Tornado

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My finest moments

My sister Laura and I were talking on the phone the other day. Laura remembers all of my finest moments, like when I wore a plume on my hat when I was in marching band...

Or when I worked at Arctic Circle for a month...

I have another fine moment to share.

Not too long ago, I was having a morning where I was really struggling with my four hoodlums. Morning begins with my alarm going off several times and then I finally peel my exhausted body out of bed at 6:30. Aaron and I pray and then I stumble to get something appropriate on to rally the troops (Typically this is some form of workout pant and sweatshirt). I try so hard to maintain some level of patience but unfortunately that morning it was lost in about 5 minutes, as it often is. I hope to someday be the perfect mom (don't hold your breath). Well, as I head up stairs to peel the rest of the family out of their beds, I cringe to think that Damian, the youngest, will cry when I wake him up. He is 5, almost six. This crying episode happens almost everyday. After struggling with him for a few minutes and finally get him into the kitchen table to eat with his brothers, I finish off their lunches and they go about getting ready for the day.

This is where I stop and spare you all the details of the arguing and whining. I will tell you this though, my second oldest son was having some attitude issues and by the time we all got to the door and had our coats, hats and gloves on, Tomy (said son) headed out and slammed the door and Zach (3rd son) followed closely behind. Mind you, we were running very behind and I was beyond frustration. I proceed to grab the youngest and fly out the door. This was as soon as we got his big bulky winter boots on and his snow pants in his bag. We get out to the minivan (I love and hate at the same time) and everyone has gotten in but me. I grab the handle and it is locked. I panic because I am almost certain that the bus will be gone, and I will be left with 4 boys with some sad and angry looks on their faces. I am confused. How did my door get locked and all the others unlocked? I am very skeptical but don't have time to think too much about it. I speed down the road to the bus stop and the bus is not there. I know in my heart that it's gone, so I speed down the road to see if I can find the "twinkie", the name my boys gave the bus. The twinkie is not too far down the road, but I am still freaking. The bus stops and the boys get out to run to get on. One neighborhood child gets on and the bus driver closes the door before my 4 boys get on. I wanna cry. My baby (the youngest) has already cried. We are a mess! I motion for them to come to me and they come and we chase after that damn twinkie again! Finally some kids yell at the bus driver to stop and he does. My boys run to get on. At that point, I feel defeated, even though we caught the bus.

After I told this story to Laura, and she was laughing so freakin hard, she told me she pictured me the whole time in a blue housecoat. One that is similar to the housecoat my mom once wore when we were kids. I laughed after she told me that.

Have you ever laughed and cried at the same time? It is a strange mix of emotions.

My hope is to share some of my life's crazy stories so that Laura, you, and I can have a good laugh. Laughter is the best medicine and I need all the medicine I can get!

A picture doesn't always say a thousand words

I was just looking through some pictures that have been taken in the last 6 months of our family. I am very grateful we are able to have pictures. I do love those tangible memories. Most of the pictures that we take in our families, we expect everyone to stop and smile. Well, I was just thinking about how life doesn't always produce smiles and we don't often take pictures of those times when we are feeling sad, frustrated, or discouraged. These are all very real feelings and yet we don't want to record them for our posterity. Why? I sometimes think that we often stop and smile at people and things just like we do a camera and it may not be a true indication of how we feel. Part of me thinks that it is good. You have heard of the saying, "fake it til you make it?" I think we can fake the smile until it is real. But I also feel like life sucks the positive energy out of you sometimes and it's hard to wake up each day and fake the smile. And why don't we want others to see us that way? I think sometimes it's a fear we have of others seeing that we struggle. Or having them see our weakness and insecurities. I also think that it is easier for us to be unhappy rather than trying to be happy. I have a son named Damian and he used to always give me a fake smile when I took his picture. He is much better at giving a real smile now, but if you take a look at his fake smile, you can see how painful it looks and how much effort is put into giving a fake smile. This is the same person who says, "it's hard to be good, Momma." I am telling you, sometimes it is hard to smile for real, but smiling is good. My point in all of this is, I am going to allow myself to feel the whole range of feelings, but I am also going to try to fake the smile til I make it more so that eventually my smile becomes real and it rubs off on others because I also believe that smiling is contagious and if I can try to make people a little happier, I will, even if sometimes it is hard work.

