Can I get a little alone time?

Bradley and Kiersten do wild and crazy things and I am horrible at journaling which is the main reason of writing in my blog so I can remember their shenanigans later. 

This last week I have had the most difficult time getting some alone time so be able to take a shower. I have been so exhausted lately that waking up any earlier than ten minutes before Adam leaves for work is just impossible and by that time the kids have been up for the last half hour watching cartoons with Daddy.
Take one during the kids nap time? Ha, I am the only one sleeping during that block of time. They just have playtime in their bedroom with the door shut and they love to come out of their rooms the whole time.
So lately I put on a movie and sneak away. But smart Bradley, he can hear that shower going a mile away.
 I have been surprised with stuff like...
"Hey Mom! Look, I found the recipe book and I want to make this chocolate cake! Can you get out and help me?"
OR
When he HANDED ME the tv remote, "Hey Mom! The TV isn't working. Here is the remote can you put my movie back on?"
Seriously little dude?
Yesterday I was so frustrated and having a hard morning. I went to try and take a long hot shower and I made sure the kids had plenty of distractions so I would be left alone. Did it work? Nope! Two minutes into my shower Bradley open the shower door and says, "I'm going to join you!" naked as a jaybird... aaand then proceeded to hog all the water. Dang! I thought I locked the door!

So this morning I wake up, make Adam's lunch and send him off to work...and the kids were STILL sleeping! It's a miracle! We put the kids to bed around eight but they didn't settle down and fall asleep till around ten, which is WAY later than usual! So this morning when I woke up to a quiet house I was hoping on them sleeping in today.
I took a quiet shower while counting my blessings they were still asleep, this is a true miracle! It's 7:15 and they are snoozing, yes!
Until I get out of the shower and hear Bradley's voice yelling, get the scissors and cut her hair!
Uhh, WHAT?!?! A) You're suppose to be sleeping still, boo!  B) and saddly this came second, what do you mean cut her hair?!
Thankfully when I checked on them in the living room they were playing a hairdresser app on my ipad and were cutting a characters hair. Phew!

Maybe they will actually sleep during nap time today? One can dream, right?

Homemade Paint

Kiersten LOVES to paint. I have been looking for a good home made paint recipe on Pinterest  to do for our preschool.
I thought I found a good one today but of course, as normal, Pinterest hates me.
I'll give it some credit though, it made for an awesome finger paint and was super duper cheap. Unfortunately, I am looking for a thinner paint like a tempera consistency.

So the recipe is as following:

1c flour
2 TBSP Salt
1 1/2 c cold water
1 1/2c hot water
food coloring.

Mix flour, salt, and cold water until there are no lumps. Add hot water then bring to a boil. Once its thickened, remove from heat. Split up into as many bowl as you want then add food coloring to your desire.
The author said to store leftovers in the fridge but she had no clue why.

I doubled the recipe and made five different colors and all three of us used it and we STILL had tons of left overs.  

 Here is what the paint looked like. It had a pudding like consistency and was rather thick...

 It didn't work too well to paint on our wood crafts.

But Kiersten LOVED playing with it as a finger paint.

Now I am going to break the cardinal rule of a twin mom... Don't compare your twins to each other. I have noticed from preschool that Bradley loves to sit still and work on his letters and practice writing his name. Kiersten hates it and has a very short attention span and gets frustrated very easily.
Kiersten is not really good at her letters yet and really struggles when we practice them.

On the flip side, Kiersten can sit still for over an hour and play with paints and art hands on crafts. Bradley on the other hand has a very short attention span and can only sit still for a short time. He also doesn't listen well to instructions. For example yesterday I had to say two to three times, "Bradley! Stop stealing my sharpie and drawing on the table!" Little stinker knows where they are hidden!

Halloween Crafts

We made "Jack the Pumpkin King" today. The kids had a great time gluing and coloring.

Clothes aren't really important around here in case you haven't noticed. 

These are our finished crafts drying on the front door. I love that the door is metal and we can use magnets on it!

I saw the bats on Pinterest and thought they were super cute! It's a cat looking head with our hand prints cut out and glued on for wings.

