The Drum Set

Much to my dismay, when I read a post on the Fishers LDS email list regarding a free drum set, I agreed to see if it was still available. It was and as of last night we became the owners of a drum set. Our kids are thrilled. As of yet the noise has not been too bad and in my imagination I see our 3 children bonding closer together as they pursue their musical talents and one day start a band and perhaps have their own special on PBS, just like the Osmond family... okay, yeah right. I woke Alexa up this morning by playing the drums (they are in her room right now). Needless to say, she was not very appreciative of my drumming abilities. Mackenzie came running into her room with a big grin saying, "Good morning, Daddy. I mean Mommy." She, for once, was quite pleasant in the morning. I'm sure our family has many more adventures in store with the drum set....i promise to post if we are going to be on PBS:-)

Home Improvement

Awesome Goggles, DUDE~!!!


Nathan spent some time today replacing all of the toilet seats in our 3 bathrooms and replacing the faucets in the kids bathroom and the master bathroom. He enlisted the help of Dayton. Ever since Dayton was little he has enjoyed helping Nathan with home repairs. As a toddler he would crawl under the sink with Nate and just sit there holding some important tool. Mackenzie, not wanting to be excluded, helped out. At one point she and Dayt0n were under the sink and Dayton was instructing her in the proper way to attach the new faucet to the water line. Nathan has A LOT of patience when it comes to teaching and he makes it enjoyable for the kids... Maybe we could hire them out for extra money :-) ... Just Kidding.

Dayton is just about 2 in both of these pictures. He was such a cute baby. (still is cute, too)

"Good News"

Nathan was offered a job today.... YEAH!!!! Where, you may ask? Here in Indy. We get to stay in our home, in our ward and with all of our friends, who we love. Nathan is very excited as are we all. The company, GRW, is located on the west side of Indianapolis, so his commute will be a little longer but it is a bigger company with offices in Kentucky, Texas, Ohio and Tennessee. He will start Monday and enjoy the next two days of VACATION!!!! Thank you to everyone for your thoughts and prayers in our behalf. Prayers are really answered and we are so grateful.

"Funnel Cakes"

For our FHE treat we made funnel cakes...YUMMY!!! Mackenzie got a little crazy with the powdered sugar, can you tell?
Dayton learned what a funnel is and he is now determined to take a funnel to anyplace we go that will have water so he can play with it.
We got this recipe from Alexa. She had funnel cakes at school a few weeks ago when the 4th grades were studying the pioneers.

Nathan cooked the very last one and commented that he would need to be "rolled" upstairs to bed after having eaten too many funnel cakes.

"Free Time?"

If you have ever wondered what you'd do while you are "between" jobs, we have a suggestion...

Shop for a car you can't afford, but make sure it is a car that has a one and a half year waiting list to even be delivered. Nathan has wanted to test drive the Smart car and had some time today. SO...once things start looking up we may be in the market for a "Smart" car.

Hands

Also, while attending the baptism, I promise we were paying attention, Mackenzie was looking at the palm of my hand. I told her, "you can tell that I love you because your initial is on my palm." She looked for a second and said, "yea, mine and Alexa's, Dayton's and Daddy's." "I know, I love all of you so I keep your initals on the palm of my hand." Her hand only has a few lines and none of them connect so now she is perplexed about whose initials she has on her hand.

Magic

We were able to attend the baptism of our friends, Ben Norton and Kaden Smith this afternoon. While we were waiting for the guys to change Mackenzie decided she wanted to try and "blow up" Nathan's tie. Nathan has, like I'm sure many dads, convinced his children that he is able to do magic with his tie. He tells them he has a balloon inside of his tie that he can blow up. He grabs both ends of the tie and blows into the small end and "magically" the larger end blows up. So Mackenzie tried and tired to get his tie to blow up. After several attempts she decided the tie must be broken. Although Nathan was able to successfully blow up his tie. But a magician never reveals his secrets.

