Party, Party, Party!

The weekend started off with a bang when we had Melody and her 3 boys come over to play. It had been a while since the kids had any friends over, and I love visiting with Melody. They came early, had lunch with us, and played in the kiddie pool/sprinkler. They left just in time for nap. When the kids got up, we went to Daniel's high school graduation party. We had a great time visiting with friends and family, and, of course, showering Daniel with lots of $$. Doris (Aunt Alice's mom) made her famous chocolate cake, and we (I) stuffed ourselves with giant strawberries...among other things. The kids had a great time playing with Fi-Fi and we were among the last to leave. I don't think the kids got to bed till after 10:30.

The next morning (Saturday), Adam made a quick run back to Uncle Don's to get a load of wood before we were to head off to Cousin Alice's 3rd birthday party. The party was at Chris' brother's house located out in the middle of nowhere near Battleground, WA. We were welcomed to a lovely home filled with TONS of kids...all of whom I'm pretty sure were related. Everyone was outside enjoying the beautiful 85ish degree weather. There was a large pool located next to a big trampoline, a small kiddie pool, a volleyball net, a large play structure, and lots of room to run. The kids had an immensely good time, as did we.

Faith made strawberry shortcake cake served with chocolate covered strawberries, strawberry cheesecake ice cream and strawberry pop for Alice's Strawberry Shortcake themed party.

Here's a shot of Samantha holding Novie in the pool. Adam got in too and played with the kids.

After cake, swimming, and presents all the kids took turns taking rides on "Oreo." Soren was scared at first, but liked it by the time the ride was over.

I think the kids had the MOST fun on the play structure. 2 slides, 3 swings, a tire swing, and lots of places to climb!

Afterwards, we met up with Patty and her friend Steve for pizza and ice cream in Woodland before heading home. The kids, amazingly, stayed awake during the entire drive home...and were able to be in bed before 10:00.

I couldn't believe it when Synnove chose black licorice ice cream and actually liked it! She ate the entire thing. What a mess!

Soren was not too keen on the licorice, so he chose strawberry...still messy though.

As of now, we just got back from church, the kids are napping, and Adam is off getting some materials from Henry to make a chicken run for our lovely layers. Tomorrow, we'll be going to Fi-Fi's 8th grade promotion! Party #3, here we come!

Camping Videos

All 3 of these were shot while on a 4-wheeler...so they are a bit bumpy. Remember to turn the sound on.

Camping Slideshow

Our camping trip this Memorial weekend was awesome...NO RAIN! This year, we had more quads than ever and we made good use of the trails. Even Synnove got to ride with some of the big boys =) Since the weather was decent, we had two movie nights around the campfire (thanks Doug and Sherri) and we played a few games. Tons of fun was had by all! I can't wait till our 4th of July trip!!

There have been lots of requests for the photos I took, so I tried to put them in a slideshow/album. I hope it works! Just click on the slideshow to view pics larger or individually. You should even be able to copy/save them for yourselves =)



I hope to post the videos I took on the trail soon (it takes me a while to shrink/upload them)

Oldies

Hope to catch up next week when we're back from our camping trip!

Here's a couple of random pics from the kids' earlier days to tide you over...

Speaking of Oxi-Clean...

First...a little background...

My brother has recently started up his own little business venture. Since he's a very busy boy otherwise, he needed to find a way to make money that didn't require him to go to a job every day. So, a friend of his got him started up with Quixtar...aka Amway Global. Now, I was a bit skeptical of the whole thing to begin with, but after some research and a very impressive presentation, I felt that Henry could have found something successful. ANYway, many of the products are a bit on the spendy side...however, the products are very good. They have everything ranging from vitamins, cosmetics, cookware, peanut butter, toilet paper, sunscreen, laundry soap, energy drinks...well...you name it! And, most of their many food/vitamin products are 100% organic (like SUPER organic) and ALL are 100% American made.

Henry had an open house about a month ago where his mentor and his wife came and brought many of the thousands of products that they sell. There were food samples as well. Anyway, I spent a lot of time talking to the wife because I wanted her to tell me why the products were better than the ones I can buy at the store. I loved how she didn't talk to me like she was trying to sell me something. She showed me a wide array of products and the bonus of buying them. And I would love to go into detail about what she told me, but I'll spare you...for now.

