Primary Activity

This past Saturday the kids had a primary activity.
Both Hunter and Maddie made these picutures for their rooms.
Didn't they turn out cute!!
Lunch was also served. Pizza, Rootbeer, Water, Cupcakes. You can't go wrong with that.
Hunter and Jaxen.
Maddie and Amber.
The weather was perfect and the kids enjoyed themselves.

Easter

It's Easter Morning. Our church begins with sacrament meeting at 8 am. I knew if we were to get to church on time I'd have to wake the kids up a little earlier then usual. So about 6:15 I started waking the kids up. Telling them the Easter Bunny had come and hidden their basketts (Kory's family tradition). It wasn't to hard to convince them to get up. We did make it to church on time too. Yeah!!

Emily wasn't to sure what to do with hers until her siblings showed her what was inside those silly looking eggs.

Maddie was thrilled to discover a package of new panties. Dora, no less. She was quite pleased.

Hunter was also excited to see that he too had received a new package of underware. Go, Diego Go!

Yes, that is new panties in Emily's baskett too. She is showing signs of going potty on the toilet so we're going to run with it. We've pulled the potty down and she loves to go sit on it. I meant to start her last week but I ended up babysitting 3 other children giving me 6 kids under 5 for almost 10 hours on a daily basis. I just didn't seem to find the time to really try with her. This week is a different story. Hopefully she can follow in her siblings footsteps and this won't take too long.

Hunter was potty trained by the time he was 2 1/2. I have a scrapbook page of Maddie sitting on the toilet with a little note that says, "Accident free at 21months". I remember starting with Maddie when she started nursery.

I'm currently serving in the nursery so Emily's been coming with me. If she hadn't though yesterday would have been her 1st day in Nursery. I can't believe my baby's 18months old.

Easter cont'

After church the kids were quite anxious to get home to look at their eggs again. It was such a warm day they compared their egss on the porch.
They most definietly liked the candy they were given but their favorite was the money they discovered hidden in the eggs.
Emily didn't get money but she quickly discovered how to open the eggs by herself.

We were invited to a friends house for Easter Dinner. There was a house full of people with 5 families. It was great. Sara (hostess) took all the kids outside after dinner and had them color a picture of what Easter meant to them. The adults stayed inside and we all brought a short story to share with each other. It turned into a really nice spriritual moment for the adults. I think we could all feel the spirit as all the kids were outside. It turned out to be a great way to end our week long Easter experience.

3 Days of Darkness

Day 6) Three days of darkness 3 Nephi chapters 8-10

So I picked about 4 scriptures describing the destruction and darkness. I then told everyone that our house also received some destruction. We pretended that we didn't know where everyone was and needed to find them. I had put pictures of everyone inside a cd case so my pictures wouldn't be damaged and then scattered them along the floor. They needed to find all 5 of us and meet at the back door. They crawled around in the dark amidst everything that was in my tupperware drawer, several pairs of shoes, pillows, towels, and rolled up rugs. When all 5 of us had been found I read 2 verses of what Christ told the people while still in the dark by flash light. I then had a picture of Christ that I shined a flash light on and read when Christ told the people who he was.

These are pictures of the kids holding our family via the cd cases.

Next year I think I'll try blindfolding the kids. They weren't very interested doing it this year. After a few seconds in the dark all of our eyes got accustumed (sp?) to the dark and it wasn't to hard to see all the objects on the floor. I'd also like to made a cd of noises from the disasters mentioned in the sciptures like the thunder, earthquakes, whailing and crying of people. Have these sounds playing while I read the scriptures. I don't know maybe this would be too much. I would like to make this a little more real but not scare my babes either.

Cruxifiction

Day5) Cruxifiction

So this night we were suppose to discuss the crucifiction. After 20 minutes of telling my children to LISTEN TO ME!, sit down, stop bouncing on the cushions, we're not singing the Popcorn song again, LISTEN TO ME!, don't hit her, don't stomp your feet, I don't care who's calling on the phone, LISTEN TO ME!, leave Emily alone, stop talking, stop hitting the couch, no you can't have another drink, LISTEN TO ME!!! and having read the first 3 verses twice now and I, MYSELF, not knowing what I had just read I QUIT!!! Everyone put their pajamas on and went to bed at 7:30 including this mom. So sorry no pictures of this night.

