Devil or Angel? I Can't Make Up My Mind.

If you couldn't tell, that title was to be sung. ;) Don't know if any of you listened to oldies when you were young...but I did... A LOT! So that oldie Devil or Angel came to mind when I was trying to think of a title to describe the blog that would divulge the secrets of my relationship with Flamin' Hot Cheetoes. (Especially the Limon ones.)

I freakin' love them!!

They are my absolute favorite junk food item. We can keep chocolate, or cookies in our house for weeks and I can not touch them...but a bag of Flamin' hots doesn't stand a chance. So, what is the problem if I love them so??? Well my shear lack of will power when I am in their presence has made me, and continues to make me a fat-a**! So, being that it is New Years Eve, and everyone is thinking about New Years resolutions, I have decided that I have to re-evaluate our torrid affair. While I can not even think about giving them up all together, I do have to turn our relationship from a nightly after hours hook-up into a more responsible adult relationship. Now, I am not saying that I will not miss our "hot" midnight booty calls, or dates (and by dates I mean me, the flamin' hots and a chick flick) I have to do better for me, and my family. So, sorry Flamin' Hots, but you and I need to be "on a break", oh and please don't feel bad....it's not you, it's me.

What A Group!

I forgot to post the Christmas picture of Noah's class at school. They are all in their PJ's because they had Polar Express day at their school. When they got there in the morning there was train noises playing over the intercom. It was really cute. This year instead of playing games the class had a white elephant gift exchange, and the kids did really well with it. The kids in Noah's class this year are a great group who are wonderful to each other, and his teacher is amazing, and cute as can be.

Christmas A GoGo

We were able to have Jon come home for a few days for Christmas, it was so nice!! We were together to watch Noah open all of his loot. Now let me explain that Noah LOVES these little toys called Gogo's Crazy Bones but already has most of the ones that are available here in the United States (there are 5 sets of them and only the first came out here in the good ol' USofA, not to mention all of the special ones that Noah wants that again are not here in the USA). More of these toys were what Noah wanted most for Christmas, so I did my shopping early since I had to order his gifts from England! Oh well, it was so worth it on Christmas morning when he was so excited!

The Gangs All Here!

The Shane family was ALL together for Thanksgiving. This does not happen a lot because some of the gang lives in Texas, but when we get together we have SO MUCH FUN!! We ate tons of Kimmie's YUMMY food, and then played games all night long. The next day we all got together and "tried" to take some family pictures. I say try only because all of the kids were WAY tired, and it was super sunny, yet COLD and so the kids were NOT excited about taking pictures. Oh well, you take what you can get, right?

Diary of a Non-Wimpy Birthday!

My Noah turned 12! I can't believe it!! Noah decided that this year he wanted to have a party with his friends. He wanted to have a movie night party, and decided on Diary of a Wimpy Kid as the movie. I wasn't sure if they would really watch it, but they did. Then they decorated cupcakes.
I do this at a lot of Noah's parties because the kids always love it, and it takes up more time then you would think. Next, Noah opened his gifts. His friends had been really thoughtful and picked out things for Noah that they knew he would like. Then they just ran around the house having a great time. Noah loved his birthday party and I am so thankful for his amazing friends and how much they support and love him. They are great kids!!

He's Classy Like That!

My boy always finds something interesting that he wants to be for Halloween. I have written about this before. This year he wanted to be a masked prince. Sounds easy enough, right? Well Noah of course had very specific ideas on what this masked prince would look like...very specific! I took him to store after store after store looking for the thing he liked to make the costume, to no avail. On one of the trips Jon was in town. He saw a Penguin costume and he knows Noah likes Penguins (a lot) so he suggested it to him. Noah paused...but it was a no go. About a week later I took him to Spirit Halloween over by TJ Maxx and we were determined to find pieces to make his masked prince costume. (My sister and mom were starting to worry and it was freaking them out) I made suggestion after suggestion about this mask, or that cape, or this crown, or this crushed velvet (very expensive) price costume...but no, it was all wrong. Then Noah sees a Penguin costume and says he wants it. In my head I am like...Are you kidding me??? So I ask Noah why when daddy asked he didn't want to be a Penguin, but now he wanted this costume. Noah looks at me like I'm stupid and says, "Because this one has a bow-tie". HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA This kid cracks me up sometimes!

Here he is in all his Penguin glory! He ended up loving his costume, and had a great time being in his schools costume parade, and playing games in his class.

Some other highlights from Halloween were my sister and her kids were here during Halloween this year, so Noah had someone to go trick-or-treating with. We made it a family affair with both grandma Holliday and Shane, grandpa Shane, Aunt Kimmie, Aunt Katie, Uncle Bill, and cousins Hannah, Tyler and Kayla. They all had so much fun...but especially Hannah and Kayla who both totally "got" trick-or-treating this year.