Seriously, what did we do before Pinterest?!?

Homeschool Preschool Lessons

Here are several ideas of what we have done for preschool. I came up with the ideas from Pinterest and from things I saw from their preschool program last year. 

I take pictures everyday to share with my parents and to remind me of what we have already done.

 You can't really see their papers in the picture but I wrote numbers on a piece of paper and drew circles underneath. They counted out beans and placed them in the corresponding circle.

We work on tracing and coloring letters.

Then try to write the letter on our whiteboard.

This craft cost $2 for the supplies. I went to the dollar store and bought a 400 pack of beads and a bag of pipe cleaners. Bradley is being such a silly model during lunch time! This activity was a HUGE hit. Kept them busy for an hour...which tired preggo Mommy fell asleep for.... When the kids went for their naptime I undid the pipe cleaners and took all the beads off so we could do the activity all over again in a week or two ;)

We worked on gluing our names with cereal, pasta, and beans. Next time...I'm leaving the cereal out. After a while they just stopped the craft to eat all the froot loops I had set out to work with.

They work on writing their own names....Apparently this is Breadly... Haha its a work in progress.

The decision to pull them out of preschool

Bradley and Kiersten were in the most amazing preschool last year and we wanted to find them a preschool for this year so they don't regress what they know.
The only option we had was a three hour am class at one of the elementary schools. That wouldn't be so big of a problem but Adam and I only have one car that we share and our budget as a first year teacher does not fit a car payment into it. Adam travels to four different elementary schools and frequents the high school also to meet with the band teacher there. We tried taking them to school for the month of August but decided to pull them out in the month of September  and I would just teach them from home.
Here is what our schedule looked like those first couple weeks:

7:20 drop Adam off at one the four schools (he rotates daily)
7:30 hang out at the preschool parking lot until 8:00 when the school opened for drop offs
10:50 pick the kids up from school straggle to the car then hang out for another half hour
11:30 pick Adam up from his school, he drops us off at home, then goes out to the next school or to the high school to work on PO's with the band teacher there.

A little insight to his crazy schedule... Monday thru Thursday he goes to one of the four elementary schools to teach classroom music, recorders, piano, and guitar. In the afternoons he teaches beginning band at only two of the schools M/W at one site and T/TH at another. The high school band teacher picks up the other two sites.
On Fridays he spends all day at one site doing  K-3 music or whatever the principal wants him to teach for that day.

Man, that was exhausting typing that.
It was really hard on me driving around like crazy for our schedule and the kids were not happy with the new school. They kept asking to go back to their old school in Chico and to see their old friends. B&K are so bubbly and outgoing that they were scaring the other quiet children whom 90% of them didn't speak English.
I went crazy on Pinterest finding preschool ideas to help me teach them. One of the ladies in our ward does preschool at home for her two girls that aren't old enough for school yet and we combine one day a week for class. This post is a bit long so I will show you all of my crazy crafts and lessons on a different post.

I have noticed that pulling the kids out of class has strengthened their relationship with each other.  Usually we separate them in different rooms for nap time but lately, they always sneak in the room with each other and play. They rarely fight anymore and are connected at the hip. If you would have told me two and half years ago that they would stop trying to kill each other and be best friends, I would have never believed you!

Ok! On to our preschool ideas and lessons!

New instruments

Adam is loving his new job as a new band teacher in our tiny town. Part of expanding the program with a new teacher was new funds to buy more instruments.

This picture is to show one of THE MOST stressful dates I have ever been on with Adam!! And I still razz him for this...

We decided to wait until Labor day weekend to go to Lowe's to buy our appliances because of the huge sales, which we scored big time!! We arranged a sitter and was about ready to go do our huge shopping trip when Adam gets a phone call... Instruments are in and he needs to pick it up. Really?  They don't deliver a huge order like that?? (Thankfully the 30 new stands and their holders WERE delivered to the school! )

 

Fresno is about half hour drive and we try to compact as much things as possible in one trip. So we were going to pick up a bunch of new things at Lowe's and 26 music instruments in one trip.  Problem is, music store was closing in an hour so we had to stop there first. The instruments had to sit in the car while we shopped for almost 2 hours. I was biting my nails the entire time just thinking about someone breaking into our van and taking over $13,000 worth of stuff from the car. Thank heavens, everything was safe when we got back.

