Raspberries and A Pregnant Mom

Wednesday we went on a field trip to Berry Patch Farms to pick strawberries and raspberries.

Yuuuummmmmmmmmmmmmmy :)









The boys are stoked about picking berries.....








....however, the strawberries were all picked out. Boo-Hoo......












Tarin was disappointed that he did not get any strawberries.






However, the raspberries were plentiful!!!!! We found that the trick was to pick up the lowest branches and underneath we would find dozens of plump, sweet raspberries.











My Kell-O







Pres was a big help, letmetellya. He probably ate his body weight in raspberries.












Yeah Baby!!! Now....time to go home and make raspberry jam!!!!







My dear friend Tiffany (yes, for real) is due with her baby #2 this Sunday. Ah yes....the last week or so of pregnancy....the best a woman feels. Ummmm, I am totally being facetious. Poor Tiff is *ready*.
So Steph and I decided to take Tiff out for a little R&R on Wednesday evening (while my kids stayed at home with Josiah eating raspberries).



Tiff, Tiff and Steph. Yeah, we were a fun group. I am little Tiff (because I am about a foot shorter than anyone else I know) and pregnant Tiff is big Tiff (only because she is taller, nothing else!). We also have another Tiff at church who is pregnant....so it is SO fun telling everyone apart. After meeting maybe 2 other Tiffanys in my life I now find myself in this Tiffany triangle (or square, if you count my neighbor....yep, another Tiffany). There are more Tiffanys at church than Jennifers.






Tiff on Monday night during our church baby shower. She is having a girl!!! :) Briana :)



Keep her in your prayers....she is going for a VBAC this time and is hoping that the docs/nurses are supportive and the labor goes great.










Aaaahhhh...............a spa pedicure. Is there a better way to spoil a 9 month pregnant mom?! And Tiff had NEVER HAD A PEDICURE.
No, I am not kidding. We called her the pedicure virgin :)







And to top the night off.....Cold Stone Icecream!

What's in a Flu Shot?

Before you get your next (bird) flu shot, watch this short video and make sure it's something you really think you need. Ha. No, really, it is hysterical :)

Udder feeding

A Busy Week...

The week began on Labor Day with Ryan, Josiah's brother, coming in town for a visit. We all ate at MiMi's Cafe (yum yum gimme some) for lunch. The boys do not call him anything normal like "Uncle Ryan"......nope, they call him "Silly Ryan" because he is a hoot and doesn't mind being silly and playing around with the boys. We all love Uncle Silly Ryan. :)







Little Pres at MiMi's Cafe. Doing what he does best..............making a mess and having a marvelous time.












Tarin finds a gummy worm at the bottom of his chocolate pudding (and crumbled Oreo) Sundae.










I think he likes it. Gee, what IS IT with boys and wanting to eat worms??????????????????












On Wednesday we had a special visitor fly here all the way from San Diego, California.

Nana Collins!!!!!!!! She is Josiah's Grandmother. We have not seen her for about 5 years, so this visit has been quite nice. She will be here till next Thursday....although we are running her ragged....








Nana and E playing a game in the backyard.










Ethan is displaying my VERY large zucchini. (well, by the word "My" I mean, of course, that I own it...not that I grew it. Our friends the La Rosa's were nice enough to toil over their garden all summer and then lavish this gift upon us). We have had zucchini something-or-other every night! And I made zucchini bread and zucchini muffins....we are fiber-ed out.





Pres is playing with my friend's little girl (girl #4!) Kristiana. Isn't she a doll?! And Pres plays SO well with her.....he needs a little brother or sister, doesn't he?










We went to the park today....braving the ominous clouds and sprinkling rain. It turned out to be a HOT afternoon once the rain shower passed. (by "hot" I mean 68 degrees). Pres and Maiza are enjoying the teeter-totter.











The boys bundled up at first and then had to strip down because of the heat!













Daddy taking Pres on a scooter ride.












So what sounds good when it is hot outside?

Cold Stone Icecream, of course!!! I think Nana is enjoying hers :)








UUUUUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM







Tarin kept closing his eyes when I took the picture, so in this one he was SURE to keep them WIDE open!











Soooo, my innocent little charming Presley has picked up some....................rude habits from his older brothers. One in particular is SO embarrassing (in public) and yet so endearing that I cannot make him stop.



He pretends to burp.



LOUD.



And when he does, he makes this face. Is it just me (and my over-abundant mothering hormones) or is that the cutest little face you have ever seen?



Now picture a long, very loud burping noise coming from those lips.




Welcome to my world.

Pampered Chef Party!!!

