{Dear Madison}

Dear Madison,

Mommy is SO proud of you for getting an invitation to the Kids' Cafe for being a Shining Star at school! That is so awesome! Your big sister was so in awe that you received this special honor, as she said this is reserved only for the students who are great listeners in school, and follow the teachers' instructions (why hasn't she gotten one yet?).

But, it truly saddens me that even though you are able to bring a guest with you, you don't want me to join you. :( You refuse to let Daddy come either! You actually stated you didn't want to enjoy this honor, and refused to go. Oh, my stubborn stubborn child. Please learn to enjoy life and not be so sensitive! No one is going to stare at you while you eat on stage!

I'm so happy you decided to invite Riley to eat with you. I guess if you won't let me be your guest, then the best person for this is a friend at school. Remember to choose the right and make good choices!!

Love,
Mommy

{Political Perspective from a 6 year old}

Madison came home yesterday showing her paperwork from school. Included in her paperwork was a Scholastic News for Kids, and on it had a picture of Obama & McCain. Inside the paper was three things about each person, and what they liked. McCain loves Mexican food, the book King Arthur and loves to hike. Obama loves chili, the book Harry Potter and he loves basketball.

Maddie’s conversation with me went like this:

Madison: Mommy… we learned about John McCain and Barack Ohana (not Obama, ohana, like “family” in Hawaiian)… and they both want to be presidents!
Mommy: Wow, well, what did you learn about them?
Madison: Well, if it were me to pick, I like John McCain because he likes Mexican food, and I LOVE Mexican food (said with the typical Maddie expression of widening her eyes big), and my favorite book is King Arthur and when we go camping, we always hike, so I LOVE hiking too!
Mommy: When did you read King Arthur?
Madison: in school
Mommy: When do you go hiking when we camp? We haven’t camped in a long LONG time.
Madison: MOMMY! I love to hike!
Mommy: OK …. OK.

So, according to the political perspective of a 6 year old, John McCain is the way to go if you like Mexican food, King Arthur and long hikes.

On the Katie update: her “surgery” went well. The dentist has a cool plasma TV playing Disney movies up on the ceiling, so Katie watched Enchanted the whole time. We went home, and from there she bled for about 9 hours. Her large tooth wouldn’t stop bleeding, but was clotting like crazy, and that was good news, apparently (I did call the dentists’ office again like a concerned mother). Last night she put a towel down over her pillow to catch any blood that may come out, b/c she is a total drooler in her sleep. Madison was VERY concerned about possibly getting blood on HER, so she kept claiming “I don’t want to sleep w/ Katie!” (remember her puking over the sight of blood?) After giving her the choice of the floor or the bed, she made a good choice and stuck w/ the bed. Here are a few pictures so you can see the girl(s) for yourself.... sorry if you get grossed out, but this morning it looked 100% better than it did last night. :)

Other exciting news today, we found our first baby lizard in the house! Yes! We didn’t scream like little girls, but I did trap him in a glass and Mike took him outside (I’m assuming it’s a him). In fact, he showed Katie, but teased her and acted like he was going to throw it at her, and she freaked BAD, and fell over a few things. ::giggling::

In honor of Katie losing her three teeth (4 if you count the night before), here is her favorite soup recipe, which we had last night.

Broccoli Cheese Soup

1 c chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 cups chicken broth
1 (16 oz) pkg broccoli florets
2 ½ c milk
1/3 c flour
¼ tsp pepper
8 oz Velveeta
Heat large saucepan coated w/ cooking spray over medium high heat. Add onio & garlic, saute for 3 minutes or until tender. Add broth and broccoli. Bring mixture to a boil over medium high heat. Reduce heat to medium and cook for 10 minutes. Combine milk & flour, stirring until well blended. Add milk mixture to broccoli mixture. Cook 5 minutes or until slightly thickened. Stir in pepper. Remove from heat, add cheese, stirring until cheese melts. Place 1/3 of soup in a blender or food processor (or hand blender) and blend until smooth. Yield: 6 servings (1 1/3 cup each).
Both of my girls eat this…. and one of them HATES vegetables (Katie). VERY yummy with fresh bread or rolls on the side.

