Linky's Binky

Presents!

Love the cake!

Goodbye Binky!

I know most of you were there and saw what we did Sunday night. I thought I'd update a little and let you know how it's been going. Monday morning he went to the trash can in the kitchen and wanted to know why he couldn't see his binky. (remember, he had thrown one away in there earlier in the day on his own.) I explained that it had been taken out to the big trash can with the garbage. That is the ONLY thing he has said about his binky. However, he has cried more and been crankier than he ever is, by far!! He'll howl and cry and ask me, "What can I do?" Like he's bored and doesn't know what to do with himself. I'm certain he feels 'lost' without his bink. It's very sad.

Funny thing is- Will was the one always saying how badly we needed to get rid of it- but he'd be the first one to cave and give it back. Will's had a hard time watching him hurt without it. I'm having to be the strong one...which sucks.

Broke My Rule

So- I've always hated clicking on blogs and being startled by unexpected music. I swore I would NEVER add one to mine- so nobody would have to suffer through my music. :) But tonight I ran across an email Misty had sent me encouraging me to try it- so I am. I picked some random songs that I love love...with the exception of the Coldplay song. I like it, but mostly because Spencer sings it REALLY well. And he sings it a LOT.

I have a very diverse collection of music. I love Bing Crosby, Chris Ledoux, and Jack Johnson. I don't listen to country very much...my taste has changed a bit...but I still like certain artists. Lately I've been listening to the Wicked soundtrack. I didn't put any of those on my playlist- I figured I'd spare everyone- but who doesn't love Popular? I'm so excited to see it!!

Keeping Busy

I've been trying to stay busy with Will gone. Not hard to do. I wanted to do something cute for the boys to hand out to their 'female' friends at school rather than a lame valentine. So I made these and they actually handed them out. I'm still working on the cards I'm making to give out to my friends (ladies I visit teach and such) and I have to make all new candy bars because the boys used all of them! I was a little ticked. They were pretty time consuming. Anyhow- Will gets home tomorrow. I am soooo glad this week is almost over. :)

Laundry room is complete!!!....for now. As expected, we ended up doing NOTHING Friday night. It had been a long day and we were in bed before 10:00, seriously. Which is really strange for us. So the laundry room happened on Saturday. Will worked all day and evening and it looks --- clean! :) I'll post pics later.

I have discovered a little bistro and boutique in Highland called My Dear Lizzie. It's the cutest, girliest place I've ever been. If I had any daughters I'd take them there every chance I had- but since I don't- I'm taking my mom and sisters every chance I get. Truly- it's beyond charming. You can go see for yourself or wait for me to take you. :)

I took a trip down to the market that sells the raw milk earlier today. I went with a friend and she showed me all kinds of cool stores down there that I've heard of but never been to. Anyway- I bought a gallon and am going to see what the boys think. (although I'm guessing they won't even notice because they had no clue I had switched from 1% to whole. But I noticed- big time.) To answer the question Abby asked- Drinking whole milk rather than low fat is supposed to be beneficial because the milk fat actually contains nutrients you want- the good kind of fat. Also, to create low fat milk, they strip the fat out of it completely, then they add the fat back in through a powder form to 'bulk up' the milk- which many critics say is unhealthy (the powdered, processed fat) as well as many of the vitamins and nutrients milk has are ruined and depleted throughout the process. So basically- like all foods- they suggest you try to keep it as close to it's original form as possible.

That's the one conclusion that I've come to after reading everything I have: that if nothing else, my goal will be to try and eat as much as I can in the state God created it. But, that is a DANG tricky thing to do in our time, isn't it? Literally, almost EVERYthing we eat is processed. And for that matter, the fruits and vegetables we eat that aren't 'processed' are contaminated beyond measure and, just recently, they approved the use of irradiation for spinach and all lettuce! It makes me crazy!!! Just leave the darn food alone and let us eat it the way it is! Now I'll step off my soap box....that's why we switched to whole milk. You can google it and find some stuff on it.

Anyhow- I'm off to pick the boys up from school. Will's probably somewhere above Florida right now. I already miss that man.

Moo

Lately I've been wondering if I have a little ADD myself. It seems we've started so many projects, and instead of finishing them, we start a new project. The laundry room is still unfinished, which has been a big pain because I need the use of the laundry room daily- as you can imagine. Yesterday I was folding some laundry, and instead of just putting the clothes away, I decided to start cleaning and organizing my drawers. Which led to a total organization project with our closet. When Will came home from work- he decided to help out and organize all of his stuff. Finally, 12 hours after I started the project of organizing and de-junking our room, we finished. We seriously have about 7 large black trash bags of clothes, shoes, and stuff to go to D.I. (Maybe we should de-junk more often!) Our small room looks so much nicer (and bigger) and it is great to have that all done- but our laundry room is still unfinished. Our plan is to complete it tonight so Will can tackle the garage tomorrow. Ha Ha. We'll see how tonight goes.

