Preschool Friends
Ryan, Hannah, Krista, Lindsey, Joey
Hannah has preschool every Tuesday morning. The mothers of the kids participating teach the lessons, and it was my turn yesterday. Because it was Veterans Day, we talked about our country. We had a brief talk about why it’s great to live in a free country and did this fun flag craft. This group is still pretty young, so there isn’t a strong structure to the class, but we played freeze dance to some patriotic songs, played outside some of those classic kids games like Duck duck goose and London Bridges, marched around with the flags they made and had plenty of play time. We talked about the different colors on the flag as they ate their snack of jello (red), banana (white), and sprinkles (blue). This is a fun group and I always enjoy teaching them!
Read MoreMaking a Commitment
This year will be a different one for us on Christmas day. Rob and I have decided to give each of our children just three gifts. This will be symbolic of the gifts brought to baby Jesus by the three wisemen. At this time of year I usually spend a lot of time shopping and preparing for the big holiday. I hope that by simplifying the gifts, I will have more time and energy for building faith and participating in service with my children. It’s so easy to get through the Christmas holiday and realize too late that there were very few opportunities to really celebrate the true meaning of the day. I was hesitant to do it because I worried that the kids would be disappointed on Christmas morning. Especially since this year we will not have any visitors and there will be a lot of the day left to fill with less gift opening to fill it up. I have mentioned it to Hunter and Emma, and they seem surprisingly happy with the idea. I did hear Hunter say to Emma, “They can be better if we have less of them.” Rob and I had decided to do this last week, and then today I went to a meeting at church that really convinced me that this is a good decision for us.
In my enrichment meeting I was reminded of the counsel given by Sister Julie Beck, our Relief Society General President: “We must stand strong and immovable in faith, strong and immovable in family, and strong and immovable in relief… as you focus on essentials (you) will be given the courage to forego the frivolous.” I’m looking forward to a holiday season with a focus on faith, family, and service (relief)!
Read MoreSuper Readers To The Rescue!
Erica tipped me off that Super Why is Owen’s favorite TV show and I should check it out. My kids love it! Even Hunter and Emma don’t mind watching it. I think they like to see how excited the little girls get. Hannah and Sabrina both think it’s the best show ever. Hannah answers back when the characters ask questions, they both dance along, and Sabrina will bring me the remote and say, “Wuh-Why.” The kids have assigned themselves characters, so in our house Hunter is Super Why, Emma is Wonder Red, Sabrina is Alpha Pig, and Hannah is Princess Presto. The show starts with a common childhood problem like: Wyatt’s baby sister won’t stop crying. Then the kids all get together and go into a fairy tale to see how they can solve the problem. For example with the crying problem they go into Jack & The Beanstalk to see how Jack stops the giant from being so noisy. It’s a blessing and curse having TiVo, because you can save several episodes and play them over and over. I’m not sure what it says about my mothering, but we have had a couple of Super Why marathons where the girls watch it several times a day.
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v14y8EQ8TWk&NR=1
Read MoreOut With The Old…
And in with the new! After spending $1,800.00 to fix our 96 Galant, it still came back from the mechanic with some serious problems and a list of things that still needed to be done. The car sounded more like a motorcycle, and when sitting at a stop light you felt like you just might crack the street with all of the vibrating going on. (In our community, the lights are annoyingly long anyway and this only made it worse!) The only solution was to put the car in neutral when it was idling.
Then on Halloween night, Rob called me from his parking structure at work and said, “Amy, we need a new car. I think we have hit the ground.” He was referring to the philosophy we have always had to drive our cars “into the ground” before we get a new one. So the last straw was that now, on top of everything else the mechanic suggested we fix, the battery had just died and Rob was stranded in the parking structure. Luckily a friend from work came along and gave him a jump, but the Galant has been parked in our driveway ever since. So it’s time to say farewell to a good car. It was a faithful, reliable car from the time we bought it eight years ago until that fateful night returning home from the hockey game. We are considering donating it for a tax write-off since the trade in and resale value isn’t much for a car that won’t start! Right now our charity will likely be Mothers Against Drunk Drivers. At least it’s nice to know we can help out a good cause.
We did our research through Consumer Reports and decided that the Honda Civic seemed like the best fit for us. And by us, I guess I mean mostly Rob since he will drive it the most. It has great gas mileage, crash test ratings, and reliability ratings so the only test left was to drive it and see if we liked it. Rob called around to several dealerships getting quotes and we settled on the place with the best deal. We went in on Saturday afternoon, and the process seemed to drag on forever. In fact, it did take up the whole day. We didn’t leave the dealer until 6:15 pm. The kids behaved well overall especially since I wasn’t prepared with snacks or anything to be there for almost 6 hours! We have heard that 6 hours is the national average for buying a car from start to finish. Can that really be true? Even looking back I can’t figure out exactly why it took so long, but by the end it was excruciating and we were all so exhausted that it was hard to be excited at all. Most of the people we dealt with were pleasant and nice, but the one dark cloud was their “closer.” Luckily, Rob had a copy of the e-mail we received with the quoted price because this guy wanted us to pay $1,500.00 more. Even after seeing the quote he immediately threw their internet sales guy under the bus explaining why he should never have given us this price and now he would agree to do that deal only if we financed through them. I was proud as Rob held firm and I even made a few comments myself about how ridiculous that was. So in the end, we came out with the deal promised us with our own lender, but unfortunately this hard-nose salesman sort of ruined the experience for us. Never go to a dealer cold! Do your research and get quotes in writing first!