Now, I finally got around to ordering a few things on Monday afternoon. I pride myself in finding a good bargain, so I made sure I wasn't spending a ridiculous amount of money for anything on my list. I even got out my calculator! ANYway, I ordered on Monday afternoon, and received it on Wednesday morning! I ordered a few things including dishwashing tabs, lemon flavored animal cookies (yummy!), and a bunch of laundry stuff. The laundry stuff was what I was most interested in trying out. The gal at the open house was telling me all about the various items (detergent, boosters, spray treatments, etc) and I was quite intrigued when she told me that the enzyme spot treatment/spray and all fabric bleach were just plain awesome. She, being the mother of 5.75 kids (8 mo pregnant) would know! She said that those treatments had like 3 times the power of the leading brand (Oxi-Clean) and that they get out EVERYthing. She said "trust me...EVERYTHING!" and she proceeded to tell me a few stories. So, I just had to try them.

Like many mothers/wives, I spend a lot of time in the laundry room trying to get out tough stains. I'll often wash a garment several times, as well as, soak, scrub, or even throw away. Grease stains are the most stubborn of all, but my husband thinks that my grease fighting powers are unparalleled. But, when I washed AND dried a whole tube of Burt's Bee's chapstick with a load of dark clothes, my title as "grease-fighting champion" was defeated...but not for lack of trying. I washed a handful of those garments (one being a dress shirt of Adam's) 3-4 different times after using "Greased Lightning," dish soap, hot water, and a toothbrush. I finally told Adam, "I think your shirt is beyond repair." He was understanding, but sad that it was ruined. The shirt had grease spots everywhere...I bet there were at least 50.

So, I got all the stuff on Wednesday and finally decided to try the spray spot treatment on the shirt last night. The treatment is in an aerosol can, so it is easily and frugally applied (unlike Oxi-Clean spray). It took me a good few minutes to spray all the spots. I had little hope it would work as "Greased Lightning" gets out virtually any grease stain...PLUS this shirt had been washed AND DRIED 4 times! I didn't actually wash it for another 20 minutes so that the spray could do it's magic...no scrubbing. I washed it, and then put it in the dryer before I went to bed. This morning, I woke to find the shirt virtually SPOT-FREE! I kid you not, I opened the dryer door, pulled the shirt out, and my eyes popped out of my head in disbelief!! I knew that I had missed a few spots in the initial test because there was so many, but I'm confident that those few spots will be gone next time. TAKE THAT BILLY MAYS!!

NOTE: I put a clarification of the products I purchased on THIS blog entry...so read it before you decide to order.

To order, all you have to do is sign up on Henry's website (just like you do for any other website you order from) and order. There are tons of everyday products (many come in bulk/or concentrate) to choose from, you just have to search. I found most of the products I ordered under the "home" tab. You can also visit a wide array of partner stores such as Barnes and Noble, and Bass Pro Shops, Office Depot, Sony, Shop.com, 1-800-contacts, Joann, and MANY more. Just by ordering on those sites through Henry's website gives him credit (not necessarily monetary) towards his business.

Why Oxi-Clean Stays in Business...

New Inspiration

I really love decorating my house and finding "cheap" ways to make it look . In the last few months, I have collected a few things to put on the walls...yet, they have sat in a spare room somewhere. This is not like me...as I like to put things up asap. I usually buy things with a spot on the wall in mind, so why not put them on the wall? Well, today, I found new inspiration/motivation to put some of those things on the wall. Where did I find this inspiration? While shopping, I found something new to add to my pile of things to put on the wall! And, this may sound funny, but this just might be the ticket to get me out of my current diet/exercise/life doldrums. I know...I'm weird.