Last Supper

Day 4) Last Supper
Our Last Supper consisted of fresh pineapple, leavened bread, asparagus and shish kabobs with beef and potato.


We've never barbequed shish kabobs before and it turned into a great learning experience. Next time we will SOAK THE STICKS BECAUSE THEY BURN. The fire was too hot and not only burned the sticks but the dinner too. Of all nights I thought this would have been one of the favorites. I was wrong. The main course was burned. Hunter and Maddie both choked on the asapragus (this was not the 1st,nor 2nd, nor 3rd time we've eaten this vegetable). The pineapple went quick. The kids enjoyed the bread but both Kory and I thought it was too dry which I was expecting. We'll have to do things a little differently next time.

Teaching The People

Day 3) Matthew 25:31-46
Nothing is recorded of what Jesus did on the 3rd day. So I stretched day 2 into 2days. The scriptures I read this past weekend talked about feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, etc. and then it went on to say how the followers are sheep. Those that don't help the needy are goats. The scripture I read tonight however didn't include the sheep/goat analogy. Of course I didn't realize this until I had read through vrs. 46 and came to the end of the chapter. So I just told the kids about the sheep/ goats and how we want to be sheep in this story. Afterward we made our sheep.
Tonight was definietly a hit. Although what kid doesn't like to have a glue stick in his hand. Emily wasn't ready to quit gluing, hence the sad face.

Cleaning the Temple

Day 2) Cleansing the Temple Matthew 21:31-46

This past saturday we all helped cleaned the church. It was great to remind the kids why we helped and what a great feeling we all had on our way home. I think the kids finally understood that just like the temple our church also belongs to Jesus. After our little discussion I took some toys and had all 3 of them help clean them.

Our Week Long Easter Experience

About 2 weeks ago I started contemplating how we are going to teach our children that there is more to Easter then the Easter Bunny. Hunter will soon turn 5, Maddie is 3 and Emily 17 months. They are still young but I have felt that this Easter we needed to do something different. Talking to many friends, family memebers and searching the web I have put together a week long of scriptures and activies. I thought I'd share as our weeek progresses.

Day 1) TRUIMPHAL ENTRY Luke 19:29-38
These scriptures tell of Jesus arriving to Bethany. The story goes that Christ tells 2 of his disciples to go to the edge of town and they will find a colt tied up. They should bring the colt back to Christ. Theres a lot more to this story but you'll have to read it yourselves. So for our activity for Day 1 Hunter and Maddie acted this story out. We tied their stick horse to the front door.
In Maddies words she was a "gurl dipal" (girl disciple).

I know they didn't understand everything we read and tried to explain to them but they got more than if we would have just read the sciptures aloud.

Spring is in the air..

The weather outside has been great lately. Spring is almost here. This past week we've been moving some dirt around in the front yard. We're trying to even it out a bit so we can tell about how much more dirt we are going to need. Hunter thinks he is go big. He likes helping dad with dad's shovels.
I came inside to get dinner ready and the girls followed. Completely dirty from playing outside they decided to be princesses while waiting for dinner.
My mom sent us home with Emily's dress up dress recently. When she see's Maddie getting her princess stuff on and she can't get her to help her quick enough she comes to get me. She holds on to my finger and leads me to her room and starts pointing at her dress.
It's fun to see how much Maddie and Emily are starting to play together.

