What's that noise?

Do you ever hear things during the night and can't figure out what it is? Yesterday I woke up very early in the morning because I kept hearing this strange whistling noise. It almost sounded like a baby wheezing. I could for the life of me figure out what it was. It was bugging the crap out of me so I had to get up and figure it out.

Tanner had fallen asleep with his recorder in his mouth and when he exhaled it would whistle. I had to wake him up to take it away and he kept insisting he was awake the whole time. He had planned on waiting for me to go to sleep so that he could get up and practice during the night. He is trying to get better than Sarah but he never has time to practice. I guess he couldn't outlast me and he finally crashed with it still in his mouth.

Life is so unfair!

Brendan comes home from school today to let me know that his shoes were falling apart and his feet had outgrown them. (they are only 2 months old) I told him there is only five weeks left in the school and he wasn't getting new shoes. He also told me that his school supplies needed to be updated. he is almost out of pencils, his markers are almost dry, his colored pencils are little stumps. Again there is only five weeks left of school and he has to make do with what he has. So he has a request - mom could you please buy a better kind of shoes next year and a better quality of school supplies? (we buy the supply kits from the schools) Then he announced that I should let him stay up later because he is older than the other kids. He's practically a teenager he said. He has friends that don't even have a bedtime so it isn't fair that he goes to bed at 7:30 like a baby. I told him that he can stay up as late as he wants as long as he is in his bed. Then he requested a lock for his room which I agreed to as long as he understands that he doesn't get to lock out mom and dad. He huffed and rolled his eyes and walked away. Life is so unfair when your eleven and a half!

Whatever Mom

When my kids use the computer they are only supposed to go to educational websites. Yesterday one of the kids I babysit went to a cartoon network sight and it locked up my computer. I told them that cartoon network was banned from our house and they were not to go to that site again. Zander thought he'd be sneaky and try again while I was down stairs and the computer got locked up so he was busted. I told him the rules and threatened to take away his computer privileges if he did it again. I told all the kids they have to ask me before they go to a new website so it doesn't break the computer. This morning Zander snuck upstairs to try again while I made breakfast and again it locked up the computer. I told him he was grounded from the computer because he didn't fallow the rules and he broke the computer. He was very upset and went to the play room to seek comfort from the boys. when they asked what was wrong he said in a very loud sob that mom was angry because cartoon network broke the computer. They all started laughing and Brendan and Tanner said that's not true you know, she just tells you that so you won't go to that sight because it isn't educational. This is their new thing, they think when I tell them something I am lying so that they will do what I want them to do not what they want to do. I have no idea how this started. I am hearing a whole lot of Yeah, right mom and Whatever mom. It's driving me crazy. I am so glad we are passed the rolling our eyes at mom phase because if that went a long with whatever mom they would have to go live in the barn with the chickens or something.

School Pictures

Brendan is 11 now. He is taking band this year and loves to garden and doing experiments around the house. He is still just as loving as ever and knows no strangers.

Sarah is 10 and is still as active as a flea. She loves aggravating her brothers and thinks every girl that comes into our house should stay and be her sister. She is girl deprived. (not a very good picture I know but she had pictures after PE)

Tanner just turned 9. He is very responsible, more so than the other kids. He wants to go on a mission when he grows up and on Sunday he likes to sit with the missionaries and read scriptures like they do.

Zander will be 7 in a month. He is our stubborn one who refuses to read or tie his shoes.He's also a daddies boy. He wants to do everything that daddies doing. He enjoys a good nap and still asks for one almost every day when he comes home from school.

I broke the washer

Okay, some of you may remember the post about me breaking appliances and how the kids and Oscar voted that I couldn't get the big washer because I would break it, well I broke the new washer. Every thing was going great and then all of a sudden it started jumping around the laundry room. It is heavier than I am so sitting on it didn't work. It put a dent in the dryer and two dents in the fridge and a small hole in the wall (but i can fix that before Oscar gets home). I am cursed when it comes to appliances! I am blaming it on Oscar because he and the guy at Lowe's laid it back when they were loading it up yesterday even though the guy at Lowe's said that laying it back wouldn't cause damage. I still say it's their fault.

My new washer

It's not the super sized three times larger than a normal washer model that I wanted but I'm okay with this one and Oscar said I couldn't spend $1200 on one machine anyways. Honestly, I am just grateful to have a working machine and excited to get the laundry room and pantry cleaned back up.

