Problems with the new house...

Okay so you know what this is right... obviously it is a burner for a electric stove. Although if you are really creative or desperate perhaps, this also doubles as a way to heat up water in a gas water heater. It seems like all you need to do is run some wires to this and then plug those wires in. Or so that is what previous owners/tenants (or someone) did at our new house.

I think I told you we got the water on, but didn't have hot water. I figured it was just because the tank was just filling up, but it turned out that the pilot light was off. As Robert was trying to light the light (it was suppose to be a self-ignighting hot water heater... I don't know much about all this) it wasn't working. We decided to call someone that knew what they were doing instead of us blowing our house up. I call Questar, they said they can't do it, but they could walk me through it on the phone. Yeah -- no thanks on that!! We decided to have a service call to the guys that did our furnace at our old house and they could also check out the furnace at the new house to make sure things are all good. Robert had mentioned that something felt loose under the water heater. Still no hot water though, no problem, guy comes to look at it on Tuesday, we move on Wednesday.

I go out to the house on Tuesday to meet the repair guy, he comes back up from the basement with this electric burner from a stove with two wires connected to it. He said this was the problem there is no hot water, this was under the hot water heater, and the REAL parts are missing and no where to be seen, we will have to order new parts. I am just looking at the heating element just laughing thinking, what was that all about? "Can't wait to tell Robert about this one!!" Turns out, that the parts won't be in until maybe Monday, and if they get them in early monday they can fix it but if not, it will have to wait until Tuesday. The whole drive home back to the old house I am just chuckling, thinking of Robert saying, "something just doesn't feel right there, it is all loose." Now we know why it wasn't lighting or turning on and the gas was just coming out doing nothing.

Then on Wednesday we had hired some movers, which we thought would be easier and faster, make one trip not have to worry about everything... that was a mistake. When I talked to the guy on the phone he told me the time started when they got to the house and it ended at the new house when they were done. No paid travel time. Well, they charged us for that. I called the guy I talked to back, and he won't return my calls and I get put on "hold" and end back up at the main menu and dial his extention again just to get his voice mail. Man I am mad about it all! It was quick and it was nice to have someone else do it all. They just didn't meet my standards I guess. They stopped once at our old house "for a break" and then once again at our new house "for a break" while they did various things from smoking to talking on the phone. And why should I pay them to have a cigarette or call their wife? (Okay, I don't know who they were calling, and it wasn't that they were smoking that bothered me, they could have been reading the BOM for all I cared, but why should I pay them to take a break to do that?) Still a little upset about it all.

We got all our stuff to our new house, the furniture it pretty much in place, all boxes went to the garage. I had numbered most all the boxes and then put a master sheet together of what was in box #1, #37 (which happened to be shoes which I had to find today) and then where it belonged. So box #37 was to go to the "loft" since they were everyone's shoes to be sorted out in the middle of all the bedrooms. I had over 140 boxes crazy huh! Now when I am looking for something, I go to my list and find what box and then go get that box. Okay back to my point, we got all our boxes unloaded, some of the boxes are damaged, since they didn't really care what was on top of what boxes, and I have sugar leaking out of a box somewhere because I unloaded a kitchen box that had sugar in it.... can't wait to find that box with my #10 can sugar that has gotten opened I suppose. They broke a few of my crates and totes that had stuff in them. The movers just weren't real careful. I opened a box today with some colored decorative bottles in them to find one was broken. Bummer! Oh well, at least we are done with that part.

Meanwhile, we are here at our new house.... enjoying the space, washing hands in cold water, heating up pans of hot water to do dishes, and boiling water to add to the washing machine to wash clothes... fun huh! It almost feels like a fancy way to go camping.

