WE'RE DONE!!!!! Well almost

It's hard to believe that we were here just 3 years ago.  It's been a looooong hard road, but we've made it, kinda.  Technically Randy has one more 3 credit class to finish until he's officially done, which will be completed by the beginning of June, but since we really don't think we will be here in August when the summer session ends, we decided to have him walk in the Spring Graduation.  We have struggled since the day we got married as to which was the right direction to go for Randy's schooling but once we figured which path to take, Heavenly Father sure took over the reigns.  We have gone from clueless on how we were going to go back to school to getting relocated to Utah, losing a job, miraculously getting Utah residency, going  to and finishing a Bachelors from UVU, thinking we were going to move to Cedar City to finish school and having that fall through, to being led to the EMPA program at BYU and not having to pay for his graduate degree all in 5 years time (which to some might sound like a lot, but when you have 4+ children things sometimes take a little longer, lol).  I can't count how many times I have felt my Heavenly Father push us in a different direction than what we was going during this time.  I am sooo grateful that He did though otherwise we may have ended up with a completely different outcome.

WARNING: PICTURE OVERLOAD!!!!

Now for the fun you've all been waiting for. . . the pictures, ta da!  Randy picked up his clothes early and we decided instead of waiting till graduation day to take pics when there would be tons of other grads doing the same thing, we'd go to the signs at BYU the day before and take advantage of less crowds.  I have so many shots and really wasn't in the mood to do a lot of editing so I just put up a few random ones. 

It was a little breezy, can you tell?

I love this shot.  We were walking back to the car and I couldn't resist shooting this.

Micah sporting his dad's cool hat.

Randy walking in, he's 9th from the end with his arm up pointing.

 A little closer shot, looking right at us.

His mom's camera got even closer, I love that he looks like he's marching.

This was right before his row got up to go to the stage.  That's one of his EMPA buddies that decided to graduate early as well.

Really blurry I know, but here he is going up on stage.

On the other side with the 2 other EMPA guys.

We were naughty and left after he walked.  Apparently in the business school, over half of the grads were getting their graduate degrees.  I really couldn't sit any longer for them to go through the Bachelor's as well especially since Randy was literally right at the end of the graduates.  Blame it on #5.

Here are the families that were able to come and celebrate with us.  Julie and her kids.

Alina and Ki Ki-these 2 are troopers.  They had already sat through another graduation early that morning.  Alina's mom graduated with her Master's in Education.  Thanx again Alina for coming.

Of course us-minus Morgan who decided she should make this day extra special by barfing, the poor thing watched movies on my bed all day.

Randy's parents and sisters.

Even though she looked like trash we didn't want to leave her out.  We had to get at least one shot of her with her handsome daddy.

At home for a couple more shots.

I'm going to regret this later, but I couldn't resist.

After it was all over and we checked up on Morgie, we went out for Linner at one of our favorite places, Rib City.  It was probably our last time eating there and man it will be missed.

Grandma tried really hard to get these kids to sit still long enough to get a cute shot, this was the best that we could do, the little stinkers.

Next on the agenda, getting a job.  Right now Randy's got a really great opportunity in San Antonio and we will find out by the end of this week if he got the job.  We are hoping things work out for us down there, but I've learned over this past years that it's really not in my hands.  So if we are suppose to be there I know that Heavenly Father will have a huge part in it.  However, prayers couldn't hurt, lol.  Here's to the next chapter in our lives.  Congrats Toots!!! We Made it!!!

Hope of America

This was our first (and maybe only) year of doing Hope of America.

Here's a link to the news paper article about their performance 

http://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/students-fill-marriott-center-for-hope-of-america/article_aef76642-b741-5698-9379-f44dad25ab40.html

McKenzie is in the 2nd from the top white row, 9th person in.  She's clapping her hands right here so it's kind of hard to see her face.

Here's the shot of the flag from where we sat.  Even though we got there early, we were still in the nosebleed section.  The article has a better shot of the flag

The songs were great, and they even added some choreography to a few of the songs.  Here are a few of our favorites.

Here's "Hope of America"

"America Rocks"

"This is America."  This was McKenzie's favorite because they made the crowd do the wave.

This was probably my favorite.  They sang with flashlights and it was really cool to see all of the kids moving their lights at in the same direction, you'll see.

Grandma, Grandpa and Kristi were able to come and they loved it.  It was moving to be apart of this and feel the patriotism we all have.  Thanks to all those who have sacrificed to keep us free.

A little busy

I don't even know where to start.  I guess amidst the barfing and being sick for an entire month, lots has happened last month and I did document some of it (kinda).  The 5th graders do a state report and McKenzie chose Wisconsin (I'm so proud of her :).  It was an easy state for us especially since we lived there for a few years and left with a few souvenirs.  She found out some of stats of the state, some famous people who lived there and even had a Sprechers bottle and Milwaukee pickles to have as props (kinda brings a tear to my eyes, lol).  They did a little (actually kinda long but I won't put it on here cuz it really long) reading about Paul Revere and sang the 50 States Song for the parents.