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss

Last week I was "teacher" in our Pre School. We celebrated Dr. Seuss's birthday. We read several Dr. Seuss's stories during "school". The kids made hats to wear and hats to eat (vanilla wafers, white frosting and red gummie life savers). We counted how many feet were at school. We even broke it down to how many left and right feet we had present. We also played number bingo using gold fish crackers as our markers. I think the kids had a good time. Back row: Abby, Hunter, Jolie, Bryant

Front Row: Maddie, Amber, Jaxen

We Have Running Water

We did survive the weekend without running water. We did turn it back on long enough for everyone to bathe saturday night. We didn't do to bad. I hope we never have to do it again. Monday morning R.E.D Plumbing showed up about 8:30. By 9:30 am they were off with a check for $98.00. And we have running water again.

How would you live without running water?

Early last week we went to Utah as a family for Kory to install a job. We spent almost a full week and had a great time spending time with family. We have been home since early Wed. morning. As most people do right before leaving town I didn't buy many groceries the week before we left. Not being able to pay ourselves quite yet we have been living without milk, eggs, and some of those bare essentials. We've done this before so it hasn't been that big of a deal.


Since we've been home I've been babysitting everyday and have had 7 kids running around. Emily has been running a fever since we've been home and it seems she is constantly crying (thanks to her shots last week).When Kory came home this morning to grab some paper work he commented on how quiet our house was. Hunter and Maddie were at a friends and Emily was napping. It was very peaceful. Not having anyone at my feet I was trying to catch up on some buisness work. Kory went into the kitchen and asked me what the hissing noise was. I couldn't hear it in the office and didn't know what he was talking about it. We soon discovered that the hissing noise was coming from under the house. We have a water leak. It's not gushing water but we've got ourselves a pudddle. After calling around and being a friday afternoon afterall the soonest we can get someone to come by is monday morning. Not wanting to waste water and cause any damage we have shut our water off.

Not having any fresh produce, milk, eggs, nearing the end of our laundry detergent and now not having running water has made me think. How would our family do in an emergency situation? I don't know if we'd do very well. Thankfully I have about 20 gallons of water stored. We have been using that today to wash hands and flush toilets. Tommorrow I will heat some water and wash my dishes by hand. I have two sinks full and a dishwasher full. YEAH FOR ME!!!

With the warm weather the kids and I spent the afternoon outside. When Kory got home from work we grabbed some shovels and started moving some dirt around. When we came in it was a real pain to wash everyones hands without running water. I can't bathe anyone tonight.
(If we had just had a natural disaster we would probably have been outside assesing the damage, maybe even starting to clean up. Chances are we would be dusty and sweaty and probably not have any running water.) I was tired and not having any leftovers tonight I let the kids make themselves a jelly sandwich. They've done this many times but tonight I realized how messy these can be when I don't have the convienience of running water. Kory and I had grilled cheese sandwiches.

Tonight feeling my nerves were fried we scrounged up some change and I ran to the store and bought another loaf of bread, milk and eggs to help ease my pain over the next few days. What if we had just survived a natural disaster and I couldn't go buy these things? I feel better tonight knowing for the next few mornings we will have cold cereal in a plastic bowl with plastic spoons. But what if we couldn't? Tommorrow night we'll turn the water on just long enough to bathe everyone for sunday. This is going to be interesting to see what and how we do during the next two days.

I have learned that I need to get a few more water storage containers and some spickets for them so I don't waste as much water as I feel I am doing now. I need to get some hand sanitizer. I need to find some recipies that don't ask for milk or eggs, especially breakfast meals. So far we've had bottled fruit, muffins that I had in the freezer and cinnamon toast. I need to have a good supply of paper goods.

It is going to be an interesting weekend for us. I know we will be O.K. it's only 2-3 more days. There is an end in sight. I'm just thankful I had water stored. I always thought I'd probably never use it and if I did it wouldn't be becuase of a water leak. I will be very thankful to teach my lesson next sunday. The lesson is "I am thankful for water". The things you take for granted.

Belly Dancing

For my brithday last month I told Kory all I wanted was to take a dance class. I looked into several but most were offered during the day during the week. I didn't want the hassle of trying to find a babysitter on the same day every week for 12 weeks. And I've started babysitting again. I babysit 2 different families and their work schedules are different every week. So I finally found this. It's a beginner belly dancing class held on Saturdays from 2-3:30, for the next 7 weeks at Yavapai College in Prescott.

