Drudgery Got You Down?

As soon as we got home, the disagreements began again. Apparently the source of our troubles is everyday life. Therefore, Paul is quitting his job and we are moving into his parent's home in Virginia to sit around all day and do nothing but watch t.v. and eat.

Merry Merry

14. I'm thankful for my new Macy's gift card. Finally, I can shop without (much) guilt.

15. I'm thankful for my funny family on Christmas day. Grace getting worried when I said that we should see if Santa came. Although she liked his present, the physical presence of Santa is not very appealing to her.

16. I'm thankful for someone else doing the big meal cooking- although maybe I should help Paul's mom more.

17. I'm thankful for nap time- we're blessed to have kids that sleep for 3 hour naps. Sweet!

18. I'm thankful for not getting the flu (yet- knock on a whole forest) this Christmas, as we all did last year.

19. I'm thankful for my Savior Jesus Christ. I am thankful for his example of love and peace and forgiveness, and doing God's will.

20. I'm thankful for Christ's atonement. I don't understand it all, but I'm trying to, and the sheer magnitude overwhelms me.

21. I'm thankful for traditions- for whatever weird stability and fun they bring to my life.

22. I'm thankful for trees- Virginia has lots of 'em.

23. I'm thankful that I don't and didn't have to go to any big sales for Christmas- or after. Those sales and crowded stores in general drive me nuts.

24. I'm thankful for Christmas!

25. I'm thankful for peace- may we all strive to have more of it this year in our homes and in the world.

Bored Yet?

11. I'm thankful to not have a cold right now.

12. I'm thankful for rain.

13. I'm thankful to have food to eat.

I'm an Idiot

The title for my blog- which is so dang original and all- was supposed to be taken from this Ramone's song called "We're a Happy Family." I guess I never really knew the lyrics- but all the time I had the chorus running in my head, which says:
We're a happy family
We're a happy family
We're a happy family
Me mom and daddy

No problem there. Then I looked up the lyrics- I mean, I didn't want to misrepresent!

We're a happy family
We're a happy family
We're a happy family
Me mom and daddy

Siting here in Queens
Eating refried beans
We're in all the magazines
Gulpin' down thorazines

We ain't got no friends
Our troubles never end
No Christmas cards to send
Daddy likes men

Daddy's telling lies
Baby's eating flies
Mommy's on pills
Baby's got the chills

I'm friends with the President
I'm friends with the Pope
We're all making a fortune
Selling Daddy's dope

I think that about sums it up for us.

Memo

10. I'm thankful for my great-grandma Memo.
Here she is with my my Great-Grandpa Paul, and my Grandma Irene and my Grandpa Jim.

Memo was a really wonderful grandma. She really cared about everyone- especially her kids and grandkids and great-grandkids and great-great-grandkids. She was great at making food- especially scalding hot hot chocolate. She had a few secret recipes that she would give people the recipe for- but they never turned out. We don't know if she purposely sabotaged them, or if she just had a special knack for making things. Probably both are true- she was pretty feisty.

Memo just passed away on Friday. She turned 97 a week before that. I really love her and am sad that she's gone. And happy. For the reasons that I should be happy- she gets to be with her family. And not feel pain. And get to be in Heaven.

I love you Memo.
Here she is in the green sweater.

Here she is on the left with the big huge bow on her head.

Us visiting last year.
Just for good measure, here is a picture, of Memo's dad, Harry. He's the one sitting. What a bad a__!

More Thanks

6. I'm thankful for friends! You know who you are!

7. I'm thankful that Paul is working at home today and we got to go out to lunch.

8. I'm thankful for ham and turkey sales around the holidays. I will gladly spend $25 at a store to get a cheap per pound ham or turkey (1.27 and .47 respectively, for those who want to analyze my sales against their local sales.)

9. I'm thankful that I'm a mom, even though it's weird being a grown up sometimes. The girls and I went to visit my family on Monday and Tuesday, and I went grocery shopping with my mom. It was weird to go grocery shopping myself today and have no one to defer to when making decisions. And it was weird being the one browbeating the butcher and checker person for a raincheck on the aforementioned ham.

The House of the Lord

5. I'm thankful for the temple. The Los Angeles Temple is pretty amazing- huge and very interesting inside, especially because you move a lot from room to room. Here are a few pictures of the rooms (kind of bad quality- someone scanned them in from an old brochure). The murals are really cool and keep things interesting.

The Creation Room


The Garden Room



The World Room

The crazy thing is- each room holds about 300 people. Can you imagine having that many people there at once?

I love being in in the temple because of how peaceful I feel when I am there. I feel like I am close to God and can really speak with Him when I am there.

