Can I Be Done?

Hola, my friends! Is today over yet? Not that it was a bad day, just that it was a long day. And I'm ready to sleep. hehe.

I woke up at 6:35, and pushed snooze. I'm making a habit of that. hehe. I got up at 6:45am, read my scriptures, said my prayers, and then got the kids ready. Captain America was off today, so he came out and helped the last few minutes before getting kids on the bus, then he went to go and skate for exercise.

And I hopped in the shower. And got ready for the day. We were going up to Albuquerque New Mexico to the temple, but first, we had our couples counseling. Busy day!

Here's me, all fixed up and ready to go :)

And, of course, we had an argument on the way to counseling. hehe. Doesn't it always work that way? ha! At least it was something to talk about, right? And Dr. Slade gave us a few things to help in our communication problems.

He talked about 4 main problems in communication. First was Criticism. Criticism is bad. It's counterpart, that is better, is complaining. To complain, you say the behavior, say how you feel about it, and WHY you feel that way about it. That's the proper way to complain.

The next was Defensiveness. And the better counterpart to that is admitting the truth about the complaint. Because there's always SOME truth to a complaint. Here's what you say "You're right about xxxxx. Can I explain to you why I did what I did?" I really liked this one, and could see how these first two can play off of each other.

The third was Contempt. Where you think you're better than the other person. As long as we're not in a HUGE MASSIVE argument, we don't struggle with this one. And the last one is Stonewalling. Yeah, same as the contempt. I'm thinking that if we do better on the criticism/defensiveness stage, we won't move to the contempt/stonewalling phase. Make sense?

Anyway, we finished up, and headed back home. But stopped at the commissary first to buy some snacks for our trip. Cause 4 hours each way in the car with 5 kids was gonna be a LONG time :)

And then headed home. And started packing. And getting things ready to go. And looking for hotels. And eating lunch. And calling the temple, and finding out hours, and junk like that. And finally, by 2pm, we were ready to go. We loaded up in the truck, and headed up to the school to pick up kids.

And were all in the car, and dropped off backpacks and cellos and stuff at home, then were on the interstate by 2:20pm. Yeah, we were a little off schedule. But we were on the road.

And it was really windy in my truck. My POOR hair. Check out the disaster that it is with the windows down. Did I mention that we don't have A/C in the truck?

And we stopped at Truth or Consequences (or something like that) to get gas.

Kids in the truck at the gas station

Me at the gas station

And then, since the gas station didn't have a good "snacks" selection, we drove across the street to McDonalds. And let kids go to the bathroom, and we bought plain ice cream sundaes (so just ice cream in a dish) for everyone, and Captain America and I got a big soda. Diet Dr Pepper??? YES!! I was pretty excited. hehe.

Middle of Nowhere, New Mexico

So we drove on. We got to listen to all of Sunday morning session of conference, since we'd missed most of that one last Sunday, and a few of the Priesthood sessions, and lots of the songs from conference. It was nice listening to conference talks on the way up to the temple.

So I was noticing that Captain America didn't seem to have any problem with is hair and the wind...

But I sure did...

And then we got to Soccorro, NM. And it was a little after 5pm, so we stopped at Burger King for dinner. Here's Jake, helping us get sleeping kids out of the car.

Me and the kids, waiting for our food

Silly Boys!

Captain America and I

And by this time, we realized that we weren't gonna make it by 6pm. Because Soccorro is about an hour from Albuquerque. And yeah, we left Burger King real close to 6pm. And we'd told the temple that we would be there at 6pm.

So Captain America called, and said he'd be there at 7pm. And yeah, now it was gonna be a push to make it by 7pm. But push on we did.

We pulled into the parking lot a few minutes after 7pm, and the temple ladies said they were reserving a spot for Captain America. So it all worked out. He and I snapped a few quick pictures of ourselves, and he ran inside, and I stayed out with all the kids.
And here's a TON of pictures of the kids and I at the temple grounds. We didn't go inside, but we walked around for about 20 minutes. Until they were being too naughty to keep outside anymore. Jumping and running and being loud. Yeah, not the place for that.... Sigh. Boys...


























