Annual Indiana Vacation

My Personal Challenge was sabatoged by a standard that was set to high. It all started with our wonderful vaction to Indiana to visit with my family and celebrate my great grandmother's 91st birthday!
The drive there was absolutely beautiful!! We drove through Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, and into Indiana. The large fields, changing leaves displaying fall colors, and the large barns found on many farms were breathtaking:

I enjoy the drive back more and more each year. However, this year was a little bit more difficult with a 5 years old asking every five minutes, "When are we gonna get there?"; a two year old who refused to keep her arm in her seatbelt; and a 3 month old that needed to be nursed every two hours. The kids were EXHASTED by the 13 hour car ride:

Our first evening in Indiana, we met up with family for a small cookout at my Great Aunt Darla's house. We roasted the kids' some hot dogs while they played in the gravel. As Nikholi bit into his hot dog, he thought he had a rock in his mouth. Promptly telling my Great Aunt Dani, she instructed him to throw it back into the gravel where it belongs. Little did we know, that pesky rock that was in his mouth was his tooth. Nikholi lost his first tooth (LITERALLY)!

We searched with a flashlight and found nothing. So when we checked-in to the condo, Nikholi and I sat down to write a letter to the tooth fairy. We explained that we he lost it in his great great aunt Darla's gravel pit. The next morning he was soo excited that the toothfairy found him and found his tooth, leaving him $1.49!
Our second day in town we went up to Mclure's Apple Orchard, one of my favorite places in Indiana. Since Nikholi was missing his school field trip to the Westmoreland Apple Farm, we decided to take him on a field trip with another kindergarten class from Indiana. We were running a little ahead of schedule so we enjoyed lunch at the little resturant on the farm. I had a delicious tuna sandwhich with celery, apples, and walnuts, on a crossant. Nikholi had some pulled pork with apples and peaches. Roger had an egg salad sandwich and Kambri had a PB&J. Best of all, each dish came with fresh apples. We also ordered some apple dumplings to go.
Afterward, we took the kids over to play on the beautifully built playground. I want a playground like this. Eventually, one day, when we finally buy a house, I'm gonna build one like this:

On the field trip, Lttl1 slept soundly:

Kambri was a bit fussy and had daddy carry her every where. I'm assuming she just liked the view from there:

The field trip started with learning about farm animals. They pulled the animals out one by one for the kids to pet them, starting from the smallest and working their way to their largest farm animal (a bunny, a cat, a dog, a baby pigmy goat, a goose, a miniture pony, and a horse - of course).

Then they learned about how the bees pollinate the flowers, which helps them grow into yummy delicious apples.

Then the kids were able to pick apples from an apple tree:

Roger took this picture of the kids and I sitting in front of some corn stocks and pumpkins. It sure made for a lovely fall picture:

Afterwards, we went to the playground across the street from the condo and let the kids play. Here is me and Ltt1 on the dinosour...

and dad and the kids on the teeter-totter

We also enjoyed watching the beautiful sunset go down and reflecting off the water.

It truly made for a wonderful day!
On Friday, Lttl1 was able to meet his Great Great grandmother:

We all had a really nice time celebrating her 91st birthday:

Afterwards, we met up with our cousins and Kambri received a pedicure!

Then, we all went to the park where the kids' great grandma played on the playground with them, they really enjoyed that:

Kambri is soo brave she'll do anything she can to show her brother up:

We LOVE our Grandma Judi!!!

Our drive home was also very pleasant, despite my speeding ticket; it's hard to watch your speed when there is no speed limit signs on a country road. :(
Watching the sun come up, on our drive to Ohio:

We met up with one of our friends from the Army in Ohio

Here are those beautiful fall colors I was talking about:

Nikholi was exhasted

but some how Kambri was able to keep up with everything (here she is with her arm out of her seatbelt again) Grr.

Although our vacation was a blast, we were soo happy to finally be home!
*I'm amazed at how time consuming it is to upload soo many photos; wishes there was an easier way.*

Personal Challenge - Day 4

As the lovely housewife I am, I was charged with cleaning up the many messes the children made throughout the house. The many people that visit my house probably don't think it's such a chore to keep up on cleaning my house, but if anyone of you saw the mess these kiddos create in ONE day, you'd be amazed at the amount of work I have to put into the house in order to keep it clean. Here are some before and after pictures to share some examples.
Here is the worst room in the house, where the family spends most of their time. Toys get brought out here from the kids' rooms, books come flying off the bookshelf, and Bri's favorite hobby (coloring) get scattered throughout the room.

Here is the after picture. You can actually see the new curtains we put up! I love them, they make such a difference in here!

The dining room is also another "catch all" place. When ever someone walks in the door, everything goes straight to this table.

Ah, soo much better! I love that my living room and dining room look like pictures out of magazines when they are clean:

This is Nik's room. He actually does a pretty good job at keeping his room clean, but since he's still learning to make his bed, he rarely puts forth the effort.