 This was for the song they sang.  She was pretty much at the end since she picked a "W" state.

 We also got to see Randy's sister's new home (Julie).  Her and her new husband bought a beautiful home near where they were living before.  We had a house warming for them and of course I didn't take any other pictures of this evening except when they were opening gifts.  So that's what you get.

 Micah finally let me pull out one of his front teeth.  Its been hanging there for a while and it took a lot of encouragement and bribery to let me finally yank it. The other one is loose but not as loose as the other so he won't let me at that one yet.  The weird things it after pulling the 1st one the other one shifted over so now it looks like he's got a snaggle tooth.  Gotta love it.  It's killing me not to pull.

 Last week Randy's cousin, Amy, and her family came down from Idaho for part of their spring break.  We haven't seen them since Micah was little so it was great being able to catch up with them.  I again didn't get a ton of pics during our little get together but enough to remember the night.  Here's Julie and Amy

 Uncle Tom (well really a cousin) and one of Amy's youngest.

 The girls with little Julie.  She's Micah's age and such a cute thing.

 Another great thing that happened was my mom came to visit.  And we all know what happens when she comes, it's cleaning time and cleaning we did.  Well more like organize and dejunk.  We threw so many bags of trash out (thanks to my neighbor for letting us use part of their trash can), we have just as much getting donated and then we organized all of the bedrooms in the house.  It feels soo good to have things clean-er around here.  Not that it is going to last cuz the kids will find a way to destroy it soon.  My mom also deep cleaned my fridge, my oven/stove, and my tub.  I will not have to clean the oven before we move, hallelujah.

 Even though I still feel like poo, I want to try and do a better job documenting this baby than I have with my others.  So here I am at 26 weeks, is it over yet??? I did take another shot at I think at 18 weeks, I know I'm not very good at this documenting thing.  I figure if I get a few more weeks in before she comes, I'm doing way better than I ever have.

Tired

I just need to vent a little bit.  I am soo tired of everything going on in our lives right now.  I'm getting really excited for baby M to join our family and I'm just dying cuz I have seriously been sick for 4+ months.  Just when I thought morning sickness was going away I get an awful cold now going on 3 weeks that resulted in a sinus infection and last night during the Caucus meeting I started getting a tickle in my throat that has turned into incessant coughing.  I give up.  I can't keep up with it all.  My only saving grace is that my kids are old enough now to entertain themselves and are more self-sufficient to take care of themselves.  Oh wait but there's more.  This week, 3 more of us got sick with fevers and congestion and aches.  Today is the 1st day all week where there is only 1 other body here with me during school.  Hopefully this weekend will bring some "well" thoughts.  

So you think that's all eh? There can't possibly be anything else that is going wrong in KT's life, Not even close.  We were planning after Randy gets a job to sell our mini van and get a suburban just for the sake of room.  The van is tight with the 6 of us and adding a 7th was just going to put everyone over the edge.  Randy walks in graduation in the middle of April and will be completely done the beginning of June.  I figure oh we can last till then, well we can but the van may be another story.  Wednesday the check engine light came on and so we took it in.  Randy and decided that if was  going to cost a lot that maybe it was time to sell it and beg his parents to drive their "burb" around for a few months till we get everything figured out.  To fix the minimum in the van to get the light to go off was going to be $500 and if we wanted to do every other little thing that was not as important was going to be $1000.  Now that may seem like not a lot of money considering it could be $2000 but when we've already replaced the breaks, a brake light cover and the alternator within the last 8 months that puts us way over what we were expecting to put into this van of ours.  So we decided to fix the minimum and have cleaned it up to start preparing to sell it, (ya know find all of the documents and get things in order).  We got it back yesterday and drove it around a bit then this morning on my way to take the kids to school the dang light comes on again.  I almost started to cry.  WHY WHY WHY.  I just want to be done with this thing.  So I took it back in and the guy checked and said "well now instead of a major leak it is showing a small leak.  You'll be fine through the weekend but if it comes on again, just bring it in on Monday."  I DON'T WANT TO PUT ANYMORE MONEY INTO THIS THING!!!!  Just a few more months till our lives were going to settle down (at least from a school/financial aspect).  It's been a great little van, we've had to fix a few hoses throughout the past couple of years and until this year we've never had any major problems with it.  It's been through a lot, and been good to us, but it is time to let it go.