{Tooth update}

Found a dentist that was able to take Katie after school.... and after an x-ray and an exam, she has to have THREE baby teeth pulled out. Two of the teeth had fillings that fell out, quite possibly b/c there were cavities that were still developing under the fillings, which made the fillings fall out. The third b/c it wasn't in good shape at all. So, we go in at 11 this morning to get the teeth pulled out, and she's being fitted for a spacer, which will be inserted in 3 weeks. Interestingly.... her canine is supposed to come in between 9-10 years old, and it's no where near the surface to coming in. Her next tooth isn't supposed to come in until she's 11-12, and it's the one that's very NEAR the surface. So, this is telling the dentist that her teeth has a mind of its own, and they aren't following the same time scale as the rest of the puberty stricken kids.

Funny story .... last night after dinner, she sat down and started wiggling her teeth. One of her loose teeth popped (it wasn't one of the three that needs to be pulled) and she pulled it out. So, now she'll have FOUR teeth, and on the same side to boot, that will be empty for awhile. Sad part, Maddie can't handle the sight of blood. Poor kid upchucked her dinner and dessert several times, then when she thought she was done, asked Katie to show her the empty socket again, and she puked AGAIN. I knew this about her though, so family, do NOT show her anything w/ blood!!

{Parent Teacher Conferences}

Yesterday I had Parent Teacher conference meetings with both girls teachers. Katie tested kind of low on a Texas test they give all students in 3rd, 5th & 8th grade. It is VERY important that she eventually passes this test in 5th grade, to ensure she gets to move up to 6th grade. Her grades are mostly A’s & B’s, except for this test. It was a reading test (which she does extremely well at), but it was comprehension that they are tested on, and she has difficulty w/ comprehension. Which explains why sometimes she just doesn’t “get it” at some math & science. Her teachers have requested that we put her in a group that will tackle this problem (just a reading group, but her teacher basically makes them think about what they’re reading, and teaches them concepts to help them understand). They say that this will also greatly help her in math & science. So, I went ahead and put her in this group.


Maddie excels greatly at math. She is an average reader for her class. Her teacher did say that she is VERY sensitive, which we already knew, and quiet and very sweet. One funny story that her teacher shared about Maddie is that last week, she was helping another student. One little boy started making siren noises, and so she looked up, warned the boy, and finished. Then the siren noises started up again, this time w/ a second person joining in. She looked up again, told this boy to sit in the corner, and then some of the kids said “but Madison was doing it too!”. She said she kind of gasped inside herself, as this was so out of character for Madison (at this point, I was shocked as well). She said “Madison, did you make that noise as well?” Maddie replied “a little bit”. Her teacher said she was just dying of laughter inside b/c she was so happy Maddie was finally coming out of her shell a bit.


Katie woke up last night with extreme pain in her tooth. Her fillings fell out months ago, but her dentist didn’t want to refill them b/c he said her teeth were becoming lose, and it would just be throwing money down the hole if we filled them, only for her to lose her tooth (teeth) shortly after. Well, we should’ve ignored him b/c so far she hasn’t lost either tooth. She woke me up at 2 a.m. last night in extreme pain, and so I gave her ibuprofen, which after 30 minutes still didn’t work. So, I gave her another one. After an hour, it still didn’t work, and we did warm salt water rinses, warm compresses, everything. Finally I remembered she had some Tylenol w/ codeine in it for her kidney stone pain “just in case”, so I gave that to her. Within 15 minutes the pain finally subsided and she was able to fall back asleep. She is very tired this morning (I let her sleep in 45 minutes longer than what she is used to), and I’m off to find a dentist to see what we can get done. Poor girl!