This past saturday was my first class. I had so much fun. Just turning 28 I was thinking that I may be one of the oldest ones there. WOW was I wrong. I was one of the youngest ones there. There's probably 30+ women and most are 50+. I ended up standing next to a teenager. She asked me how old I was and when I told her I laughed at her expression. Her eyes almost jumped out of her head and her jaw dropped. Then she said,"Your that old". I replied,"Yep I'm that old, I left my 3 kids at home with their dad." She thought I was about 21. I guess I'm aging very well. She's 17. After our class had started 3 young girls that are probaly 18-21 walked in. Other then that though the others are 50+ which isn't a bad thing it just surprised me.

I had so much fun. What good exercise it was. I don't need to loose any weight but I'm trying to tighten my flabby tummy. This class will do the trick. She started teaching us a routine already. I'm anxious for saturday to roll around again for my next class.

Plugged Back In

So, how did we do with no electronics? We unplugged everything on a tuesday night. Wed. went surprisingly smooth. It seems like every half hour I was asked if some sort of electronic device could be used but I stuck to my guns and didn't allow it. I made bread that day and we turned some of the dough into differene shapes. We had a dinosaur, a butterfly, a heart, a cookie and a monster.

Thursday went pretty well too. The kids were a little more whiny wanting to watch cartoons but again there was no tv. The kids went to school that morning and we made an elephant paper sack puppet that afternoon. In the evening we played games till bedtime.

Friday morning Hunter got up at 5:15am. He crawled into bed with us and just couldn't seem to hold still. Kory was getting frusurated with the constant movement of the bed and covers and finally told Hunter to go play the WII. Unfortunately this broke my plan of a week without electronics. Saturday and Sunday we were having our own little snow storm which kept us all inside.

I have been talking to several friends and have come up with a plan. Several weeks ago I printed out several picts. of dinosaurs. I had the kids color and help me cut them out and then lamenated them. I keep them in a container on top of the tv. Originally this was just for Hunter and the WII but for a week now I 've been using it for all of our electronics. Maddie doesn't seem to mind using some of the dinosaurs herself. Each dinosaur is worth 15 min. We have 10 dinosaurs which gives them a total of 2.5 hours. They can use this for cartoons, the WII or the computer. We've been doing this for almost a week now and it is really working. We have had a few farely warm days this past week. The kids didn't ask once during the day to use a dinosaur they spent it all outside riding bikes, and swinging. It was great!!!

Hinkley Challenge

I thought I'd share this challenge real quick before I begin our week of being unplugged from our electronics. For those who haven't heard of this challenge it's being called the Hinkley Challenge. To honor President Hinkley who was 96 years old when he died we are being challenged to read The Book of Mormon in the next 96 days. This challenge officially started yesterday Monday, Feb. 4th. You can register for free at http://www.hinkleychallenge.com/. This AWSOME website will track your progress and show you a little graph. It tells you how many pages you need to read to reach this goal. You can also type in your town and see how many people have registered to participate. When I registered I became the 7th person inPrescott Valley, AZ. It tells me who the first 6 people were. I thought it was cool the 1st person to register is in my ward. I have checked the website several times today. It is so neat to see that so far 22,752 people have accepted this challenge world wide.

Un Plugging

Kory and I have never really watched a lot of tv. We passed this habit along to our kids. It's been great. All of our kids even Emily now prefer to be outside than inside. I use to turn the tv on at 8 am. The kids would watch The Little Einsteins and then at 8:30 Mickey Mouse Club House. They would be GLUED to the tv. This gave me enough time to do the breakfast dishes, shower and get ready for the day. At 9:00 the tv would go off and it generally didn't get turned back on until 5 which was when I watched the news.