I am shamelessly using my blog as an overt attempt to boost sales for my Pampered Chef Party.



So if you have anything at all kitchen/cooking related that you need, please take a gander at the new items from Pampered Chef! The new things out for the fall are super cool....including new stoneware and all new Chef's knives. I also personally love their spices. Yum. Yum.



So click the link below:

http://www.pamperedchef.biz/staciabain?page=home

and scroll down to the bottom left corner where it ways :
Order Products.



Click on that tab and then on the next page enter my first and last name to enter my show. Proceed to order as much as your credit card will hold (or your hubby will allow without threatening divorce). In a week or so, you will receive a ton of wonderful items from the worlds most famous line of kitchen gadgets! (well....almost the most famous...)


If you would like to support me in every possible way (I get free stuff and discounts from the orders...) but have no idea what to purchase, I can help! Just send me your credit card information and I can place an order for you.


Okay....maybe that was going too far :)

New Curtains

So...after living in this house for over a year, Josiah finally painted my kitchen (the beautiful red shown here) and in doing so, he had to remove the window hangings that came with the house. OH NO! They broke!
Bummer.
Time to shop for new ones :)

Below is a picture of the new curtains for the sliding glass door and window. I am stoked because I put my two favorite colors together (red and a cool blue) and they actually match! The paisley pattern in the red contains the icy blue color that you see lining the curtains....nice. And since I am domestically challenged in the area of decor I had some help from my friend Christie...thankfully.

Aaahh...living in Paradise

The joys of living in Paradise...

After our neighbors rockin 4 year old birthday party (it really was fun.......so, did you know that you can get a 2-liter bottle of Coke and drop in a few Mento's -the fresh maker- and the coke will literally explode out 0f the bottle like 8 feet in the air?! NO KIDDING. It was AWESOME!!!!!) we decided to get out of town. The weather here was NASTY...cold, overcast and drizzle (Noelle's fav, I know).
Soooo.....we loaded up the kiddies and headed for...you guessed it...Breckenridge!!! Low and behold, about 20 minutes from Breck...the sky cleared and all we had was beautiful blue sky and *perfect* weather. Aaaah.........

There was a festival going on in Breck so we walked around for a while...and we found the kids section. :) No, really, it was fun. They had a ton of those cool inflatable slides, moonwalks and obstacle courses. The best thing...all of it was at the foot of the mountain and right by the river flowing through town. Yeah baby.

Did I get any pictures? Well.....no. I DID bring the camera with all the good intention in the world of photographing the beauty and the boys.....but alas...I accidentally left the camera in the truck. (and since we parked in ARIZONA so we could have free parking I could not go back and get it for fear of passing out from the shear mileage of it all). But allow me to reassure you...it was great fun and very beautiful. :)

Tomorrow....homemade ice-cream :)

A Free Day

Yesterday was the boys first day at their homeschool co-op classes. The three older boys go for "extra" classes like art, drama and science experiments (which, for the record, I am NOT going to do with them. I will pay someone else to dissect things with the kids to further their education (???) but I am not capable of doing that at home). They go once a week on Mondays.

I was a nervous wreck.

I am not a "drop my kids off and drive away singing" type of mom. How many years has it been since I only had one kid to care for....ALL day long? What do moms of one kid DO all day?????? I can conjure up images in my mind of when I had only one child....nope. Can't. It was to long ago.

But yesterday I had a glimpse into that past life. I only had Presley from 8:30 a.m. till 3:15 p.m....and he had the nerve to NAP for 3 1/2 hours of that time! Gee, there is only so much I can do for a day by myself. Until nap time he did follow me around wining and hanging on my leg till I would pick him up....poor kid was bored out of his mind with no siblings here. Gee....where are my 3 babysitters?! (totally kidding....)

After the house was sparkling clean from top to bottom I basically sat. I called friends to stay busy. I turned on the stereo to interfere with the images in my head of my poor, defenseless kids (well, not Kell) in this huge church all alone...being bullied...being indoctrinated by government officials (okay, I am going to far...but unfortunately I have a vivid imagination).

Needless to say, I was glad when the time came to pick them up.

And they had a good time. Tarin hated it, Kell enjoyed it and Ethan loved it. So far, so normal.

Next week??? I fear the only thing that will ease my troubled mind and release the grip of bordom that was upon me is.......................................Shopping :)

Tarin...again

Wheelies.

He is trying to "pop a wheelie". He just learned to ride a bike and now he is attempting to "throw a trick".
Nice.

Tarin on His Bike

Below are some pictures of Tarin on his newly training-wheel free bike. He is SO excited!!!