Oh yes, speaking of washing clothes, I got one for that one too. Our dryer has the "wrong" hook up for this house. Our dryer has a 3 point cord and the outlet is a 4 point (I think is what they call it) so Robert rewires our outlet so the dryer can plug into it. We get the dryer going, YIPPEE! When we hooked up the washer, there was a little bit of leaking from the hoses, figured some white "teflon?" tape would do the trick or some tools to tighten it would work, all which happens to be at the old house still. We get the right stuff and hook all that up, no more leaks. I start filling the washer up with clothes and turn it on to wash some colors... since I haven't really washed clothes for several days and hadn't done much before that since I was focusing more on moving then laundry. I keep adding clothes in the washer, and then notice all this water coming out from under the washing machine, getting my bare feet all wet. I think, "Man, this dumb washer! The hoses must not be tight enough, how did that happen?" I turn the machine off, only to keep hearing a GUSHING of water. I scoot the washer out a bit so I can get a look behind it to see that the drain hose had came off the back and now the water was just gushing out everywhere, going on the floor, under the dryer, under the washer... I am looking for anything right there to clean up the mess. I find some towels and some sheets (which sheets don't really work so great) and start soaking up as much as I can. I get myself sort of lodged behind the washing machine and the wall and the washer is shoved up against the door so it can barely open. I hear the girls shouting and all excited. They then yell, "Let's go tell Mom!" They run into the laundry room, telling me there is a flood in the basement. I am thinking, you have got to be kidding! This is rediculous. I climb back over the washer, across the dryer, squeeze through the narrow doorway and go down to the basement to find the celing dripping with water and foamy bubbles and puddles on the floor. After some cleaning and testing, it turns out the water just came through the floor, but I thought the water lines where leaking. Phew!!

What a time, what a time! I am hoping by Monday we will have hot water, and then that will make things much easier. We got the whole washer things solved. It is great except for the part of trying to get hot water or warm water to wash clothes. Cold water seems to really make the soap just clump up and not do any good. Good thing for a big pot of water and a stove to heat it on.

The phone guy said that someone had taken like half the guts out of the phone box outside. I am wondering if someone was trying to fix things themselves, or hook things up themselves. Weird huh! The more things we find out the more we get nervous of things to come.

Sorry about the long post... I just had so much to say, or should I say vent about. Oh... another thing, they don't have DSL here... or not through Qwest like we had. We can get a "air card" is what they call it I guess, it is like faster internet which goes through verizon cell phone signals, does that make sense? Not sure how I like that. But... if you go over some many Gigabytes or whatever it is, they will charge you extra. How do they determine how we do that? I am not sure, but I am sure they will let us know. I haven't let the girls even touch the computer until I know how much it is going to be for the stuff Robert and I do on the computer. Okay, I really should get to bed, I am exhausted!!

Time for a catch up post!

Has it really been that long? It seems like months! I have been so busy and so stressed that I haven't had time to get on here to post, and yet when I have thought I would like to take a minute to post, then I haven't had a computer hooked up or had Internet access. (Apparently there is only dial-up out in our area now... FUN!) That is another story in itself, but first things first!

Before our move, it seemed like Amber was going crazy making mess after mess and and unpacking each box she could get her hands on. Some of them she wouldn't unpack, but just unorganized so the books would be all flopped down or the items would be arranged in a way that I would have to redo them so that I could get more in the box. What a time! We somehow ended up with Oreo's or should I say name brand Oreo's (since I am cheap), it must have been an impulse buy, since I normally don't buy cookies. Amber was eating the cookies, and she would eat only the middle filling part and then put the cookie back together and put it back in the container. You definitely didn't want to eat any of the ones that looked skinny or a little on the soft side since she would also kind of slobber or suck on them.

The girls one day were play restaurant where Emily would order their meals and then bring them back to them. I was selling some scrapbook paper and they stacked up to make a lovely table I suppose, and even seats too.


I think the cat must have figured out that something was going on with our packing and all, he started sleeping with Samantha, which is a big NO NO. But I couldn't resist getting a picture before I scolded him and kicked him out of there while I told him what a bad cat he was.


Last Saturday we had access to the house, we had closed, got our keys (well kind of) and I thought I would take the girls out and we would do the cleaning of the cabinets and shelves and the bathrooms and all that fun stuff. Robert's parents had gotten into town the night before so they were coming out to see our house and to help clean.

