been reading

 

I started this last Friday and finished it today (Tuesday).  I have had a hard time putting down this 800 page book.  My Grandma got it for Christmas and when she finished it I asked her if I could read it.  She looked at where I was at today very surprised and said, "You are a fast reader!"  Well maybe, but neglectful mother/wife might be a better description.  Gerald Lund just knows how to wrap me in so that I can't put a book down.  I'll admit it, I have read the whole series of The Work and the Glory... three times. :)  Too bad I don't remember them better or else I'd be a whiz at church history! 

I just wanted to say a few things about these amazing people.  They had faith.  They were called on a mission to settle an area by the San Juan so that they could be a buffer for the Indians and White-Men Bandits I guess you could say.  How would you like that call?  Anyway, the hardest part though was GETTING to where they were going.  I won't go into detail but it was HARD and they stuck to it.  When they were at a point when they had to decide whether to go on or not one of the leaders said, "Even if there is no way to go through, we must go through." And they did it.  There was no way but with their faith in God, several miracles, and their "stick-to-ativness" they made the way through.  It took them 6 months when they thought it would take 6 weeks.

Lately I have been feeling inadequate in a lot of ways. Mostly with my role as a mother.  I've heard that most women feel or have felt this way at one point in their lives. I'm trying to work through it.  This book seemed to come at a good time.  I can make it through hard times, I can change, I can become a good mother even if I don't feel like I measure up right now. 

Yesterday I was making cookies for Brent's co-workers (the really good chocolate chip ones, "crack cookies" as they have deemed it) and I realized that it has been two years since I last ate cookie dough.  This seems like a super-dumb example but here it goes anyway.  When I first became pregnant with Chico I read that it's not good to eat cookie dough while pregnant because you could get salmonella from the raw eggs.  I told Brent about it and he said, "Well yeah, it's NEVER a good idea to eat cookie dough because of the raw eggs. That's disgusting."  I realized that he was RIGHT!  I would NEVER eat the contents of a raw egg plain, but there I would go shoving cookie dough down my throat like there was no tomorrow (Kimee can testify to that).  I decided from that moment to never eat cookie dough ever again.  So last night when I thought about that I realized that I am capable of change and it made me feel good.

Anyway, I just was wondering if any of you have ideas on how to make the long days more bearable at home?  To enjoy your time with your children?  I'd love some ideas, seriously.  Because I love my little chico, and as he's getting older I'm having a hard time adjusting to the greater demand to my time he requires.

a really nice weekend

Brent and I were together almost every minute of the nice long weekend.  He works 4, 10 hour shifts so he has Friday off.  So yes, we got Friday through Monday together.  It was awesome.  We got to go on a fun date to the Symphony on Saturday night because we happened to have tickets to it!  We stopped at Kmart on the way there to see if they still have a photobooth in the front of the store.  We were saddened to see that they do not.  So I ask you,

Does anyone know where there is a cheap photo booth in the Salt Lake Valley?

You know the kind where you squish your behinds together in on that little seat behind the curtain and you get 4 pictures on a strip?  I remember when Kimee and I went and did it at Kmart, they were only like a dollar each.  But that was like 8 years ago.

Anyway so while we were at Kmart we caved and bought a box of chocolates and Brent bought me a rose. We pretty much had half the box of chocolates downed by the end of the night.

The Symphony was BY FAR my favorite one we've been to.  Dvorak's New World Symphony.  Highly recommend it.  Honestly I don't know very much about symphonies and classical music, pretty much everything I know I've learned from Brent. So anyway I think this is a symphony that is accessible to everyone. Go ahead and look it up on You Tube and listen to it, I think you'll like it. :)

Church on Sunday was fun.  For Sharing Time this Sunday I was assigned to make a fool of myself to act out this fun roll play with the kids about a man falling into a hole.  I wore an extra long skirt to church knowing full well I would be flopping to the floor repeated times because we were doing this activity as one of three stations during Sharing Time.  So I had to do it 6 times total because Senior and Junior primary are separate. Most of the kids LOVED it, the only ones that rolled their eyes at me were the 10-11 year olds. But OH did the Junior primary LOVE LOVE LOVE it.  They were so excited to play make believe at church. It was cool.  And hopefully I got the message across about the Atonement that I was supposed to.

Tuesday was a GREAT day.  I finally caught up on photo editing!!!  What a good weird feeling.  I don't think I've been caught up since like May.  Seriously, it's been way too long.  Hopefully now that we finally feel caught up we can stay caught up and we are going to try REALLY hard not to bite off more than we can chew.  After I got the photo editing done and the CD delivered I got to go to our Relief Society Humanitarian Service night.  I started by tying quilts.  I know how to do it, I really do.  But for some reason I get distracted or SOMETHING and I still get the bunches of yarn at the bottom of the quilt like I did when I was a teenager.  I was also busy trying to watch Chico too so I finally abandoned the quilt and went and chatted with my friends in the ward.  Then they served dinner and then Brent came over when he got home from work and whisked Chico away so I could better serve for the rest of the evening.  So instead of tying quilts I colored alphabet books that go to help children learn English in other countries. It was SO nice to get out of the house and talk with other ladies.  I really enjoyed it.