On the same note- I'm slowly reading Omnivore's Dilemma (because I can't speed through this kind of material and I have little time to read lately) even though I never finished Secret Life of Bees. I got halfway through it when I received Omnivore and with so little time to read, Bees has taken back burner. But I hate reading that way. I need to finish a book before I start another. Am I the only one who does this? (or just the only one who worries about it?)

One last thought- as we're all trying to eat better and be more careful of our intake- I finally made the switch I've been hesitant to make for some time: we are now WHOLE milk drinkers. Crazy, I know. I've done a lot of reading about it, and even though it goes against everything I've been taught to think all my life- we've given up 1% and hopefully won't go back. Now if we all get super fat...you'll know why. :) (seriously though, it reportedly doesn't change your weight at all.) Now our next step is to go RAW. Which will take me up to Abby's neck of the woods, because that's where the closest raw milk dairy is. I've just begun my research into the benefits of drinking raw milk. Why do I care so much about this kind of stuff???

Love This Month!

February is one of my favorites! I love Valentine's Day and all of the super fun decorations. This year will be sort of a bummer- with Will being in Florida and everything. He leaves in a week and is gone until the 14th. (What company plans their yearly conference over Valentine's Day?) Apparently the one Will works for. But I'll try to make if fun for everyone else anyway.

Will and I have taken on a massive project for ourselves- painting and decorating the laundry/mudroom. I don't have any 'before' photos, but just try to remember how awful the room was. As soon as we're finished I'll post the 'after' pictures. We've been working for a week now. It's taking so long because we picked a very bad time to do this. We had stake conference and didn't get to work on it over the weekend much, and also it seems we've had something almost every week night. Time should be able to stand still while you're working on projects. (Oh, and nannies should be provided as well.) The room is LIME green, and it's almost a little too much. We debated whether we loved it or not- but we were too far into it to change our minds. I think it will end up fine. The whole project reminded me how much I hate painting- so our whole house project is going to have to wait. (We've been wanting to change our 'taupe' color over to a butter yellow.)

I'm totally engrossed in my new book. The Omnivore's Dilemma. So fascinating! I'm not even a quarter through it and I feel like I've learned so much. I find that I talk about it to everyone- and most people probably don't really care. So I need to curb my enthusiasm just a bit.

Has It Been a Week?

Wow- time flies! No matter how organized and planned I try to make life- it seems I'm always looking for more time. I wish it grew on trees, along with money, of course. "Preston, would you go outside and pick me a few hundreds and about 10 hours?" And then he'd complain that he did it last time and why didn't I ask Spence or Brig? That's usually how it goes.

I've spent the day dealing with insurance issues (which is always so much fun) and chatting with my parents. They got home from AZ Sunday night, and today I got to hear all about their trip. Quince and Linc were so thrilled to be able to go over and play. It's hard for them when G&G are gone and they don't get to go over and play with their toys. (It's hard for me too:)

I'm trying to think of what else I've been up to. I registered the two older boys for EFY this summer, and last night found out they got into our first choice session. It's Rexburg again, end of June. I'm excited. I think Spencer will really love it. It is expensive, no question, but so worth it. I got my reminder for Women's Conference today. It isn't the money that makes that hard, it's the time commitment- but just like EFY- it's so worth it. I'm going for sure. I highly recommend it to anyone who hasn't ever attended. It's two days of complete enlightenment.

Last night we went to the open house at the Draper Temple. It was a good experience. The boys liked it. The only other open house I ever attended was the San Diego, with Will, when we were teenagers. I have to say though, it felt SOOOO different being in the temple with all of those people, in dark colors (dress clothes) and hearing children make noise, and all of the quiet chaos that goes on when you've got kids. It just isn't the same. I tried to explain the difference to the boys, but I'm pretty sure they couldn't grasp it. Someday.

For the past several weeks I've been doing a lot of research and reading on essential oils and organic foods. I'm kind of obsessed. I've been spending so much time trying to learn as much as I can, I haven't spent the time reading all of the books I was planning to read. I started The Secret Life of Bees Saturday, and I should be finished by now. But I spent part of Sunday and all of Monday with a migraine. I hope to finish it by this weekend. I took Abby's advice and went onto Goodreads. I checked out both Abby's and Wendy's. And I realized that you guys have read SOOO many more books than I have. :) The books I read aren't the kind of books you'd write a review on. I've got to get away from parenting and self help books and read more novels. I'm trying. I really enjoy them- I don't know why I don't read more.

Oh- and to update all of you on how Will and I are doing with the biggest Loser. Ummmm.... bad. We're not going to hide it. To be totally honest, Will never weighed in in the very first place. He said from the beginning he wasn't interested in losing weight- he was interested in getting in shape and doing the running. So he wouldn't even weigh in. And I'd love to report that he's been running, but he hasn't been. (he started out strong) He said to tell everyone he's going to be the biggest loser- but not that kind of loser. :) I have stayed the same. Which is probably a result of little to no exercise and eating exactly the same as I usually do. No- I am trying to spend more time on the treadmill. It's the whole lack of time thing- and lack of desire has something to do with it as well. :) We're planning on really committing in February though. Just to warn everyone.