Easter Egg Hunt

We were able to hunt for easter eggs this morning while it was SNOWING!!! Unbelieveable... but what a fun time. Thanks to the Soelbergs for planning such a fun time with warm drinks afterwards. The kids had a blast and didn't take very long to fine the eggs. What crazy weather, but I guess that is what you get when Easter is in March. One of my friends, Heidi Robinson, said it had something to do with the lunar calendar and Alexa corrected her with the information she had acquired from school. "Actually, the reason Easter is in March this year is because the moon had a certain time at which it was at a certain place therefore causing the timing of Easter to occur earlier in the year." Now whether she is correct or not...I honestly can't say but she sure sounded like she knew what she was talking about.

Colorful Easter Eggs

The Nortons invited us over to color eggs today while the kids had a day off from school. I must admit, I have deprived my children of this great experience for several years (Dayton, his whole life) because I don't like hard boiled eggs. I can't stand the smell of them and the thought of even making deviled eggs is more than I can take. Thank goodness Traci likes them and was willing to let us invade. Even if she didn't like hard boiled eggs, Traci would make them just to give her kids the experience. She is an awesome mom.

Dayton and Mackenzie both ate their first hard boiled egg and they liked it. Alexa has eaten them in the past and quite frankly, she likes everything. I think I will have to plug my nose and just make them occassionally for my kids...I might be on my way to being a good mom:-)

The kids had a great time mixing colors and adding designs to their eggs. Quite the creative bunch, for sure.

The Job Search

Nathan has had so much positive feedback as we search for a new opportunity. I say we because quite frankly I have become his personal assistant. And, not to brag, I do a pretty good job.

He has had 4 interviews with actual companies in the past week and a followup interview tomorrow in addition to the many recruiters he has talked to. Good things are happening but when you are in this situation, it truly feels like time is standing still on one hand and like it is flying right before your eyes on the other. He asked me yesterday where I would want to live. What kind of a question is that? Right now, I want to live wherever you are able to find a good opportunity that will provide for our family. And I will go wherever that may be, perhaps not with a bounce in my step, but I will go. I really want to stay here in Fishers. SO...I posed the same question to him. He didn't answer. I'm pretty sure he feels the exact same way. And as the provider for our family, I can only imagine how he must feel. Nathan is a great guy. And as crappy as this whole experience is....I love him and we can get through anything together.

"Laid Off"

I never thought I would have a sick to my stomach feeling when I heard this word. Never until about 6 days ago. We moved to Indiana in August of 2006 because Nathan received an awesome job offer with a civil engineering firm here. We love it here. We have made so many great friends here that it truly feels like home. The company Nathan has been working for has been "slow" with incoming projects but there was never a warning that they may be downsizing. So when Nathan gets called into his managers office at 3pm on Thursday and is told he is being laid off, it was quite the shock. Sweet Nathan knows that I have New Beginnings that night at church and that I am a little stressed out about it so he doesn't tell me about the experience at work. He calls my parents and they are amazing. How grateful I am for my parents. They are the best. When I come home from church, Nathan says, "I need to talk to you." "Okay, what?" is my response. Then the bombshell. Wow, I wouldn't wish that news on anyone.



SO, some time has passed and we are both extremely optimistic about him finding a new job but will it be here? We are so grateful for family and friends (who we totally consider to be our family) and the gospel of Jesus Christ. In the grand scheme of things this trial really is just a small event and it has allowed us as a family to really focus on how blessed we are to be a family. Honestly though, I wish sometimes that I didn't need this experience to learn and grow.


Last night Mackenzie gave our lesson for FHE and she taught about Enos. She asked who Enos was, what he was praying for? She got the response that he was praying for the Lamanites, his enemies, that there hearts would be softened and they would come to know the truth. Alexa said, "yea, he prayed for them but it didn't work." So we had a good conversation, as a family, about how the Lord does answer our prayers, like he did answer Enos' prayer, but not necessarily in the way or at the time that we want it answered.


And I really do believe that.

Snow???

Yes, we were able to sled on the grass/snow mixture and actually we went pretty fast.

We have been waiting for enough snow all season long and when we got a "skiff" of snow on Saturday morning we decided to head to a hill. It was a beautiful day although a bit windy.