I get to the house, look for where I thought the keys were to be, can't find them. I am trying to use Robert's cell phone, which I am totally unfamiliar with, I feel like such an idiot with it, I have a hard time answering a phone call on it, much less make a phone call. I call our agent, he tells me where the key is again, I look for it to find a bees nest under the compartment that I have to get into to get the keys... I am thinking NO WAY! I brave up and open the compartment to get the keys and softly shut the door. I guess the bees where too cold to really care.

I go get the girls out of the car and tell them they can get out now, since I have the keys and we have access to the house. I unload all my cleaning stuff and misc. stuff I was bringing of Rob's and all. I shut the door and hear the "click" of the locks. I remember and notice at the same time that I left my keys (which were really Robert's set of keys) on the front seat. Great! No problem, when Robert is done with the Turkey Bowl, I will have him bring me my keys if they are not in my purse already. (I totally forgot to look for my keys or tell Robert that I locked myself out.)

I get in the house, turn on the water... no water! Great! I go to another faucet, nothing. I think back and remember that the water was SUPPOSE to be turned on. I go to the basement where I remembered seeing the water valve, turn it on, Yippee! Water is flowing! I am cleaning, the girls are helping a little, Robert gets to the house, his parents come, we talk and I clean more and get all done, we are ready to go back to our old house to go to a birthday party. As I walk out to the car, I remember I don't have keys! Oooops! Robert then has to go all the way back home, get my set of keys (which were not in my purse) and come all the way back out. Which then made us super late for our birthday party we were suppose to be at. Of course I am thinking, now I am stuck here, nothing to eat, the girls are starving, I am done cleaning all I can clean. And we are just stuck here!

Here are a few pictures the girls took and some I took too. This is the side of our yard, the back part. It is really shallow, but the sides are deeper, if that makes sense. We have two levels of rock walls on the side, which will be fun to landscape with. The yard is total weeds, mostly stickers! It will take some major time to fix up.

This is at the top of the stairs, looking into the loft area where the kids will have their toys and TV for movies or what not. It should be a nice place for them to play.

This is Lindsey coming up the stairs. The stairs have this railing all the way down and around the top edges too. It is kinda fun!

This is the top of the stairs, the railing goes around to the master bedroom, and you can see down to the front door through the railing on the stairs too, it is all open.

We seem to have a cat too! This cat seems to think it lives here! Who knows, maybe it does. The girls named it Carmel and now they have changed it to Pumpkin Pie, they call it Pumpkin for short.

A sweet moment

I have been so tired of my girls fighting and their lack of love toward one another. I keep trying to tell them that one day they will be best friends. Emily wanted to go to Savers the other day, so I told her we could after school, IF she could be loving to her sisters, since it seems like she is the one that starts it all. I even found a note on the floor the other day that said, "I hat you Lauren!" I am pretty sure it meant hate, and didn't have anything to do with things you put on your head. Of course when I asked the girls, no one did it. They even went to extremes of saying, "I have nicer handwriting than that..." I don't really think it was Emily, she spells really good, so I would have guessed she would have spelled it correctly, and Lauren most likely would not have written herself a hate note.... leaving Lindsey as the person responsible. It bothers me too, because we don't even allow the word HATE in our house, yet here I find this silly note. I am sure it was out of anger, but that is my whole point. It seems that every day they are angry or are mean to each other. I don't really remember being that mean or unthoughtful to my brothers and sisters as I grew up, but maybe I am not remembering correctly. I remember not getting along all the time, but not like what my girls do.

We tried to go to Savers after school, but before I even got Amber out of the car, we were having issues with the girls NOT behaving and showing kindness to each other, so I said I am not going in. Emily wanted a new skirt, since the skirt she was wearing is too small, I told her she needed o retire it, but it is her FAVORITE skirt. Too bad for Emily..., I wasn't going to put up with them acting out in the store. I dislike it so much when we are in the comfort of our own home, that at the store it so drains me and makes me so tired!!