Normally I can install the appliances myself but this sucker was heavy. It weighed more than my massively large fridge and I think more than the deep freezer. It took both Elder Samani and Oscar to move it into the house.

Elder Sumani can't come for dinner these days without being put to work. Oh, and he's also good at entertaining children when I'm a little late on dinner.

Five little puff balls :)

Here are the five that have manged to survive the hatch.

Chickies #6 & #7

Our last two chicks hatched last night. I didn't think they were gonna make it. They had quit pecking and weren't making noise anymore but then this morning around 3 am they were chirping like crazy.

We had four other eggs that I don't think are gonna hatch. I'm gonna leave them in the incubator for two or three day to see if anything happens but I think were done.

Chickie #5

Well here he is all wet and slimy

And here are #3 & #4 almost dry and gettin fluffy.

This sucks!

Ten minutes ago I had 3 chicks fixing to pop out and now one has died. While fighting to get out it rolled its shell over and all the liquid inside the egg covered it's face and it drowned. It was perfectly healthy and almost out and now it's dead.

Now for the good news - chickie #4 has hatched and is still alive. Lets hope it stays that way.

The race is on

I think these three are competing to hold the title of chickie #4

chickie # 3

Our third chickie hatched this morning and we have 5 others trying to make it out to join him.

Poor Chickie :(

The little chick didn't make it through the night. I think he was having issues with being alone and the other chickies are taking their time hatching out. I had to take him out of the incubator when he got strong enough to stand so that he didn't stand up and get burned on the heating element. Chicks need to be with other chicks the don't do as well alone. We thought he was doing okay and could make it by himself until the others finished hatching today but we were wrong. We have six trying to hatch this morning so hopefully we'll have better luck today.

Chickie

He's almost dry and ready to go to his new home.

Videos of him trying to walk.

Oh, and he is afraid of anything that moves so he keeps pecking his own feet. It's so cute.

Our first chickie!!

Last night I noticed that when we took the light off the box to check on the chicks the partially hatched chick would struggle and try to get out of it's shell but when the light was over the box it would go back to sleep and quit trying to hatch. We were using the light for heat because they have to stay around 100 degrees for the first couple of weeks or they will die. I put the little guy back in the incubator where it was dark so he could stay warm without any light and it worked. Around 2:30am Oscar went down stairs and found the little guy snuggled up between two or three other eggs.

Our little chick that wasn't doing so well didn't make it. He gave up around 7:30 last night.

The dryer died:(

My washer died about 2 weeks ago so we have been waiting for Oscar to get paid to buy a new one. Saturday I went to the laundry mat to wash clothes and brought them home to dry but then last night the dryer died. I keep telling my husband that we should get one of those really big washer/dryer sets that can wash like 16 pairs of jeans and dry them all in the same amount of time as 4 pairs of jeans and it uses less water and electricity to do it. He said no. They are like $1200 and he and the kids took a vote and decided that I would break them in the first year and we won't have a washer and dryer for another whole year. Brendan said you know mom this is cuz you break things. You have to get the cheap ones because you are going to just break them. I'm sure I've said similar words to him more than once so now it's come back to bite me on the butt. The all decided they would rather use the money for something else like a backyard play system with a tree house and a zip line and monkey bars that just happens to be exactly the same price as my washer/dryer combo. I may give in since we can't have a trampoline or water slide this year and I have already told them there will be no field trips this summer either. I don't entertain children so we'll see what happens on Thursday (pay day). I think if they get the play system they'll be doing the laundry over the summer.

Chicks

Our chick are hatching!!! I will be posting picture over the next couple of days. Here are the pics from this morning.

I kept hearing this tiny little chirp randomly all morning but when I went to the incubator nothing was happening. Finally after checking the eggs like ten time I put on to my ear and heard a little chirp. By lunchtime two had piped hole in their shells. Unfortunately two others are no longer moving or making noise. I hope they make it.

Ricky's 18th Birthday

The kids love going to visit Oscar's family. We all have such a great time and eat way too much food. Saturday we celebrated Ricky's birthday. We took a ton of photos so I've included a slide show. Here are some of our favorite photos of the night.

Happy Easter

Usually I do the Easter shopping but this year I sent Oscar to do the shopping. I told him to get outdoor toys like sand castle buckets and sports equipment and to get each kids a package of candy like M&M's or something. He came back with plastic eggs and a bunch of little toys and a lot of confetti. It was a mess but they had fun. For the boys he got rubber band plains and a badminton set and Sarah got a bunny. It was a mess but they had fun.

Zander was a little scared of the confetti eggs at first but he got over it.