With the cold weather we've been having lately along with my muddy front/back yard it's been really hard on all of us, but especially the kids. Hunter started turning the tv on about 6 am when he got up instead of playing quietly in his room. I wasn't quite ready to roll out of bed so I was ok with this but of course the tv stayed on until 9 am. It has slowly progressed to more and more cartoons. When they don't like the cartoon playing they'll turn the Wii on. When they are tired of that they'll try the cartoons again or get on the computer. For the past couple of days I felt like the tv and computer have been on most of the day. When I do turn it off they cry, throw a tissy fit and argue with me about it. The hole time it's off they're bugging me to turn it back on again. So this morning I decided I was going to stick with it and go back to our old schedule but.... Hunter was up at 5:30 and I was too tired to argue so the TV was on from 5:30 to 7 when I made them turn it off to get ready for school. I did not allow them to watch cartoons while eating their breakfast (another habit that has been formed). It was kinda nice. We talked during breakfast. Breakfast went by faster making them be completely ready for school earlier than usual, and we left the house calmly and on time this morning.

But what a HORRIBLE afternoon we've had. I wouldn't let them turn the tv on after pre-school and all Hunter and Maddie did was whine, whine and whine. Hunter even had a friend come over for a few hours. They played for about 15 minutes and then I let them turn the WII on. After a few minutes of the WII I realized they had shut it off and were watching cartoons. Hunter was not very happy that I made him turn the cartoons off and go play with his toys while he had a friend to play with. The second his friend left he wanted to turn the tv on again. I stuck to it and the tv has not been on since this morning before school. I was shocked to see how bored they thought they were. They REFUSED to play with their toys all day.

So tonight at dinner I announced to the family that TONIGHT we are unplugging the TV, DVD player, WII and the computer for the next 7 days. You should have seen the tears from Hunter and Maddie. I told them that Daddy and I were going to be doing the same thing. I don't think Daddy appreciated me volunteering him to go along with my plan (it's baskettball season), but after spending a few hours with the kids tonight and seeing their reactions to this unplugging idea he is willing to go along with it. The kids wanted to watch a movie after dinner but instead I pulled out a few games. We played Memory and Chutes and Ladders till scripture study and then it was bed time. Once the kids got into the board games they had fun and forgot about their movie. We had a good evening together.

Wish us luck. After the afternoon we've had I am not looking forward to tommorrow. I will bolg about our un plugging experience in a week. Till then...

It's Snowing!

Monday morning we woke up to SNOW! We pulled out the gloves and hats and we all went outside. Kory had already gone to work so it was just the kids and I.
Emily wasn't to sure about it but she caught on pretty quickly.
We had a fun little snow ball fight.
We played for about 30 minutes outside and then we got a little cold. Maddie was even still in her pajama's.
We all came inside. I had Maddie get dressed. Fed everybody breakfast and then the kids went back out for another 45 minutes and played. I'm am so glad we played as early as we did. By lunch time most of the snow was gone. We sure had fun while it lasted.

Count Your Blessings...

I have been meaning to go to Wal Mart for almost 3 weeks now. I have several things I need to get that I can only get from there. I've been babysitting almost everyday the past couple of weeks and I just wasn't going to take extra kids with me. Kory went to Safford this morning so I've been telling the kids since last week that we would go to Wal Mart this morning when daddy was gone. My kids love going to Wal Mart and playing with there toys.

The kids were so excited. I loaded everybody up, started the van, looked through my rear view mirror and saw my back window. It didn't registar at first but I new something wasn't quite right. I got out to go investigate and this is what I discovered.

Due to the rain we received yesterday when we got home from church we parked on the road so the van wouldn't get stuck in all the mud. I didn't find a rock or a ball or anything that could have broken the window. I'm assuming the strongs winds we had last night blew a tree branch into the back window???

I called our insurance company this morning and lucky for us we have 100% window coverage and a zero deductible. While talking to them I also mentioned the little chip we had in our windshield, that happened almost 2 years ago, (which I didn't mention). I was told that a new back window and a chip repair would be done tommorrow and to expect a phone call from a local repair shop. When the repair shop called he mentioned the chip and said because the van is an 02' he'll just replace the windshield and claim it was un repairable. I won't complain. I am most definetely counting my blessings this morning. This isn't going to cost us anything, it will be fixed tommorrow and he is coming to me.