Been trying to keep busy in the past few days. We turned in our broadband modem as Verizon was charging us an arm & a leg to keep it, and we are getting cable & internet through the apartments soon anyways (I found out it could be another 45 days… UGH!, but it’s free, so I shouldn’t complain). So, I can’t “hang out” online as much as I would like, as it’s hard to pick up a signal during the afternoon & night, but early in the morning I can get on just fine!

So, Friday was the first day I had to really find stuff to do. I had bought Modge Podge and decided to decoupage one of the girls’ picture frames. It was an 11x14 frame that was burgundy wood. I made them a poster from Shutterfly of their friends & family back at home, and it arrived last week. But, the frame didn’t match the poster. So, I found some scrapbook paper that matched the poster (black & red). It was a little tricky trying to get red cardstock to stay down, but it worked!! Here are my pictures, so you can see what I did.

The final outcome!!

After I got done with that project (which took me 2 hours), I made mini cupcakes & brownies for Mike’s work party Friday night. I decided to “decorate” the cupcakes with my cake decorating stuff. Do I need a life or what? I topped them with a cherry, and it look “oh so fancy!”.

Then, I went on to make some more clippies and mini flower clippies for the girls hair. There’s a company that sells mini flowers that you can layer along w/ a brad that matches it all in one package, and it was half off, so I tried it out. I needed a black flower anyways. Not too bad!!

This week I am going to tackle my childhood pictures and put them in a scrapbook. We’ll see how well I accomplish that as the girls have 3 days of school that is early release. It’s already time for parent/teacher conference!!

Maddie had a playdate with her new best friend at school: Lilly. They actually only live a block or two away, so it was a great surprise to find out she has a friend who lives close! They had a wonderful time together, and Lilly is a very sweet little girl.

Funny but yet sad story…. I decided to surprise Maddie last week and show up for lunch with her. She saw me, and was excited to see me at first, then started crying. She had a headache (or so she told me). I told her “we’ll eat lunch first, and see how your head feels afterwards”… and she cried almost the entire lunch period, so I took her home and put her in bed. I made sure she knew her play date with Lilly was going to be canceled if she went home sick (Lilly came the next day). Well, we get home, and she’s “all better”. That little stinker. I made her stay in bed the rest of the day though. She told me later to not come back to school again. I guess I make her want to come home. Sniff sniff

See in this picture there’s a little cave? Mike showed me this cave, which is located RIGHT next to the property that he’s at right now (he’s on his last week there before he goes to the construction). Either one or two years ago, a mountain lion used to live in this cave, and one morning this lady took her trash to the compactor located near this cave. She threw her trash in, and saw this HUGE FAT mountain lion eating people’s garbage. She of course freaked out, and the police, etc came to capture this mountain lion. So, I finally got a picture so you can see!

{Creating Clippies}

I had been wanting to make these ribbon covered clippies for a long time, but just kept forgetting about them. I went to Target to find a present for Presley's birthday, and in the baby section, there was a package of ribbon covered clippes for (get this...) $9.99!!! There were only four of them in the package!! I saw that, and decided "well, now's a good time to try to figure out how to do these things".

I bought a small package of the clippies, but later found out that Sally's has them for about 100 in a package for $5.36. I had bought them 12 in a package for $2.99 at Target (so don't do that route). I had hot glue at home, some ribbon (you have to use the 3/8" ribbon). I did buy some of those grip stuff that you use to lay down on your cabinets. I'm still waiting to hear from Marcie to see if they actually help the clippies stay in the hair. I just glued a small section of that on the top part of the clippies.

As soon as I make it to Hobby Lobby to buy some more ribbon, the girls want to try it out in their hair. I tried to find smaller clippies as I was thinking they may be too big for Presley's hair, but I couldn't find anything smaller than what I found.

{Primary Presentation}

Yesterday the girls had their Primary Presentation. For my family who may be a little clueless as to what this is, the primary in our church learns tons of songs and different gospel principles all through the year, and usually during September or October of each year, they "present" it to the family during Sacrament service. Since we had just started going to our new ward the previous week, and found out their primary presentation was the following weekend (yesterday).... we kind of freaked out.