Then I walked out to the car and found flowers on the seat.  My cute Sweetheart, I love that man.

screen saver

We have our screen saver mode on that one that randomly goes through your photos.  It makes me happy most of the time except for when I see those annoying crappy pictures that I should have erased ages ago!  It brings back so many fun memories of times Brent and I have shared.

Here are a few that just make me laugh every time I see them.

goofing around with a crappy camera back when we were engaged

Brent is so awesome. While we were engaged we were busy with finishing a basement apartment to live in, going to school, and working part time. With all the stress and strain on our time he wanted us to still go on fun dates while we were engaged. So we dressed up one night and went and walked through Walmart. Because it's not a full body shot you can't tell but I was a hippie and he was a cowboy.  Because everybody knows cowboys are attracted to hippies. His face is priceless.

These next two are way awesome.  Brent's dad has a nice camera and was doing candid shots at the temple on our wedding day.  Well of course the WHOLE family was following along watching as we were getting our pictures taken and apparently Brent's little brother stole the camera from his dad and started taking shots of us and was apparently being all annoying like a typical younger brother should.  Funny thing is I totally don't even remember him doing this but I'm glad he did. They're some of my favorites!

Tomorrow

If you are interested in taking Financial Peace University by Dave Ramsey my Stake is starting up the class on Thursday, February 11 (yeah I know that's tomorrow)  Anyway, even if you're not in my Stake you may still join (I asked).  Also if you don't live in the area I live in I know a guy who can help you find a class in your area.  How cool is that!?
SO, if you are interested shoot me an email and I can give the details.  (my email is sarahhatchphotography at gmail dot com)
It's a really really good class, I totally recommend it.  It's worth sacrificing your Thursday evening for 11 weeks I promise!

in our pajamas

Well, we've all been sick over this weekend so we've spent a lot of time in our pajamas.  In fact on Saturday I didn't get out of my pjs until about 7:00 when Brent said we had to get me out of the house and took me to Cafe Rio for a Pork Salad.  Oh man, there are few things better in the world than those salads. :)

Chico thinks it is fun when I climb in his crib with him. Brent was home and took some pictures of us in there together.

Well, then we climbed out and had some fun with the camera.  Though it's hard to take pictures of ourselves with our gigantic camera.  What do you think, our best family pictures yet? lol

Then chico wanted to start reading his books. :)

Later that day after church when Daddy was taking off his tie chico really wanted it.  So Daddy let him wear it. :)  Such a cutie.  But not quite as cute as his Daddy.

7 loads of laundry, 20 pots and pans, and a full dishwasher later...

and our house is finally clean...ish.  I don't know if it can be completely clean until the construction is done.  But this is good enough for now.

(although Brent doesn't look happy in this picture he was actually really cheerful I just forgot to tell him I was taking the picture. I thought it was so cute that he thought of letting chico help. He is such a creative Dad!)

 

Thanks to the help of my sweet hubby and cute chico the kitchen finally got clean.  I did all the 7 loads of laundry in one day.  It was CRAZY! I don't want my house to be like this.  I really need to be better about following the FLY lady routine.  "A load a day keeps the chaos away".  I also need to make sure my sink is clean before bed every night.  I think those two things alone would help this house feel nicer.  Time to renew the new years resolution.  Fly Lady routine here I come!

why I love working with my best friend...

Because if a photography client is late, we get to have fun staying warm in our car together and pass the time by taking funny pictures of each other.

There were definitely more than that but this shall suffice. :)

Never again, Mr. Chef Boyardee

It was a dumb idea in the first place, I'll be the first to admit.

So there has been this can of Chef Boyardee Spaghetti sitting in our cupboard for a while. My mom gave it to us a while back.  Today I just needed something quick and easy for Chico's lunch.  So I threw it in bowl, microwaved it and gave it to him.  I had just gotten him out of the tub so I didn't bother to put his clothes on figuring he would get a bit dirty.

Oh my heck, I had no idea how that stuff just gets EVERYWHERE! That look on his face was how I felt. Though I don't feel as if this picture describes how truly MESSY he got. He's always been a messy eater but this stuff was all over him all the way from his hair down to his toes.  Ugh.

So I threw him in the bath tub again.  Scrubbed and scrubbed him off.  Then got him dressed and for the next half hour was scrubbing off the table, his chair, the floor around his chair, the wall, and our orangeified tub (from washing him off in it).

Totally wasn't worth the one and a half minutes it took to microwave.  This next picture he is sticking out his tongue at me and it seems as though he is saying, "Serves you right for trying to skimp on my lunch mommy!"