Rooms have such a comforting feel when they are clean. And just simply making the bed can make such an immense difference.

The last picture of my cleaning process that I'm going to show is our clean room. I wouldn't dare show you the dirty version (lol...as I'm typing I'm realizing that can have more meanings than one, since we are talking about our bedroom. hehe) because it's honestly just about as bad as the living room. As we come home shoes get kicked off, clothes fall to the floor, kids toys wander into the bedroom, diapers and wipes also all over the place (for easy grabbin' when I need to change a diaper). Ah, now I can actually sleep peacefully, knowing that I'm not going to step on an old pop tart or trip over a baby doll on my way to the bathroom.

I made homemade lasagna for dinner last night. I'm not sure why it will never compare to the gorgeously stacked and perfectly layered lasagna in the restaurants. Either way, between my homemade lasagna and stuffed shells, they are Nik's favorite!

So after dinner I begged and pleaded for Roger to take care of the kids while I worked on a paper for school that was due last night. Surprisingly, (sarcasm) it didn't get done. I was sooo upset that I really wanted to throw something glass against the wall and watch it shatter on behalf of my frustration. But instead, I remembered my Personal Challenge, I went outside and snaped a gorgeous picture of the dark clouds forming in my backyard.

When I walked back in the house my anger/frustration level had gone from a 10 down to a 3. It was much more manageable. Despite the kids were still running and SCREAMING throughout the house, Lttl1 was crying, and Roger had the TV blaring watching Pawn Stars. I basically told myself, "Do the best you can, that's all you can do, and if worst comes to worse finish it tomorrow for 10% off your grade." A little disappointed that that ended up being my destiny. At least my house is clean and hopefully I can study peacefully with a movie on for Bri, writing paragraphs as Lttl1 sleeps.
I know I have a busy day ahead of me, with a paper to write, packing for a short vacation, shopping for winter clothes, swim lessons, and Nik's open house. I'll let ya'll know how I survived; check back soon! :)

Personal Challenge - Day 3

Yesterday was quite interesting. It didn't go exactly as I had planned, but sometimes a plan isn't always necessary. I would have loved to have watched Conference yesterday, but my husband had me helping him in the yard and I was also attempting to keep peace between the kids. He mowed the yard and cut down branches.

Roger took the Nik and Bri for a ride in his truck, which they really enjoyed. The truck just gives the feeling of adventure! Although, there is soo much more Roger plans to do to it. The kids and I love it!

When they returned home we went to Walmart, JoAnn's, Party America, and Five and Below. Roger and the kids had fun trying on different masks.
Bri had fun trying on the different masks,

I was shocked she wasn't scared of them, even when Roger and Nik were putting them on:

Roger ended up buying this one. He's looking forward to scaring his mom by sneeking into her house with this mask on. lol

Although Bri wasn't scared of the masks, she was scared of the hand that moved (it was a bit creepy lookin')

and the $60 hanging skelleton.

I soo wish I had money to spend on Halloween! I'm not sure why, but scaring kids (and its even better if its an adult) is soo much fun!! I love seeing their reactions. I know that may be mean of me, but it's just soo funny.

When we came home I made some Pot Pies and Rice -something I love!- When mom would leave for work when dad came home to work a night shift, I remember dad always making pot pies and rice, chili, TV dinners, or fish sticks. Unfortunately, these are my comfort food dinners.

After dinner I finished up some homework while Roger gave all the kids baths. Then him and I sat down together and watched a movie on TV called HitMan. I've been very cautious about watching rated R movies because I don't need the graphic images distorting my mind. Since HitMan was on TV they deleted certain scenes that made the movie rated R. Although, it was a decent movie.. I had a hard time watching it because of all the gore and graphic images. When you go from watching only PG movies for a while, when you finally stumble across an edited R movie on TV, you wonder why they even show such violent and degrading images. The movie would have been just as good, getting the same point across, if it simply changed scenes or even focused at a wall during the hardcore images.

My husband and many around me don't understand why I refrain from watching rated R movies, but honestly... Why subject yourself to such graphic images? Is it really a thrill? When you see such images, they are locked in your mind, never to come out. For example, I remember watching the movie The Patriot in theaters, one of my absolute favorite Rated R movies..BUT, I will never be able to remove the image of Mel Gibson shredding a body to pieces with a hatchet. Is this something I really want replayed in my mind? My answer is NO.

Overall my day went smoothly and it was really nice snuggling up next to my husband when it's so chilly in the house. However, I believe if I was able to surround myself with more things that I love, I would have been happier as a result.

Personal Challenge - Day 2

I'm a day late on posting, but better late than never. We returned home from our adventure rather late. Since starting this challenge I have received many comments about what a wonderful mother, sister, and friend I am and I want to say Thank you. However, throughout this challenge, I've already encountered challenges. I am not perfect, although I strive to be. Things that I could have been focusing more on yesterday included watching conference and doing homework. Nevertheless, I feel that family time is extremely important and is a number one priority in my life. Hopefully in the future, I will be able to learn how to incorporate family time in with conference and homework; but with my husband not being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, it makes it that much more challenging.

