then I'm done with stupid landlords FOREVER!!! Next time I move, its going to be into my own house!!! Woot Woot!

Thought you'd like to know...

100 DAYS TILL CHRISTMAS

Crazy

I have been a horrible blogger latley! I have several excuses, but none that are really good, so I'll just move on. It has been a very LONG and BUSY week!! Craziness ensued and I was swallowed up in it. Almost literally!! Aside from the normal craziness of being prego and having a two year old, here is what was added to my crazy plate recently.

Saturday, September 5

I went to a baby market in Calgary. "But Tisha," you say, "You're already expecting, why go get another baby?" Not that kind of market, folks! This is the kind where retailers go and meet with sales reps and put in orders for new product for their store. I really didn't know how things worked, but I knew I was getting nowhere as far as trying to get ahold of a sales rep, so we drove up for the day. The lady at the reception desk was very friendly when she told me I couldn't talk to a rep because manufacturers weren't allowed at the show. I asked if I could leave a sample of my product and if she would be willing to show it to anyone. She said sure and that was that. I left feeling pretty sure that, even though she was very polite, I had wasted my time. What did I do, you ask? I went to Red Lobster and drowned my sorrows in crab legs and shrimp. If nothing else, this made it so the trip wasn't a complete waste of time! On the way home, just outside of Lethbridge, I called my house to check the messages, since my stupid cell phone has been acting up and not ringing lately. (Wow, that was an incredibly long run on sentence!) The first message was boring, but the second one thrilled me! As I listened to the message, I started freaking out... to the point that James almost drove off the road... oops! There was a rep who'd seen the sample I left and wanted to take on the GoBelts!! SO exciting!!! As fate would have it, her name is Tisha, too, so she's pretty awesome! I tried calling her back that night, but didn't get an answer, so I just buzzed with anticipation all night!

That was the good part of my Saturday. Unfortunately, there was also a bad part. In a previous post, I mentioned that our landlords have decided to sell our house. On Thursday, the 3rd, our landlady called and asked if it would be ok if they came by on Friday to do some tree trimming, ect. I told her sure, but that our back yard was a disaster b/c I couldn't mow and James had been working tons of extra hours over the past few weeks. I also told her the plan was for James to attack the yard after he was done work Monday afternoon. She said no problem. So, Friday comes and James, TJ, Terry and I went to Cardston for the day. That evening, our landlady comes over. I was feeling really sick, so I was in bed, but she and James were talking in the back yard. She was furious that the yard hadn't been mowed and the weeding hadn't been done. She told James that it had to be done by the next day or there would be consequences. Even though they didn't give us the proper amount of time to fix things, James busted his but and worked way into the night on Friday. We both got up at 5:30 Saturday morning and finished stuff up. There was still a little weed whipping that needed to be done, but James had run out of string the night before around 9. We called them, told them it wasn't 100% finished, but we had to head up to Calgary and that we would finish it Monday. When we got home from Calgary, there was a letter they had left for us. They had done an inspection of the house, even though they had given us no notice or anything. The house was not clean. It had been a crazy few days, there was laundry that needed to be folded, breakfast dishes that needed to be done and toys/books everywhere from TJ entertaining himself while we worked in the yard. Essentially, they told us the house was unlivable and we had 7 days to clean it up or we would be evicted. Let me tell you, our house was nowhere near as dirty as they made it out to be. I won't pretend it was immaculate, but it was lived in. Not filthy by any stretch of the imagination! The stupid letter really put a damper on my good day.

Sunday, September 6

Before church, I called Tisha back. (I know, no business on Sunday. But the call really was just to set up an appointment for Monday.) We then went to church, where I played the organ for sacrament meeting, ran home during Sunday School to check on the food that was cooking, and then made it back just in time to play the piano for Relief Society. After church, choir practice started. I'm the pianist, so my presence is required! After that, I literally ran out the door, down the two blocks to my house, threw the meat that had been cooking in my slow cooker all day in the back of the truck, threw TJ in his seat and James in his and drove to the Lethbridge. Manda was blessing Adi at the church by her house and then we were having a family dinner. Although I felt super rushed when we got there, it turned out to be a great time, inspite of TJ's 35 minute tantrum when it was time to clean up the toys.