Will

Meet Will. He is my adorable nephew. He makes me smile and laugh and even though I haven't met him in person, I miss him. I had to steal these pictures.

Will has another Aunt named Mickey. I don't know how I can compete with this. I am not on tv. However, I am hoping that he can't tell the difference between the tv and skype and that he thinks that his aunt Kimmy is a star too. Love you, baby!

Happy 2011!

This is me and my nebulizor at the doctor's office on New Year's Day. I was diagnosed with pneumonia after having a chest x-ray. Those of you who know my mom, she always warned me about getting pneumonia. When I got a cold, she always told me to take deep breaths and she would have me put menthalatum on my chest with a warm towel wrapped around my neck. In fact, she diagnosed me with pnuemonia before the doctor did. Dr. Mom always knows best. Take deep breaths and hold it, people. Then blow it out your mouth. Pneumonia is not fun.

Friday night at the Lewis houshold

Tonight we sat in our "tree room". I affectionately named it that because you can see all of the beautiful trees outside because of the windows that surround the room. I love them.

Tonight I love that the television hasn't been on and that Zachary played with my hair and that he pinky swore that he would play with it more tomorrow if I will scratch his back.

I am listening to Pandora. Oh how I have missed my music.

I love that I can read my scriptures on my new droid. I don't love, however, that today I dropped some frozen sausage on my foot and I now it's swollen and I have a bruise. That is what I get for buying hot sausage for Aaron because I know that he loves it. One last thing... I listened to some Christmas music and Aaron gave me the crook eye. I think I will tell him that he owes me and I can listen to my Christmas music early because I bought him his sausage that attacked me.

What is with Zumba?

Does anyone understand what this Zumba craze is all about?

Colorful Journey

As I walked to the bus stop the other day, I couldn't help but notice my surroundings. The trees here in New England used to make me feel confined. Now they give me peace and I feel blessed to be where I am. It's taken me quite a while to discover that again in my life. It seems like life takes you on one big long journey, but there are lots of little journeys along the way. And at the beginning of each new journey, it feels difficult, exciting, overwhelming and sometimes unbearable. And at the end of each little journey I feel there is a moment that I can breath deep and take it all in and see that God loves me and is blessing me with every little detail. In that moment, I feel secure. In that moment I feel confident. In the next moment, however, is when life throws me another curve ball and I am left speechless because I don't know if I can do it and then I am back where I started where it's difficult, exciting, overwhelming and sometimes unbearable. I think this is our test and this is what we face in mortality. The secret to success I have discovered and will continue to discover I am sure, is FAITH. It seems so simple and yet so complicated, but I love it because I can see all the things that my Heavenly Father wants me to learn and become.

"Fullness"

Thanks Elizabeth for making my day and week sparkle!

Last days with Damian

A lot has happened the last several months. We went from the beginning of the school year to the end in no time. My days have been so full and I have had little time to blog. Tonight I realized that my days alone with my little sweet Damian are numbered. He will be going to school this fall and I think I will be beside myself. We have been two peas in a pod and it hurts to think of how much I will miss him. He is undoubtedly my baby. I thought I would dedicate this post to him and I.



This is Damian the builder.

Damian the student

Playful Damian

Damian in disguise

After bath time cuddled up in his soft towel

Sporty Damian

Entertainer Damian

Focused Damian

Damian in trouble

Winter wonderland Damian

We like to be silly together and sing songs like "I'm bringing home my baby bumble bee" and "My name is Stegosaurus"

Sleepy Damian (Ooooh. So precious). Even though he is 5 now, he likes me to sing Rock a bye baby

Cuddly Damian

I miss him already.

