Friday Musings

This Friday morning I've decided I have nothing better to do than to hang with my two sweet children (and our trusty talking turtle there). 

The floors were squeaky cleaned yesterday with my handy Shark Vac and Steam, the probably overpriced Valentine's Day gift from Husband that I love (both the Shark and Husband are loved).  I work tonight so I probably shouldn't overwork myself by pulling weeds the way I have very other day this week. Husband and I have done at home Crossfit workouts the last two days and I'd rather just not move all together, so laying on the clean floor while my children giggle and play is perfectly acceptable to me. 

Husband applied for another job and no matter how many times I tell myself not to get excited until we have an offer... I'm really excited and really want this job. Husband's been really patient the last four years and it's about time he got a dream job. 

In the mean time, I'm loving that he is part time at TSA. We've been able to workout everyday this week. We took another hike with the kiddos. He's home by 5 or 5:30 and we get to eat dinner as a family at a reasonable hour. Husband got to play basketball with the Elder's Quorum. There's less picking up and dropping off involved when we both have to work. It's been the perfect change for us and we're taking advantage of every minute while it lasts. 

Oh, another shout out to Husband, who makes a point to make the bed every morning. You rock! I love you and I love made beds. Poo for summertime, when we pack away the comforter because it's just too hot and the bed never looks 100% made...

January 2014 Little Moments

January wasn't full of anything real big.  It was mostly made up of little moments. 

Husband and I both worked too much.  Husband was still full time at TSA and working late into the night doing BYU-Idaho.  I was working my three shifts a week, plus some extra training.  We were sleep deprived, but surviving.

The kids survived our grouchiness that resulted from the sleep deprivation and were cute even still.  See my foot in the picture below?  I think I slept more on that darn couch than I did in my bed.  The kids stay out of trouble that way, though.

Lindi's starting to pull herself up on things.  Before we know it, she'll be walking.  I think Hyrum is going to freak out.

Her cuteness kills me, by the way.  I mean just look at her...

We also spent the afternoon with Lindsay and Cole.  Cole and Hyrum became the best of buds.  They played cars while us girls visited and laughed and had a good time.  It was a much needed best friend catch up.  We sure do love those guys and wish they lived closer so that we could see them more often.  They sent us home with a whole bag of lemons from their tree.  We made lemonade nearly every day for over a week.  It was the best!

We've become a selfie taking family.

Tired boys.  Too bad Mom was on her way to work.  She would have rather slept in the back seat with them.

In Love With Today

I'm in love with today, every bit of it.

The kids didn't wake us up at an unreasonable hour and we had waffles for breakfast.  We went for a walk as a family before getting ready for the day and dropping the dad off at the lightrail.

The kids and I went to the new Riverview Park.  It's pretty awesome.  We'll add it to our list of fishing locations and splash pad summer hang outs.

The weather was perfect and I loved just being with my kiddos.  Afterwards we went to McDonald's because Mr. Hyrum was introduced to that place by his Grannie and he asks to go there every time we drive by.  Sometimes a mother just has to splurge.  He even got his first Happy Meal.  

After lunch we ran around town doing other errands and then went to pick up our dad from work...at four o'clock!! We are loving this whole part time TSA business.  We came home and Husband and the kids worked in the yard while the momma made dinner.  Add some peanut butter cookies, family home evening, and the kids in bed.  I'd say that's a great day.

Fishing with Grandpa

Somehow, sometime recently, probably via video chat, Hyrum was told that Grandpa Brown would take him fishing. And so, for weeks he has talked about Grandpa and their fishing trip. He had been anxiously awaiting his visit and it finally came! And today he got to go fishing with Grandpa. 

Grandpa bought him a Lightening McQueen fishing pole and some real live worms and they posted up at Tempe Town Lake, right underneath the lightrail bridge. 

What a lucky boy to have such an awesome grandpa!! He sure had a lot of fun!  I heard (because I had to work...lame) that he had a few nibbles throughout the evening, but at last they decided to call it quits because it was dark. Dad taught Hyrum how to reel in his line. Then Hyrum said "It's stuck." And when Dad pulled it out, this little blue gill was hangin' on. Way to go Hyrum!  Just look at the pride on his little boy face! 