Tarin riding his bike with the pack of kids....he does very well, and is even racing. Oh yippie.

My Tarin

Josiah on the phone with me while I was in Ohio:


Tiff: "Hey Babe, what's going on?"


Josiah: "Not much. Just working. The kids are playing outside."


Tiff: "Oh what fun." (sarcasm) "So we are planning to...."


Josiah: "Oh my word!" (actually, I say oh my word, but he said something to that effect to convey amazement) "Tarin is riding a bike!"



Tiff: "What? He can't ride a bike, honey. It must be Kell."



Josiah: "Tiff, I am standing here looking out the window and Tarin is riding up and down the street on a neighbors bike with no training wheels!"



Tiff: "Is he wearing a helmet?!!!!"




Josiah: "Tiff, I had no idea he could ride a bike! He taught himself! Wow!"




Tiff: "Go put a helmet on him!!!"




Josiah: "Wow, that is amazing."




Tiff: "HELMET!!!!!"



So we now apparently have another kid riding with no training wheels. It took us (and my dad) MONTHS to teach Ethan to ride a bike (several years ago) and we have been trying to teach Kell since Christmas (he just -a week ago- got enough nerve to do it) and here is my Tarin-Bo-Barin, teaching himself with little effort. Can you say "gonna support us in our old age by playing a professional sport?!" Yeah Baby.

pictures

I have been getting some negative chatter about the current lack of pictures on this blog of my offspring. Sorry!!!!! Usually I am a picture freak, but it seems that the past few months have gotten away from me and I have taken far less pictures than normal. Below are a few random shots from yesterday and today....and Josiah and I at the Shakespeare Festival in Boulder!!! It was awesome. I am much more cultured than I thought I was.






The outdoor Shakespeare Festival....called Shakespeare Under the Stars. It was fantastic! Very romantic and very entertaining. We saw, "The Tempest"...which can be pretty heavy, but it was done very well with quite a bit of humor. We cannot wait to go again next summer.











Yesterday the kids and I went swimming with Dawn, Maiza and Bella. Here the kids are going from the outdoor pool to the indoor pool and waterslides....and being silly.






My angelic little Presley. Actually, he is not being quite as angelic lately.........he can be an ornery little cuss sometimes.







Maiza and Tarin :)










Ethan, Kellen and Tarin today playing "Uncle Barnabey" in our living room. (no idea what Uncle Barnabey is...they make up all sorts of games).

A productive journey....

My trip to Ohio was just Flammtastic :)

I arrived on Saturday evening. Melissa was several days "overdue" with her baby, and since no signs of labor were happening, we just hung out. Her mom was there from Florida...and had been there for 10 days! She was flying home on Monday a.m. so we were praying that this baby would arrive before then. Well, after lots of walking and massing of pressure points....nothing. Nada. Zippo. No bebe.
Monday morning arrived, and Lynda (Melissa's mom) departed in sad spirits. She had to be at work on Tuesday a.m. and she had already extended her trip. We were all bummed.
That evening, Melissa and Kambra (a dear neighbor and friend of Melissa's) went to the Cheesecake Factory for desert. Nothing like sugar to heal a wounded heart! It worked like a charm :) Tuesday morning (the day I was flying home!) I awoke to Melissa telling me that it was time. TIME! We flew into action. Jim (her dear hubby) set up the birthing pool and got things ready. Melissa was contracting regularly, but not in any discomfort....yet. We put everyone on alert for "the call" that it was time to come over. Lynda, Melissa's mom, was devastated. Finally she decided to tell her boss that babies and family are more important....and she jumped a flight back to Ohio!!! She had been home less than 24 hours. I do not blame her in the least.
So....labor intensified a bit by the early afternoon. At around 1:30 p.m. we called the midwives to tell them to mosey on over. The contractions were spaced out a bit, but the actual contraction had gotten much longer (over 1 minute in duration) and Melissa was saying they were strong.
The midwives arrived at around 2 p.m.
A bout 2-3 contractions later, we were in business. Melissa was no longer talking to us and being jovial (she had been in great spirits the whole day). Instead she was leaning on Jim and trying hard to relax through the contraction.
3 contractions later, while standing in the kitchen (she had been walking around) she said she felt like pushing.
WHAT?!
Okay! Let's have a baby!!!
We threw her in the birthpool and called in the kids. (Deacon, 5, had been at a neighbors playing and Maddie, 2, had been napping).
17 minutes later, we watched as Melissa expertly gave birth to her 3rd baby!!! Deacon and Maddie were right there in the thick of it, watching the birth. Deacon had a big job...to announce the sex of the baby!!! He was very excited to say, "It's a girl!!!!"
52 minutes after the midwives arrived.
20 minutes before her moms plane landed in Ohio.
1 hour and 15 minutes before I had to be at the airport for my flight.