But funny thing is, Adam had to tetris a lawn mower, couple of folding chairs, shovel, other random crap we bought for the apartment to house transition with all the stuff already in there. Thankfully the fridge, washer, and dryer were delivered to the house a few days later! 

Oh man, some of the looks from people in the parking lot were hilarious as we pulled everything out and rearranged the van for everything to fit. I mean, who carries 6 trumpets around for the fun of it?

B&K 4th bday!

Bradley and Kiersten turned four last month.

We celebrated with breakfast before preschool

 Oh, Bradley and his panties :)

And don't worry, its just OJ. We got the margarita dish set for a Christmas white elephant gift and the kids think its a fun cup set.

The kids wanted to bring silly cupcakes to school to celebrate their birthday.

All the kids really enjoyed it!

Grandma and Grandpa Bees, Adam's Mom and stepdad, came over that evening to celebrate Bradley and Kiersten's birthday with us.

I think their gift was a huge hit! I don't know who likes it more, Me or the kids... They actually stay outside more and play so I can get things done inside!

Second biggest hit??

This little number. Kiersten wears her "Melody" dress almost EVERYDAY! I let her wear it church the first Sunday she got it after her party. She LOVES that dress!

I love my minions so much! They definitely keep me busy!

Howdy Strangers!

I am at a loss of where to begin. My goodness!! I guess I'm just going to photo dump and say what we have been up to for the SEVERAL months! Although, if you are a friend on facebook, this is all old news.

Adam and I had our first weekend getaway sans kids. We had an awesome time square dancing. Be jealous of the fluffiness haha.

We went out to eat afterwards with our awesome new square dancing buddies.

Had a goofy and fun Easter! 

Got our faces painted and loved it! 

Adam passed his PACT and graduated from the credential program and we could not be happier!

The kids "graduated" from their AMAZING preschool!

 I graduated cum laude but didn't get a SINGLE picture of it! I received straight A's again this semester.
My classes were:
Accounting 101- LOVED IT! I definitely will take more accounting classes in the future and may even change my major when I go back to school for a bachelors.
Open Gym- check in, work out, check out, done.
English- Logical thinking. Could not stand the teacher but love writing papers so I got an A...
California Government- teacher was super awesome.
Microsoft Word- learned new tips but COULD NOT do this class from my Mac at home, which really stunk!

So we have very exciting news! First,

We are expecting a baby GIRL in December! 

Second on the awesome news list... Adam got a job teaching elementary music!!

We moved the end of July to a bedroom community of Fresno and we LOVE IT HERE!!
Our new ward has been so amazing to us! We rented a super cute house with a large backyard on a corner lot.


 Adam travels to the four elementary schools in the district and teaches recorders, beginning band, guitar, piano, and K-3 classroom music. We have gotten some SUPER funny responses from the kids in our ward this last Sunday after their first music class.

Mom! Mom! That looks like my new music teacher!
Well, honey, that IS your new teacher.
GASP! Nooo Waaay!

 Anyways, to sum up a very long post, We have been so extremely blessed and busy! I am REALLY hoping to keep little blurbs up on how we are...

Bravo for sticking it out on the long post!

Here Piggy Piggy piggy!!

Just before Thanksgiving we got our first real pet- a guinea pig! I had many guinea pigs and rabbits growing up so I was super excited!

After a while of having Linny ( named after the guinea pig from Wonder Pets) we decided she was lonely and since guinea pigs are very sociable we bought a baby guinea pig from the store. It took a while for them to warm up to each other but now they are inseparable! They LOVE to be let loose and run throughout the living room while the kids are asleep and can't chase them. They squeal and dance and run in circles. It is so funny to watch! Bradley and Kiersten named the new baby piggy Charlie even though its a little girl.