As I was finishing this I got a call from Randy telling me that one of the students that works for him just called him and said that he wasn't going to be back to work for a bit.  Randy, being the sarcastic boss that he is started giving this guy a hard time, (jokingly) and comes to show that his wife who has had 5 miscarriages in the last couple of years (1 just a few weeks ago) just found out her father collapsed at work and was unable to be revived. Wow.  What a wake up call for me.  Here I am complaining about being sick for what feels like forever and having to take care of my sick kids. . .
1) I have children of my own that are healthy (relatively) and growing well who I love.
2) I can get and stay pregnant relatively easily (almost too easily sometimes).  And although I feel like crap right now most of the time, I am not on bed rest and my baby is not in distress.
3) I have parents who are still around and although they have some medical issues to deal with, they are still here and I love them and I can't wait till my mom comes next week to visit.
4) I do have a vehicle that gets me from point A to point B that doesn't die unexpectedly and though it needs a little work is still a great car and I'm sure has a lot more miles to give.
I need to stop complaining and be grateful for all the things that do have and still have.  Sometimes we just need a reality check and get us back in line.  I know that Heavenly Father has a plan for me and right now is not the time to be complaining and whining, I need to be happy where I am at and realize that this all to shall pass.  We are given trials and tribulations for a reason and it's what we learn from them that make us grow.  Man I feel like I'm giving a talk at church. . . AMEN!  Now if I could get this cough to go away so my head doesn't feel like it's going to explode I'll be good, lol.

It's A. . . GIRL!!!!

Yep that's right, another little princess will be joining our family in July.  I had my ultrasound yesterday and the doctor's machine for whatever reason was producing really fuzzy pictures so he sent me to the perinatologist for a better look.  Everything looks great and she's growing perfectly.  Randy is getting use to the idea and said as long as when we get a dog, it's a boy.  I just laughed.  I guess that's the one thing that we can control is the gender of our pets, lol.  He agrees a girl will be much easier at this point and Micah got his wish so everything is good.  It's pretty obvious here that it is NOT a boy.  The two vertical lines are her femurs and the arrow is pointing to nothing which means there is no apple on the stem.  That gray circle above the arrow is her umbilical cord.

 What a cute profile.  She likes to curl up, that's her leg/knee on the right.

 Just had to get one last shot of that cute face.

The ultrasound tech did a very thorough job and we got lots of great shots of her.  A cute little foot, a front face shot (which makes her look like an alien) and a few others of her body profile one with her knee almost on top of her face.  Now we need to come up with an "M" name that we like and update a some of our baby gear.  This time I'm don't care how neutral it is, bring on the pink.  Oh and for the 4 of you who voted girl, let me know so I can do a drawing for a prize, and Ellen, you don't count cuz I know you voted both ways.  So really, the 3 of you send me a message.  Maybe a make a voting poll of M names we like later on for you to vote on to help us :)  Here's to another 19 weeks of pregnancy bliss (cough cough).

Last Chance

Tomorrow I have my ultrasound, and I will be posting what our findings are.  If you want to get in the prize pool, you better leave a comment on what you think it will be.  Who knows, maybe I'll take you out to lunch, or make you a basket of a few of my favorite things, or maybe I'll just give you a big wet kiss, lol.  Happy voting.

It's all about Micah

Micah had two programs in two days.  Busy little guy.  The first on was the 1st grade patriotic play last night.  He, along with the other 1st grade classes, had to memorize a part and sing some songs.  Here he is in front of their back drop.  The other little boy in the middle is his classmate who is also the son of his Kindergarten teacher, gotta love it.

 

Each student was asked to memorize a part and he, along with a few other kids, were given a really long poem.  We bribed him with a  Halo/Lego guy and that was enough incentive for him to learn his part.  He did awesome.  Oh and he was too embarrassed to ever look at the camera, every time he did he would start laughing, the little stinker. 

What a handsome boy.  He informed me yesterday that he no longer wants another brother because he wants to have his own room when we move.  He cracks me up.

They sang "God Bless the USA" and waved flags at the end.  I love this song, it never gets old for me.

Getting ready to wave their flags. He's in the middle trying to figure his out.

Micah's the ladies man, he tells me he likes all of the girls in his class.  Makes me worry just a little.  He's way to young to be liking girls already.

The other thing he took part in was Rad Kids.  I know I know, I've posted so many of these, but after what happened to that little girl in Walmart a few weeks ago, I don't care.  She apparently was a Rad Kids grad.  I just love this program and Micah was really excited since this was his first time to be able to take the class.  He did amazing.

You are probably wondering why it looks like he is wearing his PJ's, it's because he is.  It is our school's Read-a-Thon month and today was the actual Read all day-a-Thon where the kids get to wear their PJ's to school and read all day. . . well almost all day.  Here he is with the Lobster Man that he got to beat up.

Here they are warming up showing their Rad Kids Stance.

And ya gotta love being allowed to beat people up and no get in trouble for it.

And our newest Rad Kids Grad!!  Good job little man.  You kicked his booty!!!