Praise the Lord, He is so gracious. The birth went so well....the baby was extremely healthy (10-10 APGAR) and Melissa needed no repairs of any kind. The baby, Sophia, was born inside her bag of water! The waters never broke and so she was born still inside. This is a fairly rare occurrence and they baby is considered to be very good luck (and even psychic to some) when this happens. It also eases the birth for the mom....so all around, a good thing. :)

Below are some of the birth pictures. Not to worry....I left the graphic ones out.









Melissa and I (and the baby!) two days before the birth.














Her kids, Deacon and Maddie.










In labor, resting on her bed.













In the birthing tub. One of the midwives was helping until Jim got in the pool.




















I was the vidoeographer and kid-helper. Deac was SO EXCITED but Maddie was just wondering why we awoke her from her slumber. :)

Melissa announced that she felt the baby and was about to give birth. Deacon turned to Maddie and said, "Maddie! Guess what?!....."
(at this point everyone in the room was going, "Aaaawwww" cause he was going to tell his sister what was about to happen....)

Deac "Tomorrow I have baseball!!!"

Even Melissa laughed at that one.







She is here! Welcome little Sophia!










We love you....











The happy family. Well, except Maddie. She looks a tad irritated.









Daddy and his new little girl.

Did I mention she weighed 9.4 pounds?! :)

Bye!!!

I'm off to Ohio
I'm off to Ohio
Hi-Ho the dairy-O
I'm off to Ohio!!!!

My cousin Melissa is due to birth her #3 baby any second, so I am off for the weekend to see what I can do to help. Pray that a terrorist does not blow up my plane! :) And if I die, someone PLEASE come cook for my hubby/kids. They will starve...or attempt to live on Take 'N Bake pizza. Yuck.

Announcing.....

Dummm-Da-Da-Duuummmmmm

*drum roll please*



.....out of 300+ triathlon racers.....

Josiah came in at an over all place of 81st

and

Jon came in at an overall place of 84th

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In their age group (20-29) they were:

Josiah 14th
Jon 15th

How awesome is that? Neither of them have ever done a triathlon before and they did FANTASTIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Woo-Hoo!!

I, for one, am severely impressed.



Too bad next year they will be mortifyingly crushed by their wives :)

Noelle and I are gonna kick some rear....Yeah Baby.

"weee are the champions, WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS. no time for looooossssers cause we are the champions.....overourhusbandsinthetriathlon."

...i can't breathe....

the testosterone in this house is smothering me.......

living with triathletes.

4 sons and 1 friend (another boy).

that "ricky bobby" movie.

weird grunting and loud burping.

5 days with a house full of 8 guys.

help.

someone FEMALE please come visit me so we can go SHOPPING and get a PEDICURE and talk about our CYCLES...and i do not mean a bicycle.

My Athlete :)

Josiah raced in his first Triathlon today!!! His friends Jon and Nate raced as well, but they were all in different heats. Over 300 people did this race here in Highlands Ranch...and hopefully soon we will see what Josiah's place was. They do know the first 10 placers....congrats to Nate for 2nd!!! Jon and Josiah are just glad they finished their first Triathlon...and they are hoping they did not get place #299 and #298 :)

Worth It...????

Making $142.12 doing a garage sale.

Just enough money to pay for the door the kids put a whole through while we were having the garage sale.

Wanna Join The Club???

Interested in joining the club..."Had a garage sale with 13 kids at your home alll day long unsupervised"....??????????????
Well, I joined.
Yeah.
Oh. My. Word.

Reason #374 I do Not Let my Kid "Cry It Out"