This has been going on for some time.... I am SO tired of it, and I have tried several things, having them do secret acts of service for one another, having dinner discussions, going around the room and telling something you like about someone else or something that is special... I was wondering when I would see any happiness. Don't get me wrong, they do play together sometimes, but it seems like the fighting definitely out numbers the quiet playful times they have together. Many times too, Emily will pick one of the twins to play with but then leave the other one out, and very obviously dislike the outsider. I was hoping maybe with the new house and more space the girls would get along better.

This morning, I get the girls up for school. I had gone to Savers last night to return some stuff and look for a skirt for Emily. I found one that she would like, along with a pair of pants, and 2 shirts and a pair of snow boots for her. I was showing her the things and asking if she approved. She liked them all. Then she was telling Lindsey (who was protesting that she didn't get anything) that she could wear one of her new skirts. Lindsey was pretty excited about that. Then Emily told Lauren she could wear her skirt from the day before that she is suppose to "retire" to them. The whole morning the girls were being so good and Emily was letting them wear her clothes (which she normally NEVER does). She even helped Lindsey find a shirt to go with the skirt she was wearing. I thought, what a sweet moment! I LOVED every minute of it. Emily then got them all little jackets (of hers) so they could all be alike in the clothes they were wearing.... all wearing skirts and shirts with tank tops or shirts under them, and then boots, and these light jackets Emily picked out.

I was smiling so much inside! I complimented the girls on how well they were doing and how pleased I was with them for getting along. When I dropped them off, they told each other, "Let's play at recess! Meet me at the tree...." I was wondering where MY girls had gone, and who were these girls that were acting like best friends? Again I was so touched that for whatever reason, prayers answered, the girls growing up, the new move coming up.... whatever it was, I was so pleased and relieved to know that maybe someday they will not constantly fight and seem to be enemies all the time.

Maybe tomorrow or even this evening won't go as smooth as this morning, but for the sweet moment of this morning, I can take it knowing that somewhere in there, there is love and kindness. What a glorious moment!!

It's all in the family

I saw this pic, and thought the twins sure looked like Samantha... can you tell which is Lauren and which is Lindsey? Both of the girls were about 3 months old. Emily was just over 2 years.This is Samantha at about 4 months.

Pumpkins and snakes

I figure since we are moving (see previous post) I might as well get busy packing and cleaning up the outside of the house. Take down the cobwebs that I put up and the ones that have accumulated while we have been here. Looking at the jack-o-lanterns that are rotting away.... pumpkins don't seem to last very long once you cut them open and empty them out. Amber was playing with the pumpkins and then said, "what that? Oh, it a lil nake" and I am trying to figure out what she is talking about... I see the snake, am startled and say "OOOhhh!!!!" as I say backing up and basically freaking out. Then realizing what my reaction is and trying to stay positive and not scare Amber (one day she will see how yucky and scary and unnatural these footless creatures are) I change my voice and say in a nice story book type voice, " a snake, isn't that funny, he is in the pumpkin." Although I wasn't thinking funny, I was thinking nasty creature, scary sneaky creature.... and I decided to work on the inside boxing instead of worrying about the Halloween decorations (nasty snake!!).

Unfortunately as I got the camera he was on his way out of the pumpkin, instead of his little head sticking out the top, waving his little forked tongue at Amber. His scary defence worked on me!!

With tears in my eyes...

I feel much like Judy as she posted her thoughts on the changes of her RS calling and how she was having a hard time. Many years ago, we decided to move, started packing things up and then decided it wasn't time or that it wasn't a good thing anymore. Now, 2 kids later and many more friends... we are faced with that same problem... house too small, kids getting bigger.... It is time to move.