Monday, September 7

When I talked to Tisha, she told me to come up anytime between 12 and 2, so around 9 ish, we loaded everything and everyone in the truck and headed to Calgary, again. When we got there, she was with someone, so we ended up waiting a while. Once we got to talk with her, she told us she already had one store place and order and one other (actually, the owner of a chain of stores) coming back to see our other samples later that day! So exciting! After the meeting, we headed home. By the time we got home, I was SO exhausted. It had been quite the weekend!

Tuesday, September 8

I'm teaching piano lessons again this year and this was the beginning of my first full week. I've got 18 piano students and 1 voice student, so I'm teaching from 3:30-7 Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursdays. I'm also doing a music class for younger kids in the morning on Tuesdays, so it was my first go with that. It was crazy! Fun, but crazy! After class and before my other lessons started, we went into town to pick up some extra cleaning supplies. I then taught lessons in the evening and cleaned for most of the night.

Wednesday, September 9 and Thursday September 10

Pretty much the same thing as Tuesday. Cleaning and piano lessons. And then more cleaning. And I'm not talking picking up toys, sweep the floor cleaning. I'm talking washing walls, shampooing carpets cleaning. We also took a letter to our landlords giving them our notice for the end of the month on Thursday.

Friday, September 11

We had to make a trip into town to pick up some things we'd run out of, some groceries, birthday presents ect. While in Lethbridge, we decided we needed a break, so we went to a movie. Then came home and stayed up till 1:30 am finishing stuff up.

Saturday, September 12

TJ had been invited to a birthday party today, so around 9am I called our landlord to see if he had an idea as to a time they would be out to do the inspection so I could make sure I was home. He told me they decided after they got our letter that they would just wait until we move out. Nice of them to call and tell us! We'd wasted so much time doing deep cleaning that we now have to do again in a few weeks!! I was livid! We went to the birthday party, where TJ had such a good time. The afternoon was spent getting ready for a baby shower I was co-hosting that night. The shower went super well. It was tons of fun and there was SO much food. Although Saturday was super busy, it was a good way to end my crazy busy week!

Well, believe it or not, that was the condensed version of what happend. This coming week, we're moving back in with Dad and then I'm going to spend the last week or so of the month packing the other stuff at our place and putting it in the storage unit. I don't anticipate having much time to blog in amongst all that, but I will try!!

Fall Already!

I can't believe this summer is already over! To tell the truth, I'm kind of glad. In many ways, this has been the worst summer ever. Fall may or may not be better, but I'm determined to get through it and figure out a way to enjoy it!! Whether good or bad, this fall promises to bring about many changes!

Change #1
I decided I'd start teaching piano and voice lessons again. I was pretty nervous about how many students would actually sign up, but I actually only have 5 spots left, so I'm pretty happy with that!

Change #2
They're opening up a few dimentia wings where James works and hes signed up to work there. It means a change in hours and the type of work, but sadly, not pay. However, he's super excited about it so I'm excited for him!

Change #3
One of our super good friends are moving in the next month or so. TJ absolutely adores their little boy and asks to play with him all the time! I'm pretty worried about how he'll react, but I'm sure he'll be ok. Fortunately, we have lots of other great friends for him to play with!

Change #4
On Saturday, our landlord told us that they're going to be selling the house (and all their other rental properties) to start a dairy farm. They're just going to do one big open house and not a lot of showings, so we'll see how it goes! We may be moving much sooner than we'd like!

Change #5
We're coming up on the season of holidays in our family. Between Thanksgiving, about a billion birthdays and Christmas, we've got lots of firsts without Mom to get through. Should prove to be interesting if nothing else!

We had some exciting news the other day. We're having another boy!! We don't have a name yet. We're actually having a tough time thinking of one. Good thing we have some time still!!

Are you ready for this?

Holy crap, its been forever since I actually blogged! Life here has not really been too exciting lately, although it has been busy! Because its been SO very long... I'm just going to post a TON of pictures and say a few words about them. That way, this post won't be quite as ginormours as it could be!