Linny (the tan one) is about two years old so she is much larger. Charlie (black with tan swirls) is much smaller because she is about 5 months now.

The kids LOVE their piggys and they are definitely spoiled!

I survived my first semester back!

I am so proud to say I survived my first semester back to school after having kids! The one thing that made it possible was that the kids were enrolled in THE BEST preschool program EVER!! I have NEVER heard a bad comment about their school. Sorry I wont say on the blog which preschool they are in because my blog is not private. And my grades for the semester?? Straight A's baby! In the two classes I found out percentages they were a 98% and a 97%- booyah! My classes were: Public speaking Cultural Geography Soccer- UGH! This teacher drove me CRAZY!!! Constantly canceled class without an email or note on the door!! English 2- This teacher was super nice! Also, on a weird note, she was the mother in law of the principal where Adam student teaches. Funny huh? And finally- Piano. I developed a "relationship" with the practice room. We laughed, cried, and occasionally "he" let me take a nap on the floor using my backpack as a pillow. It was not easy! There were many tears (by myself and the kids of course!) and many late nights turning papers in under the wire. Adam is in the credential program and at times I felt I was a single mom!!! Adam student teaches 30 minutes away at a middle school in the band program. Because we only have the one van, Adam carpools with four other teachers. He leaves at 6:30 am and comes home anywhere from the earliest at 1:30 (if he drives and its a minimum day) to 4:30 with the carpool. He then has night class for the credential program three nights a week and a meeting every other Monday. Add in both of our homework loads! Oyvey! It was busy! There were many "picnics" in Adam's night classrooms. In order for the kids to see Adam for the day, Adam and I would grab dinner, pick up the kids from preschool, then go eat dinner in Adam's classroom. One teacher was very understanding and always made sure the room was open half an hour earlier for us. He was so nice!! The kids and I had to learn to take the bus when Adam needed the car. The kids loved it because it meant no car seats but there were times I HATED it because the crazies on the bus. FYI- if you live in Chico- NEVER EVER EVER take the 15S!! This route goes by two homeless shelters and Walmart- NOT the best people take this bus... I have left this bus, burst into tears, and wanted to punch someone in the face. Why do I keep taking this stupid line?!? Well, it comes and leaves twice as often as my normal route. SO random-funny-bus-related-story-tangent :) One day I was hopping on the bus at the stop across the street from my place headed to my afternoon class. At the exact same time Adam pulled into our place from teaching for the day. We waved to each other like two ships passing in the night. It made me laugh at least :) Anywho! We are now on winter intermission waiting for school to start back again. Adam started back to student teaching and he is now taking over the classroom and doing the lessons.

Crazy school life!

School life is extremely busy but we are surviving. The kids miss Adam a lot because he is gone student teaching all day and has night classes for his credential 3 times a week. The kids LOVE preschool! All of their teachers are amazing and we haven't had a single problem! Their school is so awesome! The kids are learning to label emotions, gaining new friends, can count to 20, and are a TON more independent. The kids helped me study for map test of Africa- which the test suuuucked. On all our map tests we have to memorize all of the countries AND capitals of a given continent and then he just has us name 10 from each at his random choosing. The problem with Africa is that the capitals all sounded alike to me!

So we are still alive. The blog is suffering but most important, keeping up the house is suffering. Why is it so hard to keep a house clean when you aren't home often?! I need a maid...

Cupcake time!

I had to give a demonstration speech in my public speaking class. The first thing that popped into my head that wasn't about being a mom were these super awesome creative cupcakes.

I went crazy finding new kinds of cupcakes on Pinterest. It was a great outlet to make these! My class LOVED them! I wanted to speak earlier than last position so I bribed someone with their first choice of a cupcake... And then I wanted someone to move the table for me because I was wearing my heels. It.was.awesome.

Uhh Did I tell you we took the kids to the zoo this summer? I really don't remember and I don't see a post about it....

The kids and Adam on the carousel

Kiersten and Daddy looking at the giraffes.

Watching the tortoise move sloooowwwwwlllyyy. Well.... That was a quick update of the zoo...

Third Birthday!