So my original plan was to look around the temple grounds, then drive to a store and hang until Captain America was finished in the temple. But yeah, after their super naughty behavior at the temple, I didn't want to be with them in public. Or reward them for a job poorly done. So I made them sit in the car. For about an hour and 20 minutes. And yeah, it sucked. But let me tell you, when Captain America came back out, and took the kids and I for a walk around the grounds, they were VERY well behaved and respectful. I guess they did learn a lesson.

We headed back towards Soccorro, and got a hotel for the night. We were gonna do Motel 6, but they only had smoking rooms left. So we drove down the street a ways, and found an EconoLodge. And it was cheap! $40 a room! Sweet :) And they were HUGE rooms. And we got 2 rooms. Even better - hehehe :)

Here's some pics right before bedtime.

We found Jimmy laying on the bed like this. Silly kid. We fall him "Fat Panda", lovingly, from Kung Fu Panda. Have you seen that movie? It was a good one :)

Eme and Jimmy

Jake

See, 2 rooms!

And now it's after 1:14am, and I'm SO tired. We're gonna get up at 8:30am, and drive the 3 1/2 hours back home. And then we have a Work function to go to at 3pm. Another long and busy day, I'm afraid. It's been a good trip so far, though :) Even with the few little bumps along the way :)

Click on the link below to go to my account to download the PNG file, and leave some love if you like my work. Thanks!

4shared
box.net

Always Working

Hey girlie girls! What's up in your world? Me? I spent most of my Thursday designing. Yeah, I'm SO ready to NOT be on the computer anymore. hehe.

So, wanna see my new stuff? But wait! I have my Halloween Packs on sale! Buy all my previously released Halloween stuff for only $8.00. That's only $0.80 a pack! Yeah, can't pass that one by, right? hehehe.

Click HERE to go to my store

And, here's my new stuff for the week. Hope ya like it! Its 20% off the first week, or only $2.00 per WordArt pack! Enjoy!

Click HERE to go to my store :)

I was SOOO sleepy when I woke up this morning :) I need to get my timing down of my meds. I don't like being sleepy - hehe. I snoozed my alarm a few times, and ended up finally coming out at 7:10am to help the kids get ready. Luckily they were almost all the way ready. Such good kids :)

I got them on the bus at 7:30am, and wanted to go back to bed, but ended up screwing around on my phone for about 30 minutes. Yeah, maybe I was reading emails. I don't know. All I knew was that Captain America came home around 8, and had to be back to work a little after 9am. So I hung with him as he got ready.

And then, after he went back to work, I got on my computer, and started designing. And helped kids with school and bus and lunch and whatever else came up in between, but mostly I worked.

And here it is, 3:06pm, and I'm done. Thank goodness. hehe. I don't like sitting in front of a 46 inch laptop all day long. Good thing I designed 3 WordArt packs earlier in the week, or it would have taken even longer. I did make a calendar AND masks, both of which are EXTREMELY time consuming, so I know that's why it took me so long. So, note to self, don't make calendars and masks for the same week. Ha!

And, round 2 of blogging. hehe. It's 10:49pm, and I'm about ready to go to sleep. It turned out to be a really good evening :)

So I finished up with the computer, and then didn't want to do ANYTHING else. hehe. I texted with my friend Mandi for a while, and at 3:30pm, headed up to pick up the kids from AQ. I sat in the parking lot and checked my email, and had kids delivered and back home by 4pm.

AND, my hair is getting SO long. I like wearing it in a high pony tail, because I feel like a cheerleader. ROFL! And yeah, in high school, I was NOTHING like a cheerleader. Think HUGE band geek. Seriously... hehe.


And then I just hung out. Yeah, didn't cook dinner. I didn't have the kids clean. I didn't really do anything. hehe. I was pretty much fried from working. But that's ok. Tom and Eme played outside for a while, and Jake and Hunter played for a bit. Kids were happy. I was good.