(By the way my sister Kim is a "Utah Mom" and for my friends that don't live here in Utah...she is a walking stereotype, and it's funny-trust me. And I am sad I didn't get a picture of my niece Hannah who was a cute little 50's girl. I did get her on video says Trick-or-Treat though.)

Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!!

Everything Happens For A Reason

Disclaimer! Most of you already know this, so I guess I am writing it more for a record then anything else. You all totally have my permission to skip this one. :)

Summer 2010. Jon was having what we will call issues with his place of work and decided with my help to start looking for another job. With the economy the way it is, Dixie is not booming with job potential, so Jon and I talked about other places we would be willing to live. Cali, and Utah were really the only two places we decided we would both consider and we really can't afford Cali on the money that we make....so Utah it is. We decided to open up the search we would start looking up North too. Now I was not totally thrilled with this idea because I do LOVE Southern Utah. I love the beauty here, my family and friends here, and Noah's school and friends here. But, a supportive wife has to do what she's gotta do and I had to admit that there were not jobs galore here in the South. So, I started scouting the net for the perfect job for Jon....nothing. More days past....more nothing. Then one day while I was searching I had a hit. There was a job with the West Jordan police department with GREAT hours and benefits. It was only open for one week, but Jon applied.

We waited and waited to hear something, and had just about given up when we got the call. Jon was asked to come up to West Jordan for an interview. We went and decided to make it into a mini vacation, staying with both Scott and Lauren, and Aaron and Diomar. Jon was the last interview of the day (they did about 16 interviews) and he must have made an impression with the panel because he was invited with 4 other guys to come back and interview with the Chief. The only problem was it was an interview for the day after we were supposed to leave. So we asked Aaron and Diomar permission to crash there for an extra day. Jon went to the interview, and we went home. We waited again...a lot. We again started to lose hope that he had got the job (I guess West Jordan likes to really take there time while hiring), but he finally got the call that he was there choice, and now all he had to do was pass a background check. Great! So they sent us the paper work. IT WAS MASSIVE!!! It was over 50 pages of background information they wanted. Jon has done backgrounds for Ivins, LAPD, and the government (TSA) and none of them was anything close to the one for West Jordan. They even did phone interviews with Jon, me, his parents, friends, current employer, and even our neighbors. It was a lot!! After all of this, YES! He got the job.

We were so very blessed! Jon has now been working there for over 3 months and he loves it. He works the same hours as the court, so he works Monday through Friday 9-5:30 with every weekend and holiday off. It is amazing!! So much better then all of those crazy graveyard shifts, and never being able to have Sundays off to go to church. The people in the department are wonderful and have just taken Jon in as one of their department family.

The one down side will be leaving our life here in Southern Utah. Jon has already been gone since mid September, and I miss him so much. I am still here trying to sell the house that we share with Anne and Rich. We pray daily that the right family will be guided to our house. We are tired of being separated. I have been working like crazy these last few weeks on projects to get the house updated and I plan on taking new pictures of it this next week when all the Christmas stuff is put away. Let's hope that helps, because I really don't want to have to do this very much longer. We are very lucky in that Jon has a place to stay up there. He is staying with his brother Aaron and his family. Thank you Aaron and Diomar for your love and support because we really couldn't do this without you. And thank you to Scott and Lauren for also putting us up for visits. We know how blessed we are to have you all as family.

We are excited for this new adventure, and know it is what will be best for our family once we are done with all of this separation stuff. We even know where we want to live once we are together up there...now we just have to make it happen. Thank you to all of our family and friends for your love and support. We look forward to the conclusion of this crazy adventure, and we know how lucky we are that Jon got this amazing job.

Vampires Suck... Can Suck It

On Tuesday we had a girls night. We went to Durangos and ate salads. Nom, Nom, Nom!! So Yummy!! The weather here this last week has been amazing and so we were able to eat them outside. Nothing better then good food and fun conversation with friends...especially these ladies because I ALWAYS laugh my freakin' head off around them.

So, then it was time to head on over to the theater to go see Vampires Suck. We being the Twihards that we are felt it only appropriate to pay homage to the spoof that came from our obsession, but the word "appropriate" does not apply to this movie in any way. When you see the commercial you think, "Oh, funny and fun" ... well filthy with only moderate haha moments is really what best descibes what we saw on screen. But, hey... at least I wasn't alone for the experience. We went through this "horrific experience" together. It was like a group session after as we discussed the ways this film had done us wrong. Now we must find another movie to go see to make-up for the way we were wronged by Vampires Suck..."bummer"...another girls night. ;)

Someday!