Happening #1 Adi!

I'm pretty sure I mentioned it earlier, but Manda had her little girl the end of May and I officially became an Auntie! I know I didn't post any pictures, so here are a few!

Happening #2 Road Trip

Shortly after finding out I was prego, two of my closest and craziest friends decided the three of us should go on a road trip to get some maternity clothes. (they're both due a few months before me!) So, we all cleaned out our houses, had a garage sale and took the money shopping! It was super fun! We left fairly early and had all been quite sick that morning! As we drove up to Nanton, one of us said she'd never been to the candy store there. So, I pulled in, because it really is a great store and candy seems to be one of the biggest cravings I've been having (along with watermelon, odly enough!) Sadly, the store wasn't open for another 15 minutes, so we waited!! I'm sure the lady who owns the store thought we were crazy, (and probably rightfully so!) but we had fun!

Happening #3 Fathers Day

For Fathers Day, we took my Dad, James and Tem out to Stafford Lake for the day. TJ loved the lake and we all had tons of fun. It was hot and sunny, but pretty windy, so we took our weenie roast back to Amanda's house!



Happening #4 Ari

Early this month, James brother and his wife had a little boy, who is way too cute! TJ loves both his cousins, although its taking him some practice to distinguish between saying Adi and Ari. He's getting it, though!

Happening #5 Carnival

There was a little carnival thing set up in a parking lot in town earlier this month, so we called a few friends and headed in! TJ loved it! That boy has no fear, which puts a lot of fear into me!

Other than that we've been...

Playing at many different parks...

Mowing the lawn (although if you've driven by our house recently you know it desperately needs it again!)...

Watching the July 1st Parade...

playing in the dirt...

and the sprinkler...

Having dinosaurs over for lunch...

And LOTS of backyard golfing (both in clothes and out!)

Whew! There you go!! Hope your summer is going well!

The Big 1-0

It's officially here. No matter how I tried to pretend/ignore/avoid it, it came!! My ten year high school reunion was last night. Truth be told, I'd been waffling between going and not. For the most part, I keep in touch with those I really want to and through the wonders of facebook and the grapevine, I hear about most of the others. Umm, that sounds way snobbier than I anticipated! Really, I'm not a snob! To be 100% honest, the biggest reason I didn't want to go wasn't because of anyone else. It was because of me. Let me explain.

I was not exactly the popular kid in high school. I was not even remotely gifted in sports, the school choir was kind of a joke (although it was fun!), there was no drama program, and,while I was smart, most of my friends were smarter than I was. Add to that that I was one of the biggest girls in school and my friends were all beautiful, well, lets just say I spent many dances watching them get asked to dance.

For a while after high school, I was bitter. I blamed it on the school and the small town I came from. While I was at BYU, I really found myself. I had ample opportunity to do the things I loved and had some really great success at it. Then circumstances changed and I had to come home really suddenly. Since then, I've done virtually nothing with theater at all.

When I left high school, I had the desire to "prove myself" and had all these huge plans for my 1o year reunion. As I grew up, my desire wasn't as vindictive. I heard and saw all of these great things my class mates had accomplished and I felt like I was falling short. I've accomplished so little!

Over the last few months, as reality set in, so did a huge sense of failure. I left BYU with a year left to get my degree, with the exception of when I was at university, my job history has not been illustrious or exciting, I don't own a house, my financial situation is far less than impressive, I haven't lost all the weight I want to, my business is growing way too slowly... well, you get the idea. With the exception of TJ and James, I felt like I had very little in the way of accomplishments!

As the weeks passed, I started to realize that, even though I haven't accomplished 1/10 of what I wanted to by now, I'm not a failure at all! Life has thrown me some pretty big curve balls over the past 10 years and I've dealt with them and grown from them. I'm still working towards my goals and I haven't given up. That, in and of itself is enough to make me not a failure.

I still didn't go last night, but mostly it was because I was feeling really sick.

GRRR

My power cord on my computer suddenly stopped working for no reason at all and James' power cord hasn't worked for months so now I can't get any pictures off my computer for the posts I want to do and I can only use the computer when we're over at my Dad's house! Ridiculous! I'll get it fixed asap, but really, that may not be as soon as I'd like!