We got the kids sleds for an early Christmas present and they have been so excited to use them but we honestly have used them 2 times since the middle of December. The kids had a great time and when we got home they called grandma. Grandma and Grandpa Dayton apparently have been living right because they have 16 inches at their house. Talk about jealous. Mackenzie wanted to know why we couldn't just go for a quick visit to see grandma and sled for a little bit.

The "Rental"

Due to the damage done to our new car and it needing to be in the shop to get fixed we were given a rental. Nathan went to drop off the Pilot and pick up the rental and he was offered a minivan. He figured that would be great because I could still drive car pool if needed plus it gave us more room. So he came home with the ugliest blue Dodge minivan I have ever seen. I know why it was a rental. No one would buy a minivan that color. (if you or someone you know has purchased a bright blue minivan please know that this is just my opinion) I must admit I am vain and I refused to drive it. Nathan drove the van to work and I kept the Camry for a little over a week. I did have to drive the ugly bue minivan a couple of times and I didn't like it any more while driving it than looking at it. Needless to say, I am so happy to finally have the Pilot back. I may like it more now that before just because it is so much better than the minivan.

Procrastination

Despite my best efforts, Alexa has inherited the procrastination gene. She came home from school yesterday and informed me that she had to complete a 2 page report on artifacts from the Native Americans. The problem: she didn't have any information to start compiling this 2 page report. My first instinct was to let her get a bad grade and learn a lesson for not getting her work done sooner. However, I was even more frustrated with our phone/dsl provider than I was with her. At about 4pm on Thursday our Internet and phone service died, for the second time this week. So now Alexa couldn't even attempt to find information online for her report. Our plan of attack: I went to mutual and took Mackenzie to activity days. Nathan took Alexa and Dayton to the library to find information for her report. When we all finally made it home last night around 8:30pm Alexa had little more information that when she left earlier and a 2 page report to still write. She went to be and I awakened her at the lovely hour of 6am. She did get the paper written and she did do a good job. I helped her type to speed up the process. My complaint to Nathan: Couldn't she have at least inherited my lack of procrastination in addition to your intelligence?

Happy "10th" Birthday, Alexa!

Wow, 10 years. It really doesn't seem
like that long, okay some days it does,
but really 10 years ago today I became
a mom. I have spent some time the last
few days thinking about Alexa and her
upcoming birthday I have had fun
thinking back on experiences we have
shared. I am so grateful for Alexa in my
life. She brings a joy and enthusiasm to
so many things. I couldn't have asked
for a better oldest daughter.



Alexa loves to hear stories about herself
from when she was little. So, in honor of
her birthday, I wanted to share some of
her favorites.

Just before Alexa tured 2 we were trying
to ween her from her "binki." She was in
her big girl bed and we had shut the door
to her room when we heard her knocking
on the door saying, "I out now mom, pease."
Then she pushed her "binki" under the
door and said, "pease, mom."


When Alexa was about 4 I had put her
down for a nap and thought she was
sleeping. When I went back to check
on her I found she was not sleeping
at all but had completely undressed
herself and was dancing around her
room with a pull-up on her head.

Now, this story is embarrassing for me but, it
is a funny story. Alexa was about 4 and had gotten into
a little trouble. I had gotten out the wooden spoon and
swatted her bum, not too hard, I promise. A couple of
days latter we were at the home of a friend who had some
dishes drying in a dishrack, one of which was a wooden
spoon. Alexa came over to my friend and pointed to the
spoon while saying, "poon pank a bum-bum, poon pank a
bum-bum." I, of course, was mortified. I must say I have
not used the wooden spoon as a disipline tool since, I promise.

More recently, and not embarrassing, Alexa has had
opportunities to express her testimony of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She has amazed
Nathan and I with her knowledge of the gospel and her
determination to stand up for what she knows to be true.
Not just to her peers but to adults as well. We are so proud
of her and the example she is to us and to her sister and brother.


I love you, Alexa. I can't wait for what is yet to come.