Bradley and Kiersten turned three years old last month! It was the first week of school so we knew it was going to be super busy. Adam had about an hour from when he got home from student teaching to when he had to start his night class. We had a party in Modesto with my sisters and nephews (pictures to come when I get them from my sister) We got the kids their favorite dinner- Papa Murphies, then we picked up a cupcake each from B&N (free cupcake for kids for their birthday). We took them home, sang to them, opened gifts, and then Adam was out the door. Bradley got a tool kit set. As you can tell, he was SO EXCITED!!

Kiersten got Bambi, which by the way, is a super scary movie!!

Singing to the kids. They wanted to have a Dora and Diego cupcake. About a month ago while visiting Modesto, we found cupcakes in the bakery with little plastic heads of Dora, Boots, and Diego. Lucky for us, they forgot about them so they were so excited to see them!

Off to school.....

The kids are going to preschool this year! They are so grown up! The first two pictures are from orientation. They were so excited to go. On our list of things to bring with us had swim suits. Kiersten was so excited of the thought of going swimming with 20+ new friends.

Kiersten looks so grown up!

Bradley wasn't as excited but he still was ready for the adventure.

Shaved ice!

We have been driving by this really cute penny candy store for years now saying every time, oh we should stop there soon... Since this is Adam's last year at Chico State, we will go wherever the wind blows next summer. We are trying to check off items from our Chico bucket list- like that penny candy shop. Well we finally made our stop and we thought it was worth two spoons up!

DELISH shaved ice! And for only a $1! We wanted to stop on the way home too but we had just been to sonics for Slushes. But we will definitely stop there again! (and again...)

Another hard post....

This is another very hard blog post.... Adam and I found out we were pregnant again at the beginning of June. I was very scared and unsure because it had only been a month from my D&C. I talked to my nurse about the possibility of it being old hormones that had not fully gone away yet. She said it was very unlikely it was left over hormones and that yes I was pregnant again. We really didn't tell too many people again just in case. I went to my ultrasound and just like both of my other pregnancies, I wasn't as far along as I thought I was because the baby was too small for a heartbeat. I did two HCG tests and a follow up ultrasound in a week and a half. I got my first HCG results and it came back as 17,000. I was stoked! I was so happy! My miscarriage ended at 1,800- Muuuuch better! I had only had a handful of migraines, no cramping, no bleeding- nothing. I finally told my parents after I got those results. I had to wait the whole weekend for my next HCG results. Monday comes so I call in. It only went from a 17K to 22K. Bad news- I was suppose to be in the 30's. I was crushed and confused- wasn't everything going great?? At my ultrasound there wasn't a baby. I had a an-embroyotic miscarriage where the baby dies early and gets reabsorbed but the sac still grows strong and emits tons of hormones. The sac was growing in accordance to me being 9 weeks but there wasn't a "yolk" there. My doctor said I could wait it out but it could take up to six weeks and then a D&C would be mandatory. I was having NO physical signs so I had no clue how long it would take. I wanted the D&C because I hate the waiting game. I did not have the mental strength to go through the hell I went through last time. My appointment was on Thursday and my D&C was scheduled for Tuesday. By Sunday night I was I so scared. I still had no physical proof that I had lost the baby. I still felt sick because the sac was still growing and increasing hormones. We had a friend come over and gave us both blessings and the blessing was amazing in two ways- It confirmed that I had chosen the right decision and that I required the D&C. The second thing was- hormones and dwelling on negative things create very bad results! I was becoming terrified that we weren't suppose to have anymore kids. My blessing let me know that we needed to wait but we would be blessed with more kids in the future. I tried to be as strong as possible when I went in for my procedure Tuesday at the butt crack of dawn. I talked with my nurse when I was checked in and told her all the problems of my last procedure with everyone being so insensitive. I wanted to be far from the door. No talks of babies by the nurses. Rocking chair far from me in the recovery room. I brought a book to distract me and I just did my best to see the good in things. This experience was much better. Adam didn't have finals and recitals he had to perform in so he was able to stay with me. Afterwards I went home and slept all day long. I took my pain meds this time but it was so much harder recovery! I couldn't use the restroom all day Tuesday and Wednesday was improved but not good. By Thursday night I was in serious pain and Kiersten had ran and jumped on my belly and sent me into crying pain. I took two vicodin but it didn't even touch the pain I was in. Adam took me to the ER where they catheterized me. That was the WORST pain in my life! I thought the nurse and I were pretty good buddies until then. I told her she wasn't allowed near me again after that haha. They ran several tests, cultures, ultrasounds, but things came back ok. After I was catheterized I could finally pee again so it relieved a LOT of the pain I was in. My kidneys were screaming in pain! So I came home and was told to rest and keep up my meds and make sure I go to my Dr next week. Also at the ER I found out that I had to do blood tests to follow my hormones down to zero with this kind of miscarriage. I didn't know that. I was down to 4K by now but I still have a little bit to go. I still haven't really processed this baby all the way. We gave the last baby a name and gender to grieve and accept it. This week and been so hectic and busy its hard to relax from everything and finalize things. All I know is that I KNOW that both my little babies are waiting for me in heaven. I talked to my Dad this week and he told me that my little babies were so righteous in the preexistence that they didn't need to come down to Earth to be tested. They had already earned their spots in the celestial kingdom. I like looking at it from that prospective and it gave me some comfort and peace. Well, I don't really know how to end this post. I keep this blog as my journal and I was dying to let something out of me and to write it down. I am sorry if my posts are graphic or TMI on bodily functions. Anyways. I have a testimony in my Savior. I know he is with me and guides me in life. I am so grateful for the gospel and an eternal perspective on things. I am SO grateful for blessings and probably get more than my fair share of them.

