It has been awhile

It is amazing how much time has passed since I last posted.

We had a wonderful Christmas. My parents ended up in Arizona around Christmas so a quick drive and we were there. My brother's son was baptized so we had an eventful weekend. It is always nice to see family, especially when they live so far away.

A few weeks after my parents visit we heard my grandma had passed away. The funeral was in Ephraim, Utah which is about 5 hours from us. We left our house when Ted got off from work and Just made it in time to the end of the viewing. I was a little nervous about my kids seeing my grandma like that, but my mom was there and helped them make it not as scary. I was able to see alot of my aunts and uncles and cousins that I haven't seen in over 10 years. It was really nice. Well we went to check in to our hotel and we both had missed calls from his family saying that his mom was in critical condition and we needed to get back, they were not sure if she was going to make it!! What! Ted was a wreck! We drove back to Vegas in record speed to find out it wasn't as bad....They thought.
The doctor said she had a tear in her aorta, the next day they said she still had a tear but it was clotting on the outside. To them it seemed to be healing itself. About a week later she went home. She was home about a week when she was having chest pains again and was brought back to the hospital. She still has the tear and now she has a blood clot in one of the valves to her heart. She had open heart surgery a little over 2 weeks ago. She has days where she is doing better and then the next she is worse than before. Teds dad is having a hard time dealing with all of this. He broke his leg around Christmas, he had to have 2 surgeries to fix it. So he is in a cast up to his thigh. He sits there every day in ICU.

On a happier note....
I decided last year I was going to get my cosmetology licence here in Nevada. Ashlyn is going to kindergarten this year so I will need a part time job. After looking into it I will have to take my written test over. Now it is a national test so if i decide to get a licence in another state I wont have to take the test again. I went down there on a Thursday, they said I needed to wait for a letter in the mail to tell me when the next test date was. I got the letter the next day! And the test was for the next Monday! I had a week to learn over what took me a year in beauty school to learn. I was a little freaked out! I got on an online site and started studying. When Monday came around I didn't feel totally prepared as I didn't really know what to expect. At the beginning of the test she tells us she will send out the letters for those that didn't pass right away, if you did pass it would take a few weeks to get your letter. The test was about 150 questions, and after it was done I was quite relieved but honestly I had no clue how I had done. Some of it I had to guess...
After a week of being totally scared to check the mail in case there was a letter in it :) I received the letter 3 weeks later with my licence in it! I had received an 84 on the test! Holy crap! I was so excited! So now I work part time in a salon less than a mile from my house. I totally love it! I go to work for a few hours a night when Ted gets home and on Saturdays. I think when Ash goes to Kindergarten I will be able to work longer.

Next time i wont take so long to post :)
Love you all!

Broken Glasses

A few weeks ago, in the morning I went to put on my glasses and they were all bent. They were right on my night stand where I had left them so I thought it was a little weired. I bent them back so I could wear them. Later that evening when we were having dinner, I was telling ted how bent my glasses were and instantly I could tell he was trying to keep a straight face. So I just kept talking about them till he spilled it! when he left for work that morning they were on the floor and he had stepped on them! He said they were really bent and the lence had fallen out, but he bent them back so I wouldn't notice, nice try!

Well tonight, I had been wearing my glasses all day. I was in the bathroom helping Ashlyn brush her hair and glanced at myself and my glasses were crooked. As I attempted to straighten them they broke in half! All I could do was laugh. Thank goodness Ted was a whiteness and I didn't have to explain to him how this happened. I just cant believe he can step on them and I gently try to bent them a little and they break! Ted made several attempts to tape them together so I can still wear them tonight and I guess until I get a new pair. They look bad! And the tape is scratchy on my nose!

Ash trying to Explain Christmas

My sweet at times daughter who LOVES to watch TV started saying "Oh my God" All the time! I was really embarrassed and tried my best to explain why we do not use that word. It was a little hard for her to understand since they say it all the time on her favorite show on the disney chanel. What do you do? I decided I needed to start taking her to church. I used to go as a kid and loved it. As I got older I got out of the habit, No more slaking! I have been a huge slacker at times in my life and this year I decided to make a change! Every new year I try to set a few realistic at the time goals. So we have been going to church this year pretty faithfully. Every Sunday I ask Ashlyn what she learned in Sunday school and she tells me her interpretation of the bible story they talked about. A few weeks ago she was telling me about Christmas and about how it is also "that guys birthday". She went on and on really excited about what she was saying, I was starting to get confused, "Ash, slow down..Who's birthday is it?" Now she is a lot louder "you know That guy, Jesus". She had the story right, but to refer to Jesus as "that guy" and so loud as we were still in church, all I can do is shake my head and run out of there fast! I still hear about it. A lady approached me on Sunday and said it was really cute, "hahaha,that guys birthday", I might think it was cute if someone else's child would have said it. Maybe I'm still a little too embarrassed....