Game Night

Friday night we invited 3 other couples over to play games. One couple got a babysitter. I think we were all a little envious of them. They were the only ones not having to chase kids around. We played several rounds of Uno Attack. The first round we followed the rules and the game lasted about 20 minutes. The following 3-4 games we followed most of the rules but said you could play doubles and play it out of turn. The games were lucky to last 5 minutes with 8 players.
You have to play Catch Phrase when you've got this many people together. This is a game that splits the players into 2 teams (women vs. men usually). The men won the 1st round. The women the 2nd. And the tie breaker was the MEN.

That night we also played Egyptian Rat Killer. This is a card game that Kory's family plays all the time together. I don't get the name but it is a fun game.

We had lots and lots of popcorn and cookies to go around. Thankyou all who came and participated. We had a great time and hope you did to. Till next time...

Master Closet

2 saturdays ago Kory decided to start working on our master closet. I helped him take everything out and went in search of my camera. When I found it he had already taken the shelve down so this is the only before pict. I have. You can see though where the shelve was. This shelve ran along along 3 walls with a hanging rod underneath. The 1st week we moved in one of those rods snapped in half.

Not having a garage everything that would normally be placed in there found its way to our closet. This is what our bedroom looked like after everything was taken out of the closet. We also had a pile on the other side of the bed that's been there since we moved in and another pile of stacked containers/boxes in another corner.
Last thursday Kory brought home the boxes with the face frames on and installed them that night. Friday he brough home the shelves that go inside the boxes. Saturday he finished installing the rods and the shelving that goes on the very top. And then last night (monday)he installed our built in dresser drawers.

All thats left is to buy the drawer fronts in a few weeks when we've got a little extra money. But for now it's done. Our bedroom almost looks empty without all the boxes ligning each wall and stuffed into each corner. Our closet isn't very big so I had a hard time taking a good picture of everything but you can see what a difference we have. Before we couldn't fit everything in there and now we can amazingly. In fact we have one shelf and one drawer that is empty. I'm sure it won't take to long for something to go there. Everything is organized. Most of everything has it's own place. My birthday was last friday and this was one of my gifts. My other gift is a belly dancing class that starts on Feb. 16 for 6 weeks.

Little Miss Piggy

Emily is almost 16months old. She is so much fun. She can often be heard saying mama and dada. She is finally starting to pick up on the sign language that we have been working with her on for so long it seems. She can sign thirsty, more, eat, cheese (her favorite), milk, cold, apple, candy, finished, shoes and ball all on a regular basis. We are still working on socks, cereal, crackers, dirty, juice, doll, thankyou, outside and tired.

I am so glad she has learned these signs that she uses daily. She is completely weened now and it seems this girl is always hungry. Instead of both of us getting frusturated not knowing what she wants, she uses some of her signs and we can usually figure it out quickly. Even daddy's getting the hang of it again. She is always signing eat cheese or eat apple. Sunday after church, not 20 minutes after she had eaten 2 bowls of rice, several green beans and 1/2 a cucumber she started signing she wanted to eat an apple. After eating 1/2 the apple by herself she came up to me and started whining. I asked her what she wanted and she signed, eat -more- apple. This was the 1st time she used 3 signs consecutively. It was almost a complete sentence. WOW! We need to teach her the sign for please.

This morning at breakfast she was chowing down on a bowl of fruit loops. When I was done with my cereal I left my bowl on the table and started to empty the dishwaher. She put some of her cereal in my bowl and was eating out of both bowls using both spoons. Hunter wasn't quite done with his cereal when he decided to use the bathroom. When he came back she had pulled his bowl towards her and was eating his Kellog's Mini Wheats that look like they had been super-sized.
After she tasted the mini wheats she refused to finish her fruit loops.