Comedic Moments

We've had a few comedic moments around here lately.

Let's start off with the things I do when I'm half asleep and in charge of the children.  Seriously?  Her onsie flaps are hangin' out and she's got socks pulled up over her leggings.  I remember changing a diaper and thinking her feet were cold, but by golly!  Oh the life of a momma night nurse.

Speaking of being a momma night nurse.  On Monday night all of us nurses just laughed until we cried because there were so many Code Browns back to back and all at the same time and all night long and it got to the point where you either just laugh or you have to cry.  And then I while I was mopping last night I just giggled out loud to myself thinking about that patient who told me my husband was such a lucky guy.  A lucky guy because I'll be Nurse Brown taking care of his Code Browns when he gets old.

Oh and my silly husband...I need an "alternate" wedding ring.  Since Lindi was born I have lost a lot of weight.  One side effect is that my wedding ring is particularly loose.  I got especially nervous about this after one of the nurses lost his wedding ring down the laundry shoot at work the other day, never more to be seen.  So, I requested a new ring, just a tungsten carbide band. $14.99 on Amazon.  Tonight Husband says to me,

"Go ahead and order your ring on the 1st."
"I'm not ordering it!"
"Oh..."
"I'm not going to buy my own wedding ring!!"
"Ok then, but I'll use your money."

Funny.  Mostly because it's pretty true. ;)

And we can't forget to mention Hyrum.  Today he told me he needed medicine.  Vaseline is my medicine of choice these days.  Today he needed it on his side because he "had too much fun."

Enough Catching Up

Thank goodness I've caught up on the blog.  Posts with a million pictures and no stories are just bleh! 

Life has been busy around here.  What's new?  We have days where we think life is pretty grand and other when we feel pretty low, but even on our low days, we're grateful for what we have, most of all, for each other!

So far this month, we have paid of 14% of the student loans we had as of January 1, 2014!!  The loan with the highest interest rate is completely gone.  We are pretty confident that we can have all student loans gone by October.  Whoop!  You know what that means?  Cutting down to part time!  

Husband is well under way with his second semester teaching for BYU-Idaho.  He's still loving it, probably even more this time, seeing as how he's cut down his total hours invested by about 5-6 hours a week.  A lot of work he did last year doesn't have to be repeated this semester.  It's refreshing.  He's also the online course representative now.  He's in charge of brainstorming ideas for how to make the course better.

Hyrum has learned about his heart this month.  Last week he had the following conversation with Grannie:

Hyrum: My heart is pumping...do you have a heart?
Grannie: Yes, everyone has a heart.
Hyrum: Does Lindi have a heart?
Grannie: Yes, Lindi has a little baby heart.
Hyrum: And I have a big boy heart, and you have a Grannie heart.

That just about melts your heart, doesn't it?  He's also been fascinated by testimonies lately.  Every time he hears the word testimony he lights up, "Mom! Testimony!"  We have spent the last two Family Home Evenings talking about testimonies and helping him practice bearing his testimony,

Lindi is an army crawler.  She can push herself just about anywhere with her feet.  She gives the best grins.  She's also a monster and quite a pain to carry around.  Luckily she loves riding in the cart at the grocery stores and she draws a crowd of snow-birds without fail.  Too bad they think she's a boy.  Darn bald head.  We need to invest in some new bows that fit her head...

I'm finally coming to grips with the fact that we kinda live in the ghetto.  The police 'copter was flying overhead tonight and even flashed me with his searchlight.  Sigh...I love this house.

P.S. We went to Waffle Love for date night last night. (Yes, we do date night just about any night of the week. You have to be creative with a schedule like ours.)  It was delicious.  Follow them on Instagram @waffluvaz to find out where they will be!

Upgrading the Christmas Tree

Upgrading our house meant it was time to upgrade the Christmas tree.  No more 4 foot Christmas tree for us!

Hyrum really enjoyed Christmas and all of the festivities this year.

 It's also fun to put those blue ornaments on the tree each year.  They are from the centerpieces for our wedding reception!