Making the Most Out of Mother's Day Weekend

We got started early on Saturday. We needed to make the garden more level and the dozer had done all it could do. I got out the roto-tiller to till up stiff soil so it could be easily dug out, while Adam used the tractor to shovel up the soil I tilled. It was a pretty good system! Then, we laid down some of our fancy underlayment (thanks GP!) and started building our walls/raised beds. It's gonna take us a while to get it all done...but it's a start! My mom and dad stopped by to give me a new plant for mother's day and watched us work for a while (both recovering from bad colds). Once we laid an entire pallet of cinder blocks, we headed back to Home Depot for another. While we were there, Adam and the kids let me pick out 3 new plants for the flower beds for Mother's Day! I picked a rose, a gardenia, and a pink flowering shrub (don't know the name).

Since it was nice, we let the bunnies out one at a time to play in the dog kennel. Charlie thought that Bunny-Him's cage looked cozy. He slept like this for quite a while! His neck is pink from Synnove's sidewalk chalk.

On Sunday, we all decided to show up at my parents' church for Mother's day. All of us were there, except dad (sick) so we went out to lunch and made plans for a spontaneously fun day at our house! We went to Chinese and had some really great food! They even gave out little crystal "Happy Mother's Day" figurines that lit up! It was sweet. Anyway, everyone had to go home to change clothes and get a few things and they all met at our house later.

The weather was decent so we set fire to our smaller burn pile. We also took a sledge hammer to the old goat shed (in pieces below).

While waiting for the fire to burn down to a reasonable hot-dog roasting fire, we split some wood. Dad and Adam split, while Mom and I stacked.

This is Synnove "helping"

The kids were good all day, despite a weekend with no naps.

The fire finally burned down enough, but it was still really hot! Mom found a unique way of roasting with out setting her pants on fire.

In the midst of all the fun, Synnove wanted to show off her 4-wheelin' skills...

After hot dogs, we all went up to the house to have ice cream sundaes! We had all kinds of candy toppings, chocolate syrup, caramel syrup, whipped cream, and bananas. We were all watching Bedtime Stories so I let the kids eat in the living room...Soren in his chair, and Novie on a towel. What a treat!

After ice cream, bath, and movie...

Hope your Mother's Day was as awesome as mine!!

Weightloss...Revisited

As much as I thought blogging would help my progress, I have still failed. I have a handful of excuses, but none of them are great enough to heal all of the bumps and bruises I collected when I fell off the wagon this time.

The beginning of the end happened in late February when the cold/flu season decided to reign supreme on the Brown Household for a couple of months. But, we've been healthy for at least 6 weeks now, and I haven't found the motivation to start up again, full speed ahead. I tried, really, I did. I lost my momentum and got discouraged. I will say, however, that my attitude towards diet/exercise has evolved into something much more healthy, and I'm not beating myself up about my failure....too much.

In diets passed, I have often let myself go...completely. I end up gaining much of the weight back. This time, I only gained 5 back....but I'm still eating like a horse who likes to eat cake, cheese, and lots of bread and butter. Initially, when the sicknesses started to come, I maintained fairly well. Then one cold turned into 4+ colds! In fact, I'm battling a cold right now...and winning :)

Anyway, for some odd reason, I just didn't have ANY motivation to do much of anything. I don't know why...in fact, I found it kinda weird. I wasn't even motivated to do my normal housework, or do any of the fun projects I have waiting for me. Slowly, my motivation is returning, and I feel fairly confident that I can start up again successfully. Summer is fast approaching, and I don't do well with focused diet/exercise in the summer...so I need to start now so that I have some decent momentum by the time summer really hits. We'll see.

I'm gonna try my best to start up tomorrow. Wish me luck!!

Bye-Bye Yard...For Now

This last weekend, we took advantage of our ONE nice day to demolish our yard. We still had Uncle Don's bulldozer and knew that the weather was going to be yucky soon, so really, it was the perfect time to do it. I wasn't quite prepared for the inevitable mess, but knew that it had to be done sometime. Adam had been planning to create a new garden area for some time now, but because of our other projects, we had decided to wait. Funny how plans can change with just a few hours on a bulldozer :)

Before my yard turned into a giant mud pile, we had two garden areas and another small flower garden. I had already pulled all of the old raspberry bushes out of one a couple of months ago and Adam had already taken a chainsaw to a couple of large flowering bushes in the flower garden. The day before, Adam transplanted some large bushes and plants in the large garden area, so the yard was ready to be destroyed. The only thing Adam was worried about was the old, leaning apple tree...he wanted to save it. In the end, Adam leveled a large area for a garden and ripped up some stumps, grass, and weeds, to make a nice area for some new grass. While he did that, I pulled weeds, raked, and planted some herbs in a different flower garden. THEN, after all that, we mowed the lawn, took the blower to the driveway, cut down a couple of trees, etc. My goodness, you should have seen what the kids looked like at the end of the day. They gave new meaning to the term "country bumpkin."