After Emily ate 3 of these super-sized mini wheats after she had finished off Hunter's cereal, I thought she'd be done. Maddie was feeling a little left out so she filled her empty bowl with Honey Combs and gave it to Emily. I didn't think Miss Piggy could eat anything else but she finished that bowl off too.

We're Back...

Kory needed to finish his sister's job in Utah. So for the past week we've been hanging out there. It was great to see the kids be able to play with their cousins for several days. They all got along great and had a really good time. For New Year's Eve we went over to the church. Several tables were set up with different board games, a movie was playing in a different room and their was lots and lots of dancing. Maddie loved the dancing part. Her and I were out on the dance floor for most of the night. Around midnight breakfast of pancakes, eggs, bacon and sausage was served. Following the early morning breakfast we went back to Grandma's and went to bed.

Tuesday late afternoon we loaded up 7 kids and 4 adults into Uncle Dustin's truck and headed up to the feed yard to go tubing. Uncle Kevin and 5 of his kids were already there having a wonderful time. My little family finally made it to the top of the hill for our turn. There was one huge tractor tube available so Kory thought it would be fun for all 5 of us to go down together. We all climbed on, Uncle Dustin gave us a push and down the hill we went. After what seemed like just a few seconds I realized we were headed towards a patch of dirt that was no longer covered by snow. The next thing I knew I was laying on my stomach, face in the dirt and I could here my 3 children screaming. I couldn't move. Grandpa Heaton (Kory's dad) was by my side and helped me turn over on my back. I still couldn't move. I have never had the wind knocked out of me before. What a feeling that is. In just a few short seconds it seemed all the grand kids were hovering around us and all I could make out was there was blood on the ground and Hunter was pretty beat up. With help we were loaded into a truck and rushed back to Grandma's to assess the damage. The very short trip back to grandma's Maddie kept saying, "Mommy you have blood on your face and so does Hunter"over and over. Grandma took Emily who thankfully didn't have a scratch on her. Kory (whom also wasn't hurt) washed Hunter and Maddies face, while this Mommy was laying on the floor trying to keep consciousness. When I tried sitting up I very quickly became lightheaded and nautious. I was put on the couch and was checked several times to make sure I didn't have a concussion. My entire body was throbbing, and my head felt like it was on fire. It was a horrible feeling to hear my children crying and asking for me and not being able to do a dang thing about it. After a couple hours of Daddy and their grandparents consoling them they were playing with Grandpa once again. Hunter by far looked the worse. He had a nice gash on his forehead with several scratches and cuts all over the right side of his face and 2 fat lips. Maddie had a skinned chin. Mommy ended up with 3 Goose Eggs on her forehead and what looks like road rash, a bloody nose, and a very sore body.

Grandma Heaton took this picture a few hours after the mishap.
2 days later this is what the kids still look like.

Maddies chin looks a lot better. She no longer complains it hurts until she bumps it.

Hunter's face is still very tender. He cried this morning while changing his shirt. He keeps asking when all his owies are going to be gone.

Mommy is down to one goose egg, my skinned forehead is almost healed. It looks very similar to Maddie's chin. I'm hoping by Sunday it'll be healed completely. The right side of my face is still very very tender. It doesn't look swollen anymore but it still feels like it's swollen. My back is very sore. It hurts to carry or pick up anything and I feel very stiff. But we are ALIVE with no stiches needed, or broken bones. It could have been much much worse.

After a lot of talking about our accident and how fun tubing really can be we were able to convince the kids to go to Grandpa's pond that is frozen over. We had several small sleds for them to be pushed around on the ice with. They had a blast. After an hour at the pond we went up to the feed yard again. The kids were brave enough to go down the same hill as the day before but this time with no mishaps. They only went once but they did go. Kory kept saying we had to try to replace their negative experience with a positive one. I was to big of a chicken and did not go down. Maybe next year??? We then went back to the pond and by themselves they went down the small sloped bank onto the ice. They had fun and that was what we were hoping for.

What a way to start off the new year.