Muffins

4. These muffins are so good. They are the best health muffins I have ever had. Although I waste too much time on the internet, I am thankful for the internet and its ability to bring me delicious recipes.
Here is a link to the article with all of the tasty and healthy muffin creations.

Madelyn's Cookies

3. I am thankful for Madelyn's cookies. The first recipe. I cannot attest to the goodness of the second because I haven't made them yet.
I made these the other day, and BOY ARE THEY GOOD!!! I can't emphasize enough the deliciousness, and say unto you- go forth and make your own batch. With chocolate chunks maybe. That's how I made them, and BOY ARE THEY GOOD!!!

Twins

2. I am thankful to have twins. I wonder why Heavenly Father doesn't make everyone a twin. (well, I guess we can think of reasons why not.) Anyways... I love having twins.
Here is a picture of Camille and Grace (well, not so much Grace in this picture) reading Happy Birthday Bear together. They were reading each page in their little twin talk with bits of actual English thrown in for good measure.
Camille: Make Cake...
Grace: Yep, Cake.
Then they would get to the last page and sing "Happy Birthday to you!" and roll back on their backs and laugh. Then sit up and hand the book to the other twin and do the whole process over again.
Now, I'm not dissing only children, or oldest children. I mean, I'm one of those. And my sister is my best friend and we're only 20 months apart, but think of all the extra fun we could have had in those 20 months!

I guess I should say- I'm thankful for siblings.

25 Days of Thankful

I don't know if I can actually post in 25 consecutive days, but I thought I'd get my thankfulness groove on. Therefore- during the next several days, I will be posting things that I am thankful for. 25 things. Maybe it'll take 25 days, maybe not, but we'll be sure to have all 25 by Christmas. 25 all around. What a lucky number!

1. I am thankful for good weather. I don't know if it will turn me into a weather sissy, but it may be worth it. Yesterday I took the girls to the beach and we played in the sand. They got all wet, but it didn't matter if I took of their sopping pants and shoes- it was about 75 degrees outside! We played in the sand and tiptoed in the water- watched the wetsuit clad surfers and some dolphins frolic out about as far as I could swim, and I thought: This is pretty good. The only thing that could make it better would be to have all of you here to play with me.

Happy Birthday To You!

My kids' birthday was last week. We had a party for them, which went as well as a 2 year-old party can go, I think, and the best part for them was being sung to when they blew out their candles. I guess I don't have any actual pictures of that part, but now whenever you sing that song, they get a special smile on their faces and a faraway look in their eyes.
Well... maybe you can't tell from these pictures, but take my word for it- the birthday song is pretty special.

I'm sorry

I'm sorry, Leonard. I'm sorry that when we were in middle school I was a huge jerk to you. I'm sorry that I joined others in calling you Le Nerd. I'm sorry that when you were a magician for Halloween that I laughed at you. I'm sorry.

I hope that you have some sort of successful life now with a loving family and all of the happy and good things in life. I hope that you know that I didn't grow up to be as big of a jerk now as I was in middle school and I wouldn't call you Le Nerd now unless you wanted me to and we could both laugh about it. I hope you know that if I ever catch my kids being a jerk like that that I'll send them to live on a kibbutz. I hope that you'll forgive me.

Empty

Everyone's gone except for the girls asleep in their rooms. We had a good weekend with the girl's 2nd birthday party, and it was fun to have all of our friends and family. Now our home is empty and I am sad.

It makes me think about after I had the girls. We had help from Paul's mom and my sister and my mom for several weeks and then they finally all left. It was pretty devastating. Of course, you can blame the devastation on the crazy post-birth hormones, and the after-effects of surgery, and the lack of sleep. But, it's mostly just hard to buck up and be an adult after you have been taken such good care of.

I'm not so devastated now- I can handle these crazy toddlers a lot better than my crazy newborns. But, it was nice being taken care of. And it's a little lonely at the top.

Break it down break it down, shake it shake it

Today was one of those break down days. The curse of women everywhere, break down days happen when all of the little things accumulate into one big thing and cause said women to cry.

Some might call it the straw that broke the camel's back.

The straw for me today was almost getting my whole family killed by a huge orange bus today while taking Paul to work. I already knew that the break down was coming before we got in the car and complained to Paul and Grace and Camille about it. "No, mommy can NOT hold you right now. Stop saying 'hold you hold you' a billion times, mommy can just NOT take it!!! Ahhh!!!"

Anyway, we almost got hit by the bus when I did a left turn in front of it. I then proceeded to pull the car over and cry. And Paul, whose middle name is Nice, suggested that we go home and I could rest for a little bit and he could take care of the girls. Five minutes later when I had stopped sobbing enough to speak (and drive), I drove us to the park/beach and Paul watched the girls slide while I went and watched the waves. Ahh, the soothing nature of the waves.

Don't worry, I'm all better now. For now.