You can see the little flower garden in the front where Adam pulled the stumps out with the dozer. In this pic he's scraping the grass off of the smaller raspberry patch to make a nice area to plant new grass.
Here, Adam's about ready to cut into the larger garden area and make it twice it's size. It was very overgrown with weeds and grass.

He tried to dig around the tree...but it eventually fell...so he took it away with the tractor.

It's hard to tell in the pic, but the yard is on a slope. He wanted to make it level so he dug into the slope (left).

It showered off and on until the afternoon. By mid-afternoon the sun was shining and the kids were down to bare feet and t-shirts. They were carried straight to the bath before dinner.

Pillow Lessons

The whole reason I got my new, unused, sewing machine out in the first place was to make a pillow to match the cute valance I made for my basement. Turns out, sewing is much harder than I thought, and I needed a few lessons before tackling a pillow with trim. Mom started me with a mini-pillow that Synnove now uses with her babies. I then went on to make my fabulous pot-holder thingy that was actually quite difficult! After that, I took a long break from the sewing machine...then started back up again last week. Mom came over and we made a fun pillow for my brother.

And this week she came over again, and we finally made the pillow I had been wanting to make since the beginning. I used the $3 upholstery fabric I had used for the valance, matching rope/cording/trim, and some stuffing from old couch pillows. The whole project took about 2 1/2 hours! Next, I plan to make matching drapery tie-backs.

Nice trim job...for a beginner

Way too impressed with myself. My pillow is 2nd from the left.

THANKS MOM!!

Sibling Rivalry, and a Little Bit of Heaven

Lately, the kids have been getting on each other's nerves. They fight a LOT, scream at each other, and say mean things. I suppose it's a phase that siblings go through from time to time. But, it's been no fun for me, as I'm constantly breaking up ridiculous squabbles about who's looking at who, and who's touching who, etc. When all of this escalated about a week ago, I usually handled the situation by breaking them up and explaining how they were being hurtful/ridiculous/loud/inappropriate...whatever...then they would have to apologize and hug (very reluctantly). The tediousness of it all was making me crazy, as it was happening over and over and OVER again! Just as soon as I would walk away, they were already in each other's faces again.

This morning started off like most mornings have in the last week...with a series of fights. I was lying in bed trying to drag myself out, while the kids were playing in the other room. I was listening intently and all of a sudden Synnove decided to say something really hurtful to Soren for no reason whatsoever. That was the last straw of the morning, as I had already broken up a handful of squabbles already. I called Synnove into my room so that I could talk to her. She's in that lovely "I don't want to" phase where EVERYthing is a horrible inconvenience and she'll stand there in front of me with an awful look on her face, whining and contorting her body in all different directions...like talking to her is inflicting some sort of pain on her. I find it very disrespectful, so about 5 different times during our little 3 minute talk, I ask her to stand up straight and wipe the yucky look off her face. Anyway, I begin to talk to her about what the Bible says about loving one another and treating others as Jesus treats us, blah, blah blah. I tarried a bit in my lecture and also spoke a little bit about Heaven and living forever with Jesus. I was hoping that what I said would give her a bit of perspective.

After that, I went on to make some breakfast. Synnove wanted to help, so she was in the kitchen as well. She then went on to ask me some things about heaven. I can't remember everything she said, but she was obviously very interested in what it would be like to live there forever. She knows that Heaven is a place unlike anything she can imagine...but that doesn't stop her from imagining. Here are a few of the things that she said...

"but there won't be any restaurants there!"
"how will we eat, there won't be any food?"
"how will I get my bed there...how will I sleep if I don't have my bed?"
"Jesus isn't big enough to carry my bed to heaven!"