I wanna be like Mike

Guess who is being inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame tomorrow? Michael Jordan. Guess who works in the same building where the NBA Hall of Fame is? Aaron. I wanna sneak in and take Damian to see one of my all time favorite basketball players.

Tart mango madness

My Mickey told me about this heavenly stuff and now I'm addicted and so is Aaron. I would like a lifetime supply please.

Smooth talker

Me: It's a beautiful day Damian.

Damian: It isn't a beautiful day for me.

Me: How come?

Damian: Because there are no beautiful flowers to pick for you Mama.

I love this kid and how did he get to be such a smooth talker. Must have learned it from his dad.

Here is my story of the day I moved to Massachusetts and everything after.

About a month ago, we had a moving truck arrive at our home in Pleasant Grove. If I knew what would happen, I might have stayed in Utah:)
-On the way to Springfield, we realized that Wells Fargo and Wachovia had not fully merged and our checkbook got packed in a box somewhere. After a few phone calls and a trip to Walmart for some money orders, we worked it out so that we'd have money to give the landlord, but we still didn't really have a bank out east.
-We stayed in hotels 4 nights more than we had planned for.
-When we got to our supposed home in East Longmeadow, it smelled of curry and incense, but that was the least of our worries. It was filthy and disgusting and not at all what we expected (let's just say that I was depressed for a few days.) Not knowing what to do, we went to a hotel instead of staying there. At that point we thought we were locked into a contract for 1 yr. (you understand why I was so depressed).
-In talking to the owner of the home, we were able to get out of the contract and he "generously" let us stay in the home until we found another place. I felt sick to my stomach still thinking we might have to stay there and all of our stuff wasn't supposed to be here until the 8th. We got into town the night of the 31st. On the 3rd Aaron started his job and I was freaked out that I had four boys in a place I didn't know. It was a rough week. I don't think I could begin to explain what that week was like for me. We spent a lot of time at parks. Two nights that week, Aaron's boss invited us to stay in his apartment in his basement. We increasingly got more and more worried that our movers would arrive before we found another place and that they would deliver our stuff to what we affectionately called the stinky house. It was crunch time. Saturday the 8th came and we were still without a place. That morning I was making phone calls all over the place hoping for a miracle. I called on a place in Wilbraham, a place we had heard was nice and had excellent schools. I got the lady's voicemail. The driver of our moving truck told us he would be here around 5pm. Around 1:30, I received a call back from April, the Wilbraham lady. They showed us the house. It was just what we needed. I was nervous that they would take too long to do the whole credit check thing and that they wouldn't let us move in for a while. A miracle truly happened that day. We signed a contract late that afternoon. Our movers arrived pretty much on time and here we are in a home that is very nice. On top of that, our landlord let us have a 6 month lease so that we can look to buy a home and we're not locked into a whole year. Now we are getting the boys registered and in one week school starts. Stay tuned for what happens next in my crazy life. Maybe I'll open a Dunkin Donuts/Barbershop.

Purple purses and pearls

This post is in large part due to a shopping trip with my soul mates and dearest friends, my sisters. I adore them. Last night we went to dinner and laughed, and then we went shopping and laughed, and then cut some hair and laughed, and now I wanna cry because I'm leaving them. And although it was painful for Michelle to walk away from her pearl ballet flats at Nordstrom and it was painful for me to walk away from this beautiful Steve Madden purple handbag. . . it's the one of the hardest things in the world to walk away from my sisters.

The BIG move

Pretty much I've been in denial about this, but now it's getting so close that I guess I figure I better post something about the fact that we're moving in a few weeks to Massachusetts. So, there ya go. Any questions?

My race for Mickey

My Mickey ran to Hawaii for a fun vacation so I ran to Thanksgiving Point to take part in the race she signed up for. Aaron and the boys cheered me on at the annual Running with Angels 5k. We had a pretty good time and I did better than last year on my time.

My clothes are ugly. Does anyone wanna go shopping?

Looking forward to it

My Makeover