So my day started out with cleaning the house, while Roger took Bri to her swim lessons. Cleaning always makes me feel better, it's such a therapeutic way of relieving any stress that I may be experiencing. However, when I was cleaning the excessive amount of dust off that has accumulated on the kitchen fan, I bumped the light fixture and watched it fall slowly to its death, SHATTERING into a million pieces as it hit the floor. Barefoot, as usual, around the house, I told Nikholi to go get my flip flops. He ran to my bedroom and came back telling me he couldn't find them. I then requested him to just get me some shoes, so he picked up his shoes! Then I clarified to him that I needed some of my shoes. He ran back to my bedroom and grabbed Roger's Army boots (knowing they would be too heavy for him to throw to me)...I asked one more time to get me flip flops. This time he finally came back with them. I asked him to toss them to me..which he did, except they were tossed just barely out of my reach! What a morning this was turning out to be....

When Roger returned home we discussed going out somewhere and doing something. In my mind I'm thinking about "things that make me happy". So off we went on our adventure of shooting my gun, enjoying the Calvert County Fair, and dinner.
We drove down to Roger's sister's house where we were able to set up targets in a safe area and shoot some rounds.

However, since his sister wasn't there Roger said that we should taking turns going down the hill to shoot the gun, because we knew it would be too loud for the kids and we didn't want them to be around where the shots were fired. Taking all necessary precautions.

Since I didn't feel comfortable shooting the gun alone for my first time and leaving the kids at the top of the hill by themselves.. I unfortunately didn't get the opportunity to shoot it. :( Although, Roger insisted, I was also taking all necessary safety precautions.

While we were there, Roger did teach me all the functions of the gun, how to load it, where all the safety's were, how to aim, the different stances that can be used while shooting, etc. Basically a 101 for my Gun and how to shoot. I can't wait until I get to the practical part of the lesson where I'll actually be able to shoot my gun! lol
While Roger was off shooting targets, the kids and I played with Roger's sisters dog. It made me want a dog sooo bad. Roger is soo dead set against me getting a dog. Since he gave my last one, Kesi, to his sister because we were unable to find a house that we could rent and they would accept dogs. Two weeks after getting rid of Kesi, we found our place and they allow dogs. So I'm missing having a dog and I feel that the kids are missing the experience of growing up with a dog (which is something I enjoyed growing up).

Knowing that we are leaving on vacation soon, I don't want to get another dog now, but when we get back, I will be searching for the perfect dog for our family.
After spending time with the gun, the dog, and the kids, we rode up to the Calvert County Fair, where Nikholi had fun dancing on a stage

I LOVE it when he dances.. He has the coolest moves (no joke)!
Nikholi was able to ride a pony

and Bri was also able to ride a pony for her first time.

Roger was soo happy that his little girl was able to ride on the pony! Even though, he's deathly afraid of horses and it will take more than persuading from me to ever get him on a horse.

I love the fair atomosphere and the smell of funnel cakes. Alhtough, I probably could have done without the crowds of people. I was able to capture this AWEsOmE photo of the ferris wheel. (This counts for my photo of the day) It wouldn't be a fair without one of these:

We also enjoyed walking through the barns with poultry and livestock.
We admired the unique looking chickens

This one reminds me of a chicken that we had growing up named Tina Turner

I loved seeing all the baby cows! And they were soo close to the aisle way that the kids were actually able to pet them.

I loved being able to share this agicultural experience with them. I can't wait until we are able to buy some land so that they....I....can experience it everyday. It was soo relaxing.. and this little guy, makes me want a COW!

I love Mums.. they are such pretty fall flowers. I'd like to get some to set on my front porch steps.

I also have this love/hate relationship with my husband. I guess that's what happens when your spouse is your best friend. And I love taking pictures of him, even though he's not crazy about the way he looks in them.

Kambri is soo beautiful, I was fortunate to capture this picture of her sittin' in the grass.

I've mentioned this before, but I adore my husband and Lttl1's relationship:

This kids kept asking, "When do we get to ride the rides?, When do we get to ride the rides!?" Here is them patiently waiting:

Lttl1 is soo little, it's difficult for him to really take in the experience of our adventure. But I'm thankful I'm able to capture this memory. He's such an awesome Lttl1.

Another thing I LOVE... is Bri's curly hair! It's soo perfect, I never have to do anything to it; which is a good thing because she doesn't like me playing with her hair.

On one of the rides the kids were able to get on, Nikholi reminded his sister Bri to hold on. I love that he is concerned about his sister:

After the fair, it would have been too late to cook dinner by the time we arrived home, so we hit up Applebees.. MMM Chicken Pene.. Delicious! and Food also being one of my weaknesses. If you're still following my challenge, thank you for keeping up..viewing all the pictures, and reading all the stories I have to go along with them.