One of these days I will get caught up one here.... just not today. Too many things still not ready to write about. One day you will pull up your blogger and I will have written a book. :)

Thank Heaven for Little Girls...

Thank heaven for little girls... without them what would little Noah do??? Noah is one lucky boy. When he goes to lunch at school, he sits at a big round table full of girls. When Noah gets invited to a party, it is usually a party full of girls. When Noah wants to go on an outing, he wants to invite girls. When Noah plays at school... you guessed it... girls, girls, girls. Thank heaven for little girls!!! Noah adores them, and I will tell you why.

Being a mother I of course think my son is the cutest, sweetest thing ever. I do realize though, that he is different, and that being his friend must not always be the easiest thing in the world. Noah is lucky however to live here in Southern Utah with some of the sweetest things in the whole wide world....his girl friends. They are amazing! They watch out for him, help him when he needs it, laugh at his silliness, and most important to me as his mother... they include him. I couldn't have asked for better friends for him then he has in Sydney, Jadzia, Caitlyn, and Kaitlyn. You girls make life better for a special little boy.

Brace Face

I know this is WAY late, but Noah got braces (over two months ago) and so I thought I should at least write a blog about it. He hates getting them tightened, but has enjoyed that when his mouth is sore mom lets him have Slim-Fast shakes for breakfast. He also like that he can have so many colors in his mouth and cracks the assistants in the office up every time he describes in detail the colors he wants for his rubber bands and the order they should go in. He has done better then I thought he would with them, and I know I owe that in part to Dr. Beckstrom and his amazing team! They have been so awesome with him!! It really is a blessing to me and to Noah. I know he is my own kid, and to say so seems really vain... but I think he is just about the cutest brace face I have ever seen!!

Happy Hot Mamas Day!!

I know this is late, but I was busy having fun on Mothers Day and since I sit in front of a computer all day at work... on a day off it's like the very last thing I want to do. I just wanted to let all the mothers in my life know how much I appreciate them. I appreciate my own mom and have learned from being a mother how much goes into each and every day and things you do for your children. I have come to realize how hard she worked to give us all the things we had, and I of course am talking more about the things that money can't buy. I am thankful to all my friends who are mothers. You are always such an example to me and I learn from you all everyday. I am thankful for my Noah who loves me in spite of the mistakes I make. To all the mothers out there... one day to honor you is really not enough, but you still have my thanks and gratitude for doing the hardest job in the world... producing the future. Love to you all.

Vampires, Girlfriends, and Babies... OH MY!!

This blog is a very long time coming!! Back in March I had an idea to throw a Twilight themed baby shower for my two friends Valerie and Alissa. Now, let me go back and explain that we (my friends and myself) love Twilight... so while, yes Vampires being involved in a baby shower might seem strange to some... to us it is perfect. Anyways, I remembered that New Moon was coming out soon, and being that we wanted the shower to be a surprise I thought that having a New Moon viewing party would be a good cover. (The picture of the invitation above is the one the two preggers girls got, everyone else had one that explained the whole thing.) I talked to my friends Shelley and Lindsay and they thought it would be a good idea and helped me plan the whole thing... thanks ladies, you're the BEST!! We went way over the top trying to make it as "campy" as possible (if you are having a themed party... why not go ALL the way, right?) and I think it turned out amazing. I picked up lots of Twilight themed decorations, and Shelley did too. I bought Edward and Jacob buttons and had a bag of each at the door. Lindsay made sure everyone "declared a team" as they entered and picked a button with either Jacob or Edward to wear for the night. Then we themed the food.

I decided to have a light dinner that we called an "edible art" salad bar, and I had lots of snacks light veggies and dip and chips and my guacamole to eat during the movie... not to mention New Moon Sweetheart candies of course!

Shelley made the most amazing fun drinks that looked like blood with the type on the bottle. They were TOO FUN!! And then she had the most amazing cupcakes made that were not only really yummy, but that had cut Twilight sayings and pictures sticking out of them using Forks as holders.... get it... FORKS.

I had picked up Edward and Jacob dessert plates so you could choose who you wanted to lick your frosting off of. (hehe).

Valerie had a hard time choosing.

They really were amazingly cute cup-cakes!

I even ordered each girl a Twilight themed onesie for their little bundle of joy. Alissa is having a boy, and Valerie just had her girl yesterday.

It was a really fun night... and yes we did really watch New Moon after we ate and opened the gifts. I have to say a special thanks to Lindsay and Shelley for helping me plan and run the party, and to my dear friend Liz who not only let us invade her home for the whole thing, but spent hours helping me set up and clean up. I love all of you!! And of course thank you to all those who came and made the night fun!! Congrats Valerie and Alissa!!!

Yes, you can see I was a little tired in the above picture... but Valerie still gave it a thumbs-up! :)