Here comes Aug!

I am looking forward to all the happening that are going on. Right before we left for a fabulous vacation to the Oregon coast and spending time with Russ' sister that we haven't seen for a while. Russ and I decided to look at houses. I wasn't sure about getting one yet as we are still paying on the student loans. They are the reason we sold the other house in the first place. But I picked up some bug and thought it would be fun to see what kind of house we could get into. Well someone told us that a bank would give us money for this crazy idea of a new house. So Russ called his aunt Leslie (The best real estate agent in UT). I think she was more excited about us getting into a house then we had been. She said that she wanted to help us find something before we left for our 10 day vacation. Well the 2nd day of looking we found a house put an offer on it and they accepted it. So here are some pictures of the house we will be signing papers on the 12th. Russ and I are not sure what to do with all the time we will have by being able to just move in.If you don't know what I am talking about you can look at my older post about the last house. I will do some painting and we would like to figure out about moving the laundry room because it is on the 4th level hiding in a bedroom closet.

http://browser.3sixtyonline.com/homes/photos/510/5101

Dream

I had the sexiest dream last night. Now mind you it had nothing to do with sex or nakedness. It was one of those dreams that you feel an intimate warmth. One when I look back and remember it I want to go back. I don't remember much of it now that it has been a full day but what I see when I close my eyes is someone calling me to come talk to him. He didn't use words he beckoned me to come to him with his fingers. He wanted to just talk to me I remember feeling safe. When I think about my dream I just want to go back and feel that same peace. I don't remember a face but the person in my dreams spirit was Russ.

I love being able to feel close to him even in sleep. It is just one extra small way that I remember he is my soul mate.

I have been so busy the last few months. It is crazy how fast life goes. I finished my parenting with love and logic class. One of my friends said that it is probably the best class I have ever taken. Now that is saying a lot I have been doing a life training for 4 years now. I have taken so many classes and have learned so much. But the parenting class is the only thing that has taught me how to work with Kaleb. I have had the hardest time being a mom to him some days. I didn't know how to discipline a kid that didn't care about anything. I love his carefree attitude but when he gets up set he can be so mean. I had days that I would have to go hide and cry. He just loved to say "I hate you mom", "You are stupid", "I don't love you". I just couldn't take it any longer and nothing I did would get him to stop. One night I went out to dinner with the family and some friends. It was one of the worst days he and I had ever had. At the dinner table Rachael was wanting me to hold her and love on her. I turned to my friend and said "It is nice to have a kid that loves and wants me." He looked and me and said "Tina some of the craziest stuff come out of your mouth sometimes." Now this friend doesn't have a wife and kids so to him this could seem to be an off the wall comment. I kept having the thought I should know how to do this mom stuff. I hit bottom and wanted to figure it out thus the class.


The last 2 months have been the best mothering months ever. Kaleb and I spend about 30 minutes every week alone. I put the other kids to bed and we sit on the couch and just talk about whatever is on his mind. I also do that with the other kids. The tools I learned has changed the face of our house and how we all work together. So I am sending Russ and Kimmie to the same class and the same teacher starting on Mar 19th. I would like us to all be on the same page with the kids.

This is at the Parade that was put on for the Utah football team. It was so much fun to be a Ute fan this year. My sister in law has put some really fun and interesting stuff

about the team and all that happened this year on her blog.

My kids love going to the games. Russ and Andy take the boys over to the high school to kick the football around. It is fun to see to fat old men running around like they did when they played football. Until one falls flat on his face and I being so caring laugh my head off and my belly hurts. Collin wants to be a kicker when he grows up

I have been interested in making a change and doing something different in our home. I have been feeling completely out of control and even a little more crazy then normal. A thought came to me. I have friends who have been telling me about Parenting with Love and Logic. I just thought is was a bunch of crap and didn't do anything about it. Well It was time for me to find a way to work with Kaleb or else he would die a very slow and painful death. I like him to much to let that happen. I headed to the Sandy Library and checked out the book. Wow the difference it has made in the way I treat and act around my kids is wonderful.

So I am setting some goals for myself this year and so far I am doing pretty good. I have been wanting to eat better and save some money at the same time. Russ and I are really bad at money and I didn't want to cook dinner for my kids or Russell. It is hard when they wont eat anything. I hate the fight that comes with dinner every night. So to let you know how bad we had been we would eat out at least 5 times a week and maybe more. It got worse after we sold the house and freed up even more money. I still don't know how much I actually spent a month but I do know that with 5 of us eating just at Wendy's we would spend about $25.00 every time. But most of the time we would eat at like Applebee's. So I was putting a lot of money into our failing economy.

Russ and I did a class like 3 years ago called Financial Peace University. We have never done anything with the information that we got from this class. Until this year we figured it was time to do something different. We started looking over the information again and have been doing what he tells us to do. It is the most in control of our money we have ever been. It has been a very good change of pace for us. I like being able to do most of our stuff with cash and not on our card. I now know where every penny is going.

With the year of changes and wanting to do better with money and eating better I have found some fun food blogs. I really like this one http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/. I am working on getting my family off of gluten everything she makes is gluten free. But it doesn't have to be. I have also had my family on Soy milk for years now because cow's milk is the cause of so many problems. I know I am on the kind of weird side of things. I also came across this South Beach Diet site and I have made some really fun and interesting items Kalyn's Kitchen. Now that I have some fun ideas for food I need to get off my bum. I am looking for some good ideas for working out and maybe even someone to do it with.

It has been a while. I have been having some big downs the last month or so. I think my body was telling me that I needed to stop and smell my very soft pillows. With all the crazy stuff going on with selling the house and Kaleb's broken elbow. I also did some Charity work with The Great Life Foundation called Living Christmas. It is like a sub for Santa. I got to purchase gifts for 7 different families (36 people). I then staffed a Part 1 training at The Great Life one of my favorite places to be but it takes up a lot of time to staff 4 full days. My point is I was very busy and so my body shut down and I ended up with walking pneumonia. So I have done nothing for the last month just letting my body recover. I have some fun pictures that some day I will add.

Glad to be done! Will never do again.

Russ wanted a fixer upper home. He got one! Here are some before and after pictures. I am not sure it does the work we did justice but it at least gives you an idea of what we went through.

I was talking to my friend today and he said that we did our own version of This Old House. I have many many more pictures. I just wanted to show the rooms that had the most dramatic change.