How I wish this day would never come... I thought maybe if I got all this "good bye" stuff out of the way I can emotionally move on and get things going here that I need to do. Even though I didn't want to face this day, I knew realistically it would happen someday since our house is just too small for us. We have been here for 8 years, when we got the house it was great for us, we had 3 bedrooms and one little baby. Then we had twins which stretched things out a bit but then we gained possession over the basement apartment. Now 2 more babies later we are bursting out of this house. I can't ever seem to be organized or find the things I have "stored" away. If we could dig ourselves a basement under our house that might fix our space issue, but I don't know how safe that would be or sane. I feel so blessed that we are financially in a spot to do this, and be able to upgrade our house to a newer and bigger model. In times of hearing of job loss and financial hardships, I feel we are as Nephi said, "Favored of the Lord..." (I guess those bigger than I wanted to make donations to the friends of scouting paid off.)

My mind is racing, I am not sure how to get anything out there... except that I sure love this area! I love all the neighbors here and friends we have made. I feel like I still haven't made all the friends here that I wanted to. I keep thinking of this one or that one that I didn't get to know as well as I wanted to. Every time we have talked about moving, I just keep thinking it wasn't time or it wasn't a good enough place to go... being spoiled with our abundance space in our backyard and such a wonderful street with lots of kids for our girls to play with... and the amazing friends I have here.

It brings me back to that exciting and scary time when I moved to Utah. I remember packing up all my stuff in a u-haul trailer. Looking at the trailer and thinking, what am I doing? Is this what I should be doing? It was so "bittersweet" because I was moving to Utah to get married to my best friend and start a family which I had so longed to do, but on the flip side I was leaving all I ever knew behind. Even growing up, I never moved or had much change in my life like this. I did move out of my parents house after school ended, but that was just a few miles away. I was leaving all my family behind and was really scared, yet excited all together. I remember too that Robert couldn't come get me so he sent his best friend and his wife to come get me and my trailer of stuff. I wanted to cry my eyes out the whole way here... but didn't want to because of the company I was with. Saying bye to my parents and family was so hard. Coming to a new place in my life which would strengthen me. I felt like I was leaving one life, and starting a whole new one.

Since then, we have moved a few times, but we hadn't stayed anywhere long enough to really be too attached. I am feeling pretty attached here, so this is really tough for me. I am excited to get in a bigger house that has room for our family, but wish we could just pick up that new house and drop it down on this house and stay put. Does anyone know how to do that?

I really don't look forward to starting all over in a new ward or in a new neighborhood. I don't like change really. The one thing that makes it seem easier is that we are keeping our house on 550 W to rent out, so we will be here from time to time to maintain the yard or what not. It will give us a good reason to come back often I guess. Of course it won't be the same as living here though.

I don't even know how to say good bye... I think of certain ones that I have really gotten to know well. I am afraid I can't and won't be able to even say good bye since I get so emotional, I am crying now thinking about it all. I have to stay positive and be strong for my girls though. Especially Emily, she has been excited to move until we told her we got the house and we are moving, then all of a sudden she wasn't so excited. She started getting all sad about leaving her friends. I know she will shed tears, and I will sob with her too.

I think about the callings I have had here, the people I have served with, the people I love here, the youth which some are not youth anymore that I served and so love. Sometimes I think how selfish I am being, going through this move, it is just a move. I think of those who have suffered great trials and yet I am whining about moving to a newer house, that I picked out and decided to do. I guess I should just "cowboy up" and get over it. I am too weak to I guess. Maybe if I would stop being so dramatic and just move forward it would be easier, but I haven't learned to do things that way. Instead I have to complain and whine and compare everything and look back to things that might have been or should have been or could have been... instead of focusing on the future.

I sure will miss everyone here.... I will miss the relationships I have made, will be sad to leave those I love and those that have done so much for me and my family. I always pictured us living here forever. I know this move will strengthen me and my family. Hopefully make my girls come closer together and help them realize how important families are, and how sisters can be best friends too. (Although I probably didn't figure that out until mich later in my life.) Maybe now that I have gotten this off my mind, I can get some things done around here. I have been just so foggy minded... trying to figure out how to announce this news to everyone. It's not really something I feel I can just say, "Hi there, we are moving! We bought a new house!" I am excited to move, excited but with tears in my eyes.

