Happy New Year!!!

 Welcome 2023, I am glad that you are here. This year the twins will turn 7, Justin will turn 40 and Natalie will turn 10. I am not going to mention how old I will be because I don't have to.  

 We moved last year to Hartsville, South Carolina. That makes 4 moves in the past 4 years. Hopefully there will be no moving this year.  The hardest part about moving is leaving friends and making new ones. The best part about moving is knowing that your family has your back. 

What I mean by family is our own family. Justin and I have no extended family nearby and the closest friends that we have live about three hours away.  We have started to call our three kids, the three musketeers. 

There is an amazing homeschool community here in Hartsville. The library has a homeschool program that happens every other week.  

Natalie was in a children's community choir that sang in a christmas concert. There were only three kids in the whole choir. 

Mat loves all things that pertain to video games and is easily bored.

Libby is everyone's friend and will always try to be your best friend. 

Hugs and kisses to all

Every Day is a Holiday (EDH)

 Within a few weeks of living in Greenville, I found out that there was a Big Lots. I love Big Lots. I would go there every week if I could. Well, one day we went there and got a few calendars for 2021. One of them was a daily calendar that has a random holiday for each day. Since our 2020 has been kind of blah, I thought I would make next year a fun one. 

And the best part is that I will be sharing each day on this blog, along with my ideas to make it a fun lesson. I take full responsibility for the crazy ideas that are about to come your way- plus a few tips from the internet.

So here goes.......

January 1 - Polar Bear Swim Day

I got most of my facts from this website.

  https://polarbearsinternational.org/

For most people, polar bear swim day means that you go jump in ice cold pond. Well, we aren't that extreme so we are toning it down a little. 

    I found five facts about polar bears that sounded interesting to me and I will put them on the back of five pictures of polar bears.  Then I will talk about the weather: 

Weather -  In the High Arctic, the sun sets in October and doesn't rise again until late February. Winter temperatures can plunge to -40° or -46 C (-50 F) and stay that way for days or weeks. The average January and February temperature is -34 C (-29 F).

Our polar bear swim will consist of a spray bottle outside. Then we will come inside to make a polar bear from cotton balls and have Swedish fish. 

January 2 - National Science Fiction Day

My plan is to watch a classic science fiction movie with my kids. The vote is still out as to whether it willing be E. T. or something else. I will let y'all know.

January 3 - Chocolate Covered Cherry Day

Now you can either make your own chocolate covered cherries with this recipe

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/24698/chocolate-covered-cherries/?internalSource=hub%20recipe&referringContentType=Search&clickId=cardslot%2

We will be eating Little Debbies Chocolate Covered Cordials

January 4 - National Trivia Day

State of the Ferrell address - volume 1.75

 Well here we are, two years from my last post and a lot has happened in the past two years. 

Springville had a grand opening of their awesome new recreation center in May. We were so excited about it because it was within walking distance. I took the three kids and as we were going in the front door, Natalie closed the door to fast on her brother while he tripped on a mat. His head collided with the door and he got a gash that needed stitches. I had to fill out an incident report as the workers were trying to figure out how to help me. At the urgent care, Mat did great, I almost fainted.  Mat tripped on a mat. We never made it back to the rec center because the rest of the year got a little crazy. 

At the end of May, I was laying in bed and my heart started feeling heavy and I had trouble breathing. I had just had a friend who had experienced a heart attack and the early signs for her felt exactly the same as mine. I called Justin and he rushed home because he was afraid that I was having a heat attack.  Well it ended up being a gallbladder attack. I went to the doctor and it was confirmed that i had gallstones. Surgery was scheduled to take my gallbladder out on June 28, two days before my birthday. I was unable to pick up my children for six weeks.

We were able to go see my side of the family twice. The first time we had a family reunion in Sunriver, Oregon. We went rafting and bike riding. There was tons of laughter and tons of flamingos thanks to my wonderful sister, Camie. We stayed in the same house and cousins played with cousins. Later in the summer we went to Washington for Mindy's wedding. It was great.

The rest of 2018 was like any other year when you have two year old twins and a five year old. 

We ended the year of 2018 on a high note. On December 29, in the morning, we were all in the twins bedroom watching tv. Justin and I had just shared presents with each other because it is our anniversary. We both leave the room and then we hear Mat laughing. We go check on Mat and Libby is on the floor having a seizure. She slept for about four hours and then was fine after that. Justin and I were able to go on our anniversary date. 

2019 started with the twins turning three, and a certain little girl turning six.  Justin accepted a job with the University of Utah and it was soon decided that we would be moving up north closer to the U because traffic was crazy for Justin and it often took him about 70 minutes to get to work and back. He started working in February and we moved in May. 

We put our house on the market on Monday and by Wednesday we had an offer. We went house shopping on Friday/Saturday and found the perfect house for us in Woods Cross on Saturday afternoon. 

It was hard to say goodbye to our first house, our first friends.  

Natalie remembers her friend Emma, primary in the Dry Creek 1st ward, dance classes with Cami McFarlene, music classes with Ms. Shea, getting licorice from the bishop every week after church (Bishop Braithwraite may just be the best bishop ever).

We miss Springville and will always remember our time there. 

