What we've been watching

 My girls love to watch "Max and Ruby", and to be honest I really like it too. I really don't mind them watching it and it's great for bribery. Hailey doesn't like to get dressed in the mornings, she would much rather stay in her PJ's all day. Some mornings I let her until she has to get ready for school, but on the mornings I need to her to get dressed I use "Max and Ruby" to help motivate her. It works every time.

 It's also on at the perfect time in the morning too. They can watch it and play while I jump on the treadmill and watch a little of this...

 I have heard about this show, but never got into it until recently. I watch it on netflix on my kindle fire and it's the perfect distraction to keep me going, the episodes are about 40 minutes so it's just about right for a nice walk/ slow run.

Of course, Sunday nights are for watching this...

Season 2 is airing on PBS and I just love this show. I think I look forward to it more than anything else right now. Is anyone else watching this? Although it still makes me wish I had a servant or two around here sometimes if only just for the cooking and laundry.

My favorites on Friday

I thought Emery had been sitting and coloring so nicely for a little too long. She just can't be trusted. Although snapping crayons in half and leaving behind a pile of carnage is far better than coloring the chairs, which she did a few days before this.

My boys

One thing that still amazes me, even after 5 kids, is how different they each are. These boys of mine are so unique in so many ways. They can be the best of friends or the worst enemies. Kayden and Carter are only 17 months apart, and when they were small I used to get asked quite often if they were twins, but I never saw it especially knowing how different they are it's even harder to imagine.

A classic example of their personalities is how they spend their money. At Christmas, Carter got a Ipod touch with 3 Itunes gift cards. Kayden got a kindle fire with money to spend to put stuff on it. Brendan got a 3DS, but he didn't get any new games since it is compatible with all the others we already have and it had games free on the system.  Carter spent all his gift cards, bought another gift card with his own money, and spent that all in the first couple of weeks of having it.  He bought games, music and apps. Not a single book to read. Kayden has only spent a small portion of his money. What he has spent has been on books. Brendan was as content as can be with his and never even thought to spend or ask for anything else on his until a couple of weeks ago when he bought a $10 gift card to get some games. I know this seems funny, but it amazes me how this just speaks volumes about their personalities.

Make-up Monday

I have missed my favorites on Friday for a couple of weeks now. Blogging is not the only thing I am behind on around here. I was sick last week and didn't even touch the computer for several days so I figured I better make-up for it today. If I had posted pictures on Friday these would have been it.

Hailey was the Star Student of the week for her class and was over the top excited about it. She spent several days creating her poster to hang up in the classroom. Then on Friday she got to talk about her poster and bring some things from home that represented her. She took her favorite stuffed animal, rhino, her favorite toy horse, and a pokemon card. I also wrote down some things about her for her teacher to read. 

Because we are mean

Emery has this thing about her jacket. She refuses to wear it. Most days around here it doesn't really matter and it hasn't been that cold, but obviously some days it does. She has a few jackets and I try to give her a choice on which one she wants to wear hoping that would solve the problem, but nope. Saturday, Corey went to run some errands, and was going to take the younger kids with him. Emery loves, loves to go, she doesn't care where she just wants to go. Well it was a little chilly so we told her she had to wear her jacket to go. She refused and Corey finally had to leave. She was a little devastated.

Like most things though, it was soon forgotten and she went about her business. She even still liked Corey when he got home. However she wanted to wear her jacket to bed that night. She won't put it on during the day, but will sleep with it?! Everything has to be on her terms, even the business of jacket wearing.

The ordinary

It's been just over 3 weeks since I had my eye surgery. I am still not totally clear yet, in fact the computer screen is the hardest thing to see, but I love not having to wear or worry about contacts and glasses anymore. It's amazing. Corey is loving it too, we both have found new freedom. After so, so many years of wearing them though I still have the thought, every night, that I better take my contacts out. It's hard to break those habits.

 Over the Christmas break I finally watched "The Help". It was also amazing, I loved, loved the book and was worried the movie wouldn't do it justice. It was really good though even though I had to sit right in front of the TV to see and it made me tear up at the end.It's one I would love to watch again.

Now that I can see better again, we have resumed our regular Wednesday cleaning. Lately the girls and I have turned up the music and may have had a few dance parties while cleaning. Emery has become quite the little singer and dancer, she loves it. It's a good thing they don't know that I am a bad dancer. 

While I slave away cleaning bathrooms, changing beds, mopping, dusting, hanging my clothes on the line, and polishing my silver, the girls usually tear apart the toy room.

I don't mind though because they keep themselves entertained while I do all the above listed things.

Also over the Christmas break, Corey and I asked our older boys, on several occasions, if they had any homework or projects that they were supposed to work on. They both told us they didn't, Then last week, of course, when I picked them up from school Carter says he has a 3D model of an animal cell due the next day. And he had known about it since Thanksgiving. I love those surprises. It's a darn good thing we have the internet to find ideas for that stuff and that Corey is so dang creative to help him build it. And it's a dang good thing Carter lived through that night. 

(note the half eaten peanut M&M, it was my favorite part)

Corey and I are in nursery together. So with the new year all our little kids moved up to Sunbeams. And now we have to train a whole new little group that includes Emery. She is proving to be the hardest to train, but she is the only one that sings with me during singing time. It's a good thing she doesn't know I am a bad singer also. 

Hailey has always been known to say some funny things around here, but something she said at school last week definitely is one of the best. Her teacher told me that they were giving examples of opposites and writing them on the board. Hailey raised her hand and said, "wet wipes and toilet paper". Her teacher said that after she stopped laughing she just wrote wet and dry on the board. 

I am still loving my Kindle fire, I have read a lot of books since I got it. Something about having access to so many at the tip of your fingertips just makes it that much more fun. It saved me from sheer boredom while I couldn't see. I would increase the font size to massive and hold right in front of my face. I really would have gone crazy without it. Once of my favorite recent reads was this...

It was our book club pick for the month. It was different than some of my other favorite reads, but I really enjoyed it.

Nothing like being all over the place with a blog post, but that's certainly the way life has been around here lately. But we kind of like it that way.

My favorites on Friday

Clearly, Corey and I, have not been using the treadmill for its real intended purpose.

Official

It becomes official today- we now have a teenager in the house. A little scary, if you ask me. Not sure how it happened so fast, but we still enjoy having him around all the same.

A year in pictures