Finally Halloween and more

I have finally got my halloween pictures up here. This last week has been a whirl-wind and this week is even more busy, or would that be busy-er? The girls are doing great in school... I can't believe it is nearly Thanksgiving and then Christmas will be here right around the corner as well. How did that happen so fast?

I have a load of pictures here to put up, so here we go, randomly...



Isn't she so cute... what a doll, and she is starting to sit up by herself. It is only for a few minutes and has to be totally supervised, because you never know when she might crash.

Samantha is so fun, she smiles and giggles, I love it! She is getting to really use her hands too, she will grab my pant legs or my skirt on Sundays, or toys or things she sees in reach on the ground (which is a good sign I need to do better are keeping the floors clean and debri free). The girls seem to really like her as well. Amber was playing with her the other day too. I think the bigger Samantha gets, the more Amber will interact with her.

Amber in her "little giraffe" costume. When Halloween came, I thought she was going to be a spider, but when we put the costume on her, she didn't want to do it. I put on like 3 different costumes, and it was like time to go, and she still didn't have a costume. I finally just talked her into wearing this one... phew! Which was great, it was nice and warm.

Lindsey is a vampire, which yucky blood, and this is her best friend from school, Tess. Tess looked really cute too! Lindsey was so pleased Tess was there at the same time we were doing pictures so they could get one together.

Here Lauren and Emily are in the leaves that are in our front yard. Lauren really poses and makes great faces for the camera.

And as for the last posting of "Potty Training" it didn't work. We had more accidents then potty in the toilet. I guess I will try again later. I really thought she was really ready. She was showing signs, she would even wake up in the morning and say she was soggy and wanted to be changed. She did tell me when she went potty on the floor, but just wasn't getting into the toilet or even trying to. In fact the thing that made me decide to try again later was the following story....

On the second day of potty training, Amber had panties on, had gone potty once on the floor. I was going potty and asked her if she wanted to go to. She tried and got up quickly, and I kept telling her to sit back down and try it again. She just kept getting back up. As I was washing my hands, she wanted to wash her hands too. I thought, "sure, go ahead... I will go get Samantha dressed." Figuring this usually keeps her busy for a little bit washing her hands over and over. I came back into the bathroom because I heard her splashing in some water. I assumed she had spilled lots of water on the floor or the stool she was on and was now patting her hand in it. I came in to the bathroom and seeing that was what happened. I picked up Amber to get her out of the water, and she grabs my shoulder to hang on with her wet hand. She then says, "I went potty" and points to the stool. I was like, YUCK! Those aren't wet hands those are potty hands! Now for sure she needed to wash her hands and I wanted to take a shower! After all that, and the idea of her JUST being on the potty a few minutes before that and not going potty, I would just bag it and do it again in the summer time or something. Sooooo, we are still 2 in diapers, with the added formula expense. Oh well I guess!

Potty Training 101

Amber is 2 yrs old, normally I try this closer to 3, but Amber seems interested in going potty. Maybe beacuse the older girls... I got some new panties for Amber... the ones we have are all TOO small, even the ones I bought were too small. I couldn't find any 12 or 18 month panties... which is the size she normally wears. I stocked up on "potty treats" which include m&m's, dots, marshmellows, skittles, jelly beans... most anything I could find in our cupboards or in the kids candy that is small and not too sticky.

She went potty as soon as we got home, I put some panties on her, gave her the potty treats to pick out of and she then called "dad" to tell him she had panites on and she went potty in the toilet and got a potty treat.

We will see how this all goes, I think sometimes "I" am the one that is potty trained by asking her if she needs to go and making sure she gets to the bathroom frequently. My idea of potty trained is when they TELL you they need to go, so "I" may be potty trained here first, but hopefully she will get the idea.

I think if we don't have diapers for here anymore, that might almost pay for the formula that Samantha has started on. We will see how it goes. (fingers crossed!!) It seems like for the first 2 days at least, I am just cleaning floors, clothes, and furniture from the potty not getting where it is suppose to be! So far this morning, she is not keeping her panties on, she just keeps taking them off. Wish me luck!!