And finally, at 5:45pm, we decided to get ready for Scouts. Joe's on-post pack was having a Campfire at Old Ft Bliss tonight. And all the kids wanted to go. Which I was kinda glad for, because it meant we'd all be together, but I was pretty much done with kids, so only taking Joe would have been MUCH easier...

I changed clothes and put on something yellow. Because yellow is the Cub Scout color. Yeah, it made sense at the time. hehe. My uniform is kinda big. Because, apparently, I'm no longer a medium. I'm a small. ha! That's gonna take some getting used to :)

And here's me and ALL the kids driving the 2 blocks to Old Ft. Bliss.

Our Cub Scout pack has REALLY grown. There were a ton of people there. They had a flag ceremony, then the dens did skits, then we roasted marshmallows.

So I told Jimmy to come over and take a picture with me, and he decides to pick his nose and eat the booger during the picture... nice.

And I brought our campfire cooking metal sticky things (yeah, don't know the official name of those...). And our leftover marshmallows from camping. Yeah, those were old. And hard. But when you cook them, no one knows the difference. Ha! See, again with the cheap. hehe.

Anyway, someone else brought BIG marshmallows. The little one is really normal size. That one Joe has is TOTALLY on steroids, or something...

Joe cooking marshmallows

And at around 7pm, Captain America was able to come! I heard his truck from 2 blocks away. hehe. He sat for a few pictures, then helped me load all the kids up and we headed home.


And we got the kids home, and fed, and changed into jammies, and ready for bed. And prayed, and scriptured, and put kids in their bed. And left the oldest 2 doing their chores. And Captain America and I headed out on a date. Because we're gonna be gone on Friday night, and can't do a date night then, so it's gonna be Date Night Thursday :) I'm flexible :)

So we headed out to El Taco Tote. Because I love that place, and I hadn't eaten yet. And if I was gonna have to eat, then I wanted it to be something good. hehe.

Here's Captain America and I with our food.

And yeah, most of the reason I like that place is the guacamole salsa. It's the salty green sauce, and it's pretty spicy for me, but labeled "MILD". Whatever. It makes my mouth on fire, but I like it :) And yeah, it was TOTALLY not right tonight. I don't know what was off about it, but I know it didn't like it. If I added a lot of salt to it, it was almost good. Sigh.

But I ate my cucumbers, and my chips (yeah, I counted them as my crackers/bread), and my meat and veggies. SO tasty. And drank my Diet Coke. It's not Diet Dr Pepper, but it IS diet :)

And then we headed to the mall. Because Kohl's was having a 60% off sale on their sterling silver rings. And I just love jewelry, you know...

So we parked, and Captain America was showing me his glove box, and ha! I found drink holders. hehe. Yeah, I don't know why I thought it was so funny, but I did - hehe.

And here's me in Captain Americas truck. He loves his truck. Me? Yeah, I'm getting used to it. It kinda scares me - ha!

And me, giving the drink holders 2 thumbs up. Because I'm cool like that...

So we went inside, and looked around. And their sterling silver rings are now kept behind lock and key. So we looked and looked and looked and FINALLY tracked down the worker chickie to come and open it up for us. And these are the 2 rings that I found that I fell in love with. The ring finger ring is a small 6, and the flower ring is a size 7. Who would have ever imagined that I'd wear such a small size of ring! hehe.

Aren't they pretty? Captain America and I had fun picking them out together. And, Veronica, you'd be happy to know that they were NOT from the Jewelry Box, and that I paid $14 a piece for them. And they're not gonna turn my fingers green. hehe.

And then we headed home. And yeah, it was a GREAT end to the day. And now we have a 4 day weekend (called a 4 day in the army), and I'm looking forward to it. We have a lot of stuff planned, and I hope we can fit it all in!

So, yeah, ok, so I'm not ALWAYS working. Or wait. My blog IS my work, right? And my life is my blog.... Are you following me here... So, living my life IS working, so I'm ALWAYS working. Ha! See, I knew I could get that to fit. ROFL!

Click on the link below to go to my account to download the PNG file, and leave some love if you like my work. Thanks!

4shared (they're updating their servers....)
box.net