We had our Christmas program on Sunday Ian had 6 lines and he totally had them memorized, he did so good! Ashlyn was an angel and had a bit of stage fright, all she did was shake her head no when it was her turn. It was still pretty cute. A funny story, They had their rehearsal on Saturday, they had 3 Angels all about 4 ish. The one little girl had on her wings and halo on for at the most 5 minutes. When it was their turn, this little girl screams "I don't want to be an angel, I want to be a chicken!" then walks around squawking like a chicken! I couldn't help but laugh. She didn't do it on Sunday, I think her dad talked her out of it:)

Christmas Pictures

I have had it in the back of my head for several months we need to get our Family picture taken, since Ashlyn turned 4, August. So a long time:) One day Last week Ted was messing around with his camera found the timer function and decided we could take one in front of the Christmas tree. It was a lot harder than he thought. He took over 20 pics and only 1 turned out ok. Someone wasn't looking or smiling. Ash decided she didn't want Ian touching her, crying, fighting some yelling a good hour of our day and still only 1 photo :)

Teeth....Tooth Fairy

Ian used to be terrified of pulling out his loose teeth. He would wait till it was dangling there to tell me it was loose, then try to make me pull it out, like it would be less painful! To be honest the thought of putting my fingers in his mouth totally grosses me out, then to pull the tooth out! No way!! So now, he just pulls them out like its nothing! good for me but it still grosses me out. Good thing I never attempted a career in the medical field! When we got home from church today he shows me his loose tooth, I tell him "EWWW gross, show Ted" he goes into the bathroom and pulls out his tooth and proceeds downstairs to show him. Not exactly what I meant! Boys are so crazy!

This is only the 2nd tooth he has lost at our house. The majority of the madness happens over at his Dads. My complaint is the tooth fairy he has over there. For Ians last tooth he got $50. Yep! Who gives their kid $50! Ian said his first tooth he pulled out the dear tooth fairy gave him $100!! I gave him 3$ for his tooth and he was totally cool with it, so Why?? I asked him what he does with it, he said it goes in his piggy bank..... It still is so strange to me that this happens! To my child!! That is one of SEVERAL reasons why I am not a fan of X-husbands:)

Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving we went out to Teds Parents house. We are lucky they don't live that far from us. It takes us a little over an hour to get there. Where they live they have a lot of land, so Ian loves to ride his quad. He can go anywhere and ride for hours. We spent the night out there and Ian woke up with Grand pap at 5am! I have a hard time waking him up for school at 8am and he woke up on his own, totally excited to ride his quad. Ted didn't get up till 6:30 so he was just chilling on the couch waiting, waiting and waiting. It had been raining the night before so it was a little muddy in areas, Ian thought this was even more fun!

When I finally got ready to take my morning run, I was trying to keep up with Ian:) Every puddle he had to ride Thru it again and again. His pants and quad were covered in mud. He was having the best time! UNTIL We were going around a corner and Ian saw this big puddle and decided to go thru it and got stuck! Back tires were spinning him deeper and deeper in this hole, yeiks! The only time I left my cell at home was the time I needed it, go fig. I didn't want to get my running shoes muddy, but I jumped on it and tried to rock it out, ended up stalling it and didn't know how to start it again. I sent Ian running to Grand paps to grab help as I stood there looking like the dummy that got it stuck. An elderly couple stopped to see if i needed help. I could hear the lady in the car " why on earth would you ride thru the mud in that thing!" I was totally embarrassed, my shoes covered in mud! What a mess!! Finally Ted showed up and pulled it out and Ian drove off ready for some more. He rode the rest of the day. I had to scrape the mud off his shoes before I could wash them off. He said this was the BEST Thanksgiving EVER!!

Teds Birthday

Ted turned 33 on November 19Th. I decided to make him a red cake for this special day. He is always bragging about how good his moms was and I thought I would give it a try. Making a cake from scratch is something I haven't done, EVER! A little advise if you are thinking of trying this in the future, It takes a huge bottle of red food coloring. I red the ingredients before going to the store to make sure I had everything, I noticed the food coloring and paid no attention to the amount. When I was at the store I saw the food coloring and bought a 4 pack with 3 other colors. Thinking there was no way it could use a huge bottle. Well it did, so i filled up my measuring cup with tho coloring that I had then added water to fill it up. Made sense to me at the time.

Now to the frosting, you had to cook it! The first half you cook on the stove then let it cool and finish it off later. For some reason it never really blended together. To me it was a mess! Ian thought it tasted like hard whipped cream. I had to put it in the fridge for several hours to harden up.

Now for the Ted test.... After the first few bites, he scraped the frosting off and left most of the cake on his plate. It was a little dry. The Kids loved it, especially Ian. This cake took me over 4 hours to make, Im not sure if there will be a repeat for next year, maybe?? :)