Presley is 2 1/2 years old. He sleeps just fine almost every night, with no issues.
Last night we went to a birthday party and the kids all got worn out...they were exhausted. I put them all down to bed and proceeded to do laundry. Presley and Ethan kept playing instead of sleeping, so I put Pres in our bed to sleep. Typically if he is in our bed he goes right to sleep, no problem. But last night he was crying and crying and he kept saying," dinosaur bite me!!!!" and pointing to nothing. I tried and tried to reassure him that there were no dinos in the house, but he was terrified. Now, a typical CIO person might have suggested that he just did not want to go to sleep so he was stalling by creating a diversion....and I should just walk out of the room and let him cry. Uuummm, thanks but no thanks. I do not let my kids cry it out. Parenting does not end at night....there are no "parenting hours". Some say that if the kid crosses that time then they need to just learn to get over it on their own. Not me.
So I went in there...again...and decided to lay down with him to help calm him down and help him get to sleep....the laundry could wait, this is my baby. I laid on the bed with him and starting singing his favorite song...and he kept crying. That is not normal. He was really scared. I held him in my arms and he was STILL terrified! What was the deal? As I was trying to calm him down I glanced at the ceiling....and there, in the middle of my ceiling, was a HUGE shadow that looked, no kidding, just like a dinosaur!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was the reflection of what Josiah was watching downstairs on TV. Little Presley had been staring at this "dino" and was scared he was about to be dinner!
So what if I had let him cry? What if I thought he was "disobeying" by not going to sleep and I ignored his cries for me? Poor kid would be warped. He would not trust that his mommy would be there for him and comfort him when he was scared. Doesn't our Heavenly Father come to us at any time/hour when we are hurting, scared or just lonely? Does He not comfort us...even if we just want His presence? I take that as an example and do the same with my little ones...and teach them that when I am not there, their Savior is there and He will be their comfort.

A Day That Will Go Down in History.....

Welcome to the world of Josiah and Tiffany....10 years ago!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Today is our 10th wedding anniversary, and in honor of such a magnificent day in history, let us take a walk down memory lane....



May 1996. The top picture was us when we graduated from High School. We got to "walk" at church with the other seniors even though we were homeschooled...which kinda was dumb to me.....I had graduated a few months before (took the GED) and felt far above all the other idiot seniors. I know...how awful. I am still ashamed.

The next picture was us at our Prom. We created our own Prom since, again, we were SO not interested in the "real schools" Prom. Don't we look adorable?! :)
I was 17 and Josiah was 18....and this was 3 months before we got married.













On to wedding showers.....we had about 17. They were WAY fun and we got so many wonderful gifts! Gee, don't we look like kids? Ummm, that is because we were!!! Ha!









Our wedding!!! Now, you might be wondering about the poor photo quality of these wedding pictures. Well, here's the scoop:
We had a sweet friend take the pictures and he took several hundred. In all the commotion after the wedding (while we were on our honeymoon) the pictures and negatives got THROWN AWAY. Yep. All of them. The only surviving pictures we have are ones we had photocopied....hence the poor quality. Josiah and I had concluded that one day when we have more expendable cash (and assuming by then we are still in our right mind and able to walk without a cane) we will get married again...have a BIG party...and get our pictures taken by a professional who we can sue if the negatives get lost. :)
Kinda hard to sue your own flesh and blood.










Our wedding....with my parents and his parents.

















Our honeymoon. Humm......why do we not have more pictures from our honeymoon? Well....................................here's that story:
We went to a cabin on lake blue Ridge for our honeymoon. It was SO beautiful! However, 2 days into the honeymoon our car broke down. Yeah. Like, we had to stop every other mile and fill the something-or-other with water so the engine would not explode. So we ended up cutting our honeymoon short so we could drive home and let my Daddy fix the car. It was quite expensive. So the other pictures from that glorious week are mostly of Josiah working on the car...and the car smoking....
Now I am beggining to see why everyone made bets on how long we would actually stay married...our luck was not so hot at first!!!



















Aaaahhh....our very first house! A week after the wedding we moved to Travelers Rest, South Carolina (near Greenville). This is a 200 year old farm house on 40 acres that had been restored sometime in the 40's-50's. Despite the bitter cold and flaming heat, it was an adorable house that we really enjoyed. My friend Aran (in this picture) and her mom drove up there with my mom while we were on our honeymoon and fixed up everything for us! They put up all the gifts and got all the furniture ready (both pieces) so when we got there everything was ready. What sweeties!!!!! :)

Birthday

In honor and in joyful celebration of the month of my birth, I will be receiving gifts from August 1st through the 31st.

Just FYI to aid you in your gift giving...I like very shiny things...such as jewelry and cars (Cadillac Escalade or GMC Yukon), vacations in the Caribbean, loooong massages at a Spa, and anything purchased from J Crew, the Gap, Banana Republic, REI (for the outdoors woman in me), or Nordstrom's.
The gift amount will solely depend on you, however, anything less than $50 should be considered "sweet" and should be accompanied by a larger more expensive gift.

Please keep in mind that August is also our 10th anniversary month, and in observance, we will also be receiving gifts throughout the month. Feel free to combine the birthday and anniversary gifts into one package (for cheaper shipping), HOWEVER, please note what gift is for Tiffany and what gift is for Tiffany AND Josiah.

I (we) thank you in advance for your generosity.