Day of Thanks 6, 7 and 8

Maybe one day I will catch up and actually be thankful for the day that I am on. As for now, I am just proud of myself for continuning this. Usually I get this far in, realize that I am behind again and give up.

Day 6 - my right to vote.
 Day 6 was election day. Justin has been a poll worker for three years now and everytime we go visit him and have lunch together. There was only one time that we couldn't stay for lunch and that was the presidential election of 2016. It was super crowded.  They changed things up and Utah County started mailing the ballots out. Election day 2018 was just as bad as 2016 and we ended up not being able to stay for lunch. I am glad that I can vote, I just wish that people voted all the time, not just when they think it is important. You want to make a change, start small. Vote for the city council.

Day 7 - music
I have always been musical and I love it. I was in band and choir in high school. I have played organ/piano for my church since Justin and I have been married. I now teach piano and have been doing that for five years and I love it.

Day 8 - Food
 Yes, I know that it is generic, but it's still true. I am grateful for food. The food that I can buy for my children and my favorite food that I can eat. Since I got my gallbladder out this summer, there are still some things that I can't eat as much of.

That's all for today! I am getting tired and need to try and put the twins to sleep.

Day of Thanks 4 and 5

Well like most things in my life that are deemed not important, I am behind. I always have good intentions, but then life happens.  Most of that life is making sure that my children are nice to each other (aka not killing each other)

Day 4 - Sleep

For some reason, someone who doesn't have kids said "Let's do daylight savings. In the fall we will go backward which means everyone can sleep in one hour!" It was great as a college student. However, as a parent, I don't do daylight savings at all. All three of my kids were up at five, laughing. Thankfully, I am a morning person, but still five is a little too early. I do treasure my sleep. The best thing though is that we were all asleep by 7:30 pm. Lately I have been going to sleep at about eight because I am up at 4:30 am for my job with VIPKid.

Day 5 - My body

I may not like my body somedays, but I am grateful for it. I am grateful for every heartbeat. I am grateful for all my scars.  My body is amazing.  I have to admit that for awhile when Justin and I were first married, I felt like my body was broken because I couldn't get pregnant. It took me long to time to grieve for my infertility because the only thing I ever wanted to be was a mom. My body wasn't working the right way and there was nothing I could do to help it. I finally realized that I can get help and that I am not alone. With my body, I can play tag with my children. I can tickle my kids to make them laugh and I can snuggle my three precious miracles all because of my body.

Stay tuned for the rest, I promise that is coming.

Day of Thanks 2 and 3

My second day of thanks is laughter. Laughter is the best medicine, they say. They also say that you can either laugh or cry although most times, I do both.

I love a good laugh. The kind of laugh where your smile hurts because you've been laughing so hard. I sometimes have a musical laugh. (it goes up and down in a scale) Justin has a great secret laugh that I can't share or I may be killed that I adore. Natalie's laugh is long and loud. Mat's laugh is a guffaw. Libby's laugh is super contagious. Just last night she was laughing at herself in the mirror because she was making funny faces at herself. 

I will admit that I don't laugh as much as I should because there is always something else that I need to do. Something always need to be cleaned or someone is always fighting with someone else. I wonder what would happen if we just had fun. I will play with my kids when we have more space. Right and then something else will come up. It is time to STOP and play. My children will only be children once.

This brings me to day of thanks number 3 = my family.

My family is my everything. Justin and I are going on almost 13 years of marriage and 18 years of knowing each other. I cannot imagine my life without Justin. He encourages me, believes in me and most of all, makes me laugh. For five long years, we tried to have kids on our own, but nothing worked. We had finally made the decision to adopt and were approved by LDS Family Services in Georgia. A few months later, we moved back to Utah and found a fertility doctor named Dr. Foulk with Utah Fertility Clinic to try a few last minute attempts. A miracle occured and our little Natalie was born.

Two years later, we went back to the same doctor and said we want to try again. After a failed attempt, we made the decision to do IVF.  We got two more miracle babies, our beautiful twins, Mat and Libby.  Our family is complete.

#MomLife = Day of Thanks:1

Yes, the title of this post is hashtag mom life or if you're musically inclined - sharp, mom life.
Mom life is hard, no joke. One of my friends just posted on Facebook that she is thinking of starting a blog for all those moms who know that life isn't perfect. It made me realize that the whole reason I started my blog is so that people would see how fun life is as a mom of twins + a toddler.

Now, my toddler is almost six and my twins are toddlers, and my blogging days are not a number for the record books. But that's how mom life is for me. It is filled with screams, changing diapers, potty training, hitting, fighting, kicking, hugging, snuggling, and I love yous.

Today is the first day of November which starts the month of Gratitude for most. Today I am grateful for my mom. Ten years ago to the date, our family was going to the funeral for my mother. She had passed away after a long battle with breast cancer. That is the only time that I have ever ridden in a limo.

I still miss my mom and this year has been especially hard. I don't know why, perhaps because I could really use her wisdom as I try to help my children learn and grow. When you get sick, who do you want, you mom. When you get hurt, who do you want, your mom. When you are sad, who do you want, your mom. And my mom isn't there.

But it hit me today, that I have three wonderful children who do want me when they get sick or hurt or scared. I am their mom.  I am not perfect and will always make mistakes, but this is me.