Every ward does different songs (they have a guide of songs they can choose from, but some choose an extra song or two that may not be on the guide).... and that happened to us in our case. The girls didn't know several of the songs... EEKS! But, they did a pretty good job lip syncing along to the words, and making it *appear* they knew. This ward did a new song I had never heard of, by Steven Kapp Perry, called "Teach Me About the Temple", and it was beautiful!! Katie, sadly, left all the words in her scriptures, which were with me, so she had to "play along" as if she knew the words.

The funny part though... Katie volunteered at the Primary practice on Saturday to say "I am a Child of God" in spanish. OK.. we can practice that with Daddy over the weekend. So she practics it and practices it. So much Maddie and I can say it fluently now. Soy un nino de dios. Pretty easy, huh? Well, Katie had to say it twice on Sunday, in the beginning and at the end (there were about 6 languages spoken by kids to show that we are all children of God). First time she gets up there she misses a few words. The last time she gets up there instead of saying "dios" she said "dois", which sounds like "dos". So, I am a child of two, may be quite appropriate, but it wasn't what she was supposed to say. ha ha!

Saturday night we headed to the current property that Mike's at right now. It had the MOST amazing pool & setting around the pool. A HUGE room full of nice table and chairs, with a gorgeous grill. I was speechless... it was so awesome. They tell me Mike's new property will have that also, so I'm stoked! It was a bit cold that night, but the girls enjoyed themselves. I got bitten to death by mosquitos. One swelled up to the size of a nickel on my skin! Yikes! I kept an eye out for rattlesnakes... didn't see any, if you wanted to know.

{Happy Birthday Miss Pres!}

Miss Presley, my sister in law Marcie's little girl turns one today!! I love how she has so many amazing expressions on her face!! So cute!

I have the cutest nieces & nephews.... my nephew Adam celebrated his 3rd birthday a few days ago (Mike has a nephew & niece born right after his birthday, so I can remember those!). Sadly, I don't have a picture of Adam. {{uh-hum ....Tiffany!}} Happy Birthday to Adam as well! I'd post a picture of you if I had one!

{Attack of the Butterflies}

While driving to meet Mike for lunch yesterday, I happened to notice there were a TON of big brown bugs on the highway. They were running into my windshield at an alarming rate, and I couldn't help but notice this phenomenon as I really took a look around the highway, and saw these "bug" were everywhere.

It wasn't until I made a comment to Mike that there were a ton of bugs around where he was, that he said they were baby butterflies... snout butterflies. Once we started driving, we got close to a few of them, and they indeed were baby monarch butterflies. They were everywhere. Not sure if they just hatched, or if they are migrating, but they were beautiful in a sense that these were butterflies, but also a nuisance when it came to driving, and seeing their fragile bodies smash into my clean windshield. Ugh.... cleaning up bug goop is the worse.


I sat at the girls' school waiting for them to come out, and I noticed the butterflies were all going in one direction: east. Mike told me last week it was like a huge fog of brown while he was driving, it was that thick with butterflies. But yet, it was a beauty of its own, to be appreciated only in the eye of the beholder.

***ETA: they are not monarch butterflies. They're called snout butterflies, and according to the news who reported on this phenomena last night, it happens every few years, and it's a pain in the butt. They get in the grills of your A/C, the grills of your radiator, your car.... etc.

{When sisters fight...}

What does a mother do when her daughters start fighting and bickering with each other? That's right, she puts them to work on chores they have to do together. Usually the end result is usually they're giggling at the end of their chore.... but in this case, it wasn't the end of chores for Maddie.

Madison also had to clean the bathroom, and when she was still griping after that was done, she had to clean her room. By herself. She finally got the point after her room was clean. "Quit yer griping & bellyaching!"

Why was she griping? Because she wanted to do that hard job Katie was doing ... which was mopping the floor (which wasn't part of the chore, Katie just volunteered to do it, which is MY most hated chore of all time, so heck yes! She can mop if she wants to!) I had to tell Madison next week she can mop. ::rolling eyes::