Lemons.

When life gives you GIGANTIC lemons...

You shove it into the tail pipe of Grandpa's One Ton truck. SO GLAD we found that! At least it wasn't his brand new diesel! I went into the warehouse to find a flat head screw driver to stab the lemon and pull it out because I couldn't reach far enough in to get it out. It was pretty deep in there. While Lynn (Grandpa) and I went to go find a tool Bradley took care of it himself and got it out. He reminded me of Mary Poppins when she blacked her nose out for the Chimney sweep portion.

It took a lot of scrubbing to get the soot off!

A Very Pinteresting Day!

I decided to do some kid activities that I read on Pinterest. The first one was playign with baking soda and vinegar.

They had a ton of fun! I put some baking soda in a glass pan and then gave them paper cups with dyed vinegar. Tip for next time- don't use paper cups. The bottoms get too weak. We also did paper towel roll bowling. The kids have always loved to play with bowling kits but we don't have one. I read my friend's status a while back that she needed toilet paper rolls for her primary class. I teach 4 year olds in primary so I decided I should start saving my rolls just in case I needed them. So today I saw the rolls hanging in a bag in the closet and decided to set them up like pins and give the kids bouncy balls. They loved it- especially Kiersten! And we worked on their awesome counting skills and we put the pins up each time.

My bucket list- first draft!

So I decided to finally post my bucket list. Its only 40 items long now lol. I have completed a few so I took them off. Go on an Alaskan cruise Learn sign language Travel to Australia Be a home owner See the Aurora Borealis Snorkel Visit every state Go fishing and catch a fish Adopt a pet Be a foster parent Own a painting Get a fully pampered spa day swim with dolphins Visit every temple in US (completed all in CA,NV, and DC) Do a temple with a General Authority Earn my Bachelors raise a pig Complete a triathlon Go to girls camp as a leader Eat a meal mostly from my garden Make a stained glass window Take a cooking class write a basics cook book Attend a live filming of a show Hike Half Dome Go on an RV vacation Take the kids to Monterrey Bay Aquarium Learn to play the piano fluidly Go to Disneyworld Stay in a Disney resort Shake the prophets hand hike in and camp Make cement handprints with my kids Save a life bottle feed a wild animal/ volunteer at a wildlife reserve Go river rafting Donate my hair to Locks of Love Participate in Relay for Life Milk a cow Gallop on a horse