Mother's Day, A Birthday & Some Pancakes

May is always a busy month for us. Between Mother's Day, my birthday and 3 family member's birthdays, its one party after another! Just for ease of remembering, I'm going to go in chronological order!

#1 Mother's Day

James was wonderful and let me sleep in, made me breakfast in bed and pretty much took care of things all day! Sadly, he doesn't usually remember to take pictures and I didn't even think about it! After church, my family all got together at Manda and Tem's for a weenie roast. It was pretty awkward but we still had a good time! This I got a few pics of...

James was our resident weenie roaster/s'more maker. What a man!~

#2 My Birthday - The 13th was my birthday and, honestly, I didn't want to do much! A few of my friends took me to lunch and then we got together with my family at Amanda's place for dinner that night. The next night, a bunch of our friends threw a little surprise party for me, which was really fun. Sorry, no pics! I took my camera to all three places and forgot to use it!

#3 Long Weekend = Pancakes. Ok, so actually, pancakes and eggs are the breakfast menu almost every morning b/c its one of the few things I can get TJ to eat. I had a gift card from Williams Sonoma that I got for Christmas over a year ago, but I don't get to the store nearly as often as I'd like. (James doesn't think it's justifiable to drive 3 hours just to shop. I guess he can't be perfect!) But, we were up there for a business thing a few weeks back and I saw these...

They are pancake molds!!! And they make the cutest pancakes ever! So, I used my gift card and ordered a set. We had a bunch of friends over on the Monday of the long weekend and had a huge pancake breakfast where we ate monkey's, elephants and lions. I also had a few heart shaped molds I got when I lived in Utah, so there were hearts too. The kids had a blast! It was so much fun!
Ok, my pancakes didn't turn out quite so nicely, but close! This is actually the pic from Williams Sonoma. And for some reason, I can't get pictures to turn the right way, but just tilt you head! ;)

Where to Start?

I know it has been forever since I have written. In fact, blogging is not the only thing I'm seriously behind on (sorry to those of you who are STILL waiting patiently for me to finish alts!). I do actually have a few really good reasons. Honest, I'm not just an unreliable slacker. I've been debating for well over a month now to blog about whats going on and, in all honesty, I still have some reservations. For one, I'll probably get in a truckload of trouble. For two, I'm always worried about freaking people out and having them look at me like the goober I truly am. Although, if you know me at all you already know I'm pretty much a mental case. So, here goes...

My mom has had and affair and left my Dad. What makes it worse, if that's possible, is that the guy she is "seeing" is an inmate. Yep, you read that right. A prisoner she me while she worked there. The affair got her fired and she doesn't care. I'll spare you the rest of the details, but lets just say she has become the most selfish, unfeeling person I have ever met. I don't really feel like going into how I feel ect, but lets just say that I've kind of shut down over the past month. I have been avoiding people in general, but especially those who know my family.

So there it is, my big dirty secret! Crappy. There have been several really great things that have happened over the past month, but they've all been tainted by this one huge thing. I'm going to post about all of them over the next day or two, I just have to sort through all the pictures! Stay tuned for some much happier posting!

{two}

My little man turned two on Monday. How time flies! We are so blessed to have TJ in our lives. I don't feel like getting too emotional, so I'll keep the gushy part short. When I'm having a bad day, he always cheers me up. He is too smart and so thoughtful. Really, he can always tell when I need a hug! I just love him to pieces.

We had a big family dinner on Monday with all the grandparents, aunts, ect. It was super fun and TJ got ridiculously spoiled.

The loot...

Opening the loot...

In our house, the birthday person gets to pick what thywant for dinner, so we had homemade baked mac and cheese, one of TJ's favs. I forgot to take a picture of the cake, but here is what's left...

On Tuesday, we had a party with his friends and I did't take single picture, except the cake. Its my goal to start taking more/better pics, but here's the cake. Guess what the theme of the party was...

*On a side note, anyone know how to fix my blog? It won't let me change my background at all. Very frustrating.*

**On another side note, its really difficult to type when your keyboard looks like this...