Hannah came home with us after church so Sarah selectively shared her treats.

Instead of candy Oscar bought two kind of Yogo's snacks. They are Tanners favorite but I never buy them because they are too expensive and I hardly ever give them fruit snacks.

Brendan is our not messy child so he cautiously opened his eggs behind the couch to avoid getting dirty.

Sarah and Hannah had a blast with the confetti while the boys ate all the treats.

After eating like 16 Yogo's Brendan decided to cut them open to find out what's actually in there. He was a little disappointed to find that they aren't actually filled with yogurt like the box said. We always make them wait until after church before they get their treats and every years some one wakes up and asks why the Easter Bunny didn't come. Every year we have to remind them that we don't have an Easter Bunny we have an Easter Daddy and they can have treats after church.

We also make them write down everything they know about Easter

Brendan - I know about Easter day that the Christ died and it really is supposed to be about Jesus and not that Easter Bunny. He died for us and we got to give away all of our sins to him. He died for our sins.

Sarah - Easter is when Jesus died for us. He died to repent for our sins and the very next Easter he came back to life again. That is why we have Easter. She also drew a picture of Jesus on the cross with a speech bubble that says I repent for everyone, please for give them.

Hannah - What Easter really is made of. Easter is when Jesus died and repented for our sins and came back to life but first he stayed on the cross for three days stinking and rotted and dead and then he came back to life again and so will we.

Tanner - Easter is the day Jesus rose from the dead. We are not supposed to be celebrating, we are supposed to be calm.

Zander drew a picture of a bunny because he couldn't draw Jesus he said. I think he's a little upset that we don't have an Easter Bunny but he'll get over it.

Time Out

Apparently Time Out is exhausting. Two of the kids went to time out for biting and pinching other kids. After a few minutes I noticed they weren't crying any more. When I went to check on them they had both crashed. My day just got a lot easier. I love early naps!!

Blog Award

I was nominated by Sharla for this award. I wasn't much of a blogger until someone told me about blog books and how she prints her blog every year because she never has time for scrap booking. I'm now addicted to blogging because it is a lot less mess than a scrapbook.
Thanks Sharla for the award.

"These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers. Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award."
Here are my eight nominees:
Cassity

Cindy

Denise

Emily

Ginny

Michelle

Randi

Shannon (not me)

Family Pictures

Last Saturday we went to the Botanical Gardens for family Pictures. My friend Denise took the pictures while her husband Robert tried to entertain children. She is so amazing and she even got pictures of all of my children to smiling at the same time. We do pictures every year and every year they are terrible. Zander is always grouchy, Brendan has a fake smile, Sarah never sits still so she is usually a blur, and Tanner is usually making funny faces. In the end Oscar usually looks angry and I look like I am going to scream out of frustration because no one cooperates. This year was different though because I bribed Zander. I told him if he was good I would let him play in the mud and he was good. When he behaved they all behaved.

If you click on the last picture you'll notice that Tanner snuck in bunny ears.

Chunky Monkey

It took a lot of searching but I finally found a baby picture of Tanner in a box this morning.

He was such a chunk!

What's for lunch?

Okay, so I think my husband is trying to fatten me up before he leaves so I don't run off and divorce him while he's in Afghanistan. (because that happens) He keeps bringing me treats and junk food. Today he surprised me with my favorite lunch ever.

Seasoned fries and blue cheese dressing from the farmers market. There was also a giant brownie, but I ate it, this is the leftovers of my lunch. At the Ridgmar Farmers Market you can get a huge basket of fries(that basket was over flowing before I ate them) and a giant brownie for $2 so whenever my husband has to go to the base during his lunch break he stops at the farmers market so he can surprise me with lunch. It used to be a once every couple of months thing, but now it happens a couple of times a month. He also keeps bringing me chocolate bars and cookies and on his drill weekends he brings me whoppers he says because there is a Burger King on the base but I think he has other motives.

Candled Eggs

Candling eggs is like a sonogram for chickens. Here are some pictures of our candled eggs that we have been incubating.

The first is a fresh egg that we candled for comparison.


This one is an older egg and contains a large chick. The big dark shadow is the chick.



This is a younger egg with a smaller chick.


Here is a green egg that we candled with a very small chick.

I wish my camcorder worked in the dark so I could post a video. When you candle the eggs you can see the heart beating and on older chicks you can even see them moving around. There were a couple of very active chicks that seemed to be jumping in their shells. They looked like early baby sonogram videos.