Clutter

So, I'm on this cleaning and organizing kick. I've been reading a couple of books about both topics and they have me all geared up. I like to organize, that's kind of fun. Cleaning isn't really fun, but if everything is actually organized, then cleaning isn't so bad.

Anyway, right now I'm reading a book called Clutter's Last Stand which is pretty good. It's all about how we all have too much junk and we spend our lives trying to take care of and clean up our junk, instead of living our lives. I completely agree with this, I am always thinking that I don't want to spend the rest of my life cleaning up all my crap instead of getting to actually play with the kids, or do something I enjoy. So now I am on a mission to get rid of stuff.

The problem is that as I start looking around for stuff to get rid of, I just don't find a lot! We are a pretty non-materialistic bunch, and I do get rid of stuff fairly often, yet we still have too much. We have a TON of books, but as a homeschooling family that is always going to be the case, and I am ok with having all of them, they are beneficial. We have kitchen appliances, but nothing really over the top, a toaster, a blender, a juicer, that's about it. We do have a collection of fondue sets, but we use them several times a year for special dinners and such, so I think they are worth keeping around.

We limit the number of toys the kids have, and purge them regularly. The are not as limited now as they have been in the past, but even when I go into their room to start paring down I look around and see that they really do play with everything they have. They have their doll house and the people to go with it, their ponies, their baby dolls, stuffed animals (3 apiece) and that 's really about it. So I am at a loss there.

I have been sorting through my scrapbooking supplies and have quite a big pile of stuff that I have purged out. My sister Anna is coming to claim it in a couple weeks. I need to go through my closet and take out the things that don't fit, honestly, if I ever stop being pregnant I can just buy new clothes then.

What else is there? We don't really have "stuff" just for the sake of having stuff. I don't have fancy decor or anything, our decorations pretty much consist of pictures that I have taken. I don't know, but I am going to keep looking cause our house is so cramped! Granted, it is a very small house (under 1000 square feet, with 5 people and a dog) but still, it would be nice to see an inch of wall without anything in front of it!

Beautiful

I actually do have plans to write a new blog entry, but it will require a time when I can sit, and think, for more than 3 minutes. So until then, here is another of my newest and most favorite layouts.















PS. when I ran a spell check I discovered that blog spot's spell checker doesn't recognize the word "blog". Just kind of thought that was funny.

my newest and currently favorite layout

This is a layout that I just finished of the girls in thier dresses that Faron's Co-worker bought for them when he went home to India for a visit.

Learning to walk in a war zone

Alexander is starting to walk more and more. He has been taking steps for several weeks, but he can walk for good stretches now, across the room and such. He can even make turns and step around things. He is pretty excited about it, he knows that he is doing something cool and likes it when you applaud.

At times it is a bit like walking through a war zone for him. The girls love to run around him in circles. But with all the challenges he still manages to learn.





The three of them were dancing and dancing to their new favorite song, “Honey Pie” by the Beatles. They also enjoy “Wild Honey Pie” or as Isabella calls it, “the one where they scream Honey Pie”.

Visit to Grandad's house

We went to visit my Grandad yesterday, met up with my parents and my brother and his family and all spent the afternoon there with him. The kids had fun all being together, and hanging out in a new house with new rooms to explore. The girls had the most fun laying in Grandad's bed reading books with Grammy (my mom).

Grandad is reading the "if you give a pig a pancake"











Grammy and Pop brought their sprinkler for the kids to play in. The boys loved it. Alexander WILL NOT let go of the hose, not for anything. Perhaps he will be a fireman.

Here he is sporting Pop's hat.









Isaiah and Alexander stayed in the water for a good long time. Alexander would have stayed all day. Notice the hose in his hand.












The girls were not so fond of the cold water.
















The did get in briefly.















Phia yells "Giddy up" over and over to Uncle Gabe. After a while Isabella gets/falls off and Gabe tries to buck Phia off, but she is sturdy and never falls. She has to be dragged off!












Trying to take a group picture is always fun with all these kids.

Isaiah was ready for a nap, so he was highly offended at being made to put on a shirt and told where to sit.









Nehemiah had no such qualms.

bucket heads

Alexander loves Peek-a-boo right now, so when he discovered these buckets it was tons of fun. Everybody got in on the action.

It is funny how many things he understands now. He knows what he wants, for sure, he usually knows what I want him to do also. Whether he does it or not just depends.

In the last couple of weeks he started sticking his arms into his shirt sleeves when we are dressing him, and today he started sticking out his legs for me to put his pants on. I think that is pretty good for a nearly 11 month old, especially for a boy!















The girls have been putting on lots of performances up on the stage (aka - coffee table). On this particular night they had also found the paper umbrella's we had left over from Auntie Anna's "tropical" baby shower.

Wanna see something gross?

So this is what Faron h ad to do today, empty a pool, (one of those above ground, buy at wal-mart type pools) it was completely full of trash. The people who rented this house before we bought it apparently miss took this pool for a large trash can, and they threw everything they had (why did the even have some of this stuff?) in there. 8 hours today, and 5 hours last Saturday and it is now almost finished. The pool walls and such are still there, but the trash is out. You wouldn't believe the crazy stuff he was pulling out of there. Several lawn mowers, part of a riding lawn mower, about 15 bikes, a washing machine, a Christmas tree, various shoes, and a lot of trash bags, several years old. We kept waiting to find a skull or something, but luckily that never happened. A box of gold would have been nice, but that never happened either.

We have "large item pick-up" every other month here, where we can pile whatever we want out at the curb and the trash guys come and take it away. I think they dread our house, in the two and a half years that we have owned this house I don't think we have missed a pick up. We have had some large piles, but this one is by far the yuckiest.

Today I was glad I am not a man!
This is the whole pile, as seen right now if you drive by our house.

































This is some of the crazy stuff that I found amusing while looking at the pile.

4th of July

We had a fun 4th, regardless of the fact that we didn't really do anything! We are definatly getting old, we couldn't even get motivated to go to a concert last night, Don Chaffer no less! But we did have fun just hanging out. I went out and got a little pool and the kids played in it, then went to the trampoline. Faron started spraying down the trampoline because it was so hot for thier feet, then they had a ton of fun slipping and sliding around on the wet trampoline.





After dinner we went and got slushies at Quick Trip, then headed to the park. It was quite cool last evening, so we had fun running around at the park. Alexander can crawl from the bottom of the slide up to the top in a matter of seconds.


Once we got home we went from one window to the next watching fireworks. We saw some out the back, then went to the front window and watched some across the street.