So now our silver Civic is part of the family and we are having fun trying out all of the buttons and features. We plan to drive this car for at least twenty years, so it’s a good thing we like it so much!
Read MoreGetting To Know Me
1. WHAT TIME DID YOU GET UP THIS MORNING? 7:45am It should have been easier since it was Daylight Savings, but no.
2. DIAMONDS OR PEARLS? Diamonds, but I’m just fine with cubic zirconium too.
3. WHAT IS THE LAST FILM THAT YOU SAW AT THE CINEMA? “Bourne Ultimatum”
4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE TV SHOW? “The Office” until the Pam and Jim storyline goes south.
5. WHAT DO YOU USUALLY HAVE FOR BREAKFAST? Cold Cereal or Oatmeal
6. WHAT IS YOUR MIDDLE NAME? Too paranoid to write it here.
7. WHAT FOOD DO YOU DISLIKE? Vienna Sausages- everyone else in my house loves them
8. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CD? My Brainwashing CD
9. WHAT KIND OF CAR DO YOU DRIVE? 97 Plymouth Grand Voyager
10. FAVORITE SANDWICH? ham and cheese sub
11. WHAT CHARACTERISTIC DO YOU DESPISE? Hateful behavior and speech
12. FAVORITE ITEM OF CLOTHING? My football/soccer t-shirt
13. IF YOU COULD GO ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD ON VACATION, WHERE WOULD IT BE? Italy
14. WHAT COLOR IS YOUR BATHROOM? Renter’s White
15. FAVORITE BRAND OF CLOTHING? Whatever is a good bargain
16. WHERE WOULD YOU RETIRE TO? Southern Oregon
17. WHAT WAS YOUR MOST MEMORABLE BIRTHDAY? My 19th birthday- My mom sent a cake and balloons to my dorm and my roommates arranged for several young men to serenade me in front of my auditorium sized Biology class.
18. FAVORITE SPORT TO WATCH? Basketball
19. FURTHEST PLACE YOU ARE SENDING THIS? You tell me…
20. HAVE YOU EVER VISITED ANOTHER COUNTRY? Hong Kong, Mexico, Belize
21. PASS YOUR DRIVERS TEST THE FIRST TRY? No, the second and it was a set up!
22. FAVORITE SAYING? Nobody wants to hear your fuss
23. WHEN IS YOUR BIRTHDAY? April
24. ARE YOU A MORNING OR NIGHT PERSON? Night
25. WHAT IS YOUR SHOE SIZE? 9
26. PETS? No, and no plans for one
27. ANY NEW AND EXCITING NEWS THAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SHARE WITH US?
After driving our trusty Galant for 8 years, it bit the dust and we bought a new car yesterday.
28. WHAT DID YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU WERE LITTLE? A waitress or movie special effects person
29. HOW ARE YOU TODAY? Very Good
30. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CANDY? 3 Musketeers
31. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE FLOWER? No favorite, I like everything
32. WHAT IS A DAY ON THE CALENDER YOU ARE LOOKING FORWARD TO? Hannah’s Birthday
33. WHAT IS YOUR FULL NAME? Amy Likes Nickel Sidewalks – Again too paranoid to say on the internet
34. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? My kids laughing and playing play-doh as “How It’s Made” plays on TV
35. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE? Orange Cream Milkshake
36. DO YOU WISH ON STARS? No, haven’t seen any for a while
37. IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? Purple- a little red and a little blue
38. HOW IS THE WEATHER RIGHT NOW? Overcast, (or is that smog?) and cool
39. FAVORITE SOFT DRINK? Rootbeer, but I’m not crazy about carbonated drinks these days
40. FAVORITE RESTAURANT? Ruby’s
41. SIBLINGS? 1 sister and 2 brothers
42. FAVORITE DAY OF THE YEAR? Christmas!
43. WHAT WAS YOUR FAVORITE TOY AS A CHILD? A dollhouse my parents made
44. SUMMER OR WINTER? summer
45. HUGS OR KISSES? hugs
46. COFFEE OR TEA? Sleepytime Herbal Tea
47. CHOCOLATE OR VANILLA? Chocolate
48. DO YOU WANT YOUR FRIENDS TO COMMENT? Yes!
49. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED? Yesterday, Rob started telling me how to collect the life insurance if he dies, too sad!
50. WHAT IS UNDER YOUR BED? Dust, and a few bags of I don’t know what
51. WHO IS THE FRIEND THAT YOU HAVE HAD THE LONGEST? Erica, my sister
52. WHAT DID YOU DO LAST NIGHT? Ate dinner at “Ruby’s”
53. FAVORITE SMELL? Citrus
54. WHAT ARE YOU AFRAID OF? My children being harmed
55. SALTY OR SWEET? sweet
56. HOW MANY KEYS ON YOUR RING? 4
57. HOW MANY YEARS AT YOUR CURRENT JOB? 9
58. DO YOU MAKE FRIENDS EASILY? No
59. HOW MANY TOWNS HAVE YOU LIVED IN? 6 since I’ve been married
60. FAVORITE DAY OF THE WEEK? Sunday
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