Logan

I just love being a mother and watching all of the personalities of these little ones unfold. Logan, who is 22 months, is so fun to watch lately. It is as if he is realizing that these people around him are his very own family and he just can't stop being excited about it. He'll just be sitting there and he'll begin reciting everyone's names, "Aubrey, Logan, Brennen, Kamron, Mommy, Daddy." Then he'll smile. When he wakes up in the morning, he is usually one of the first of the kids and when he first sees the others he'll go, "Aahhh, Kamron," or whoever he sees and then he wants a hug and will often repeat the, "aahhh." This sure emakes everyone start their day off feeling loved and connected.

My Goals for This Year

I live by goals and plans, though they do not always coordinate with the new year. I have a master plan of goals that I would like to do by 2012, this is a step towards that. It looks ambitious and probably is, but I have gotten off to a good start already.

Goals for 2007

Gardening and Outdoor Spaces

Grow a productive square foot garden
Get an orange tree
Plant flower bed under back window
Plant part of flower bed in front yard

Cooking

Document and master 12 breakfasts with recipes in a pretty recipe box
Master 10 lunches
Master 10 dinners
Master 8 types of bread
Master 10 vegetable dishes
Master 3 desserts
Work a plan of freezing 10 dinners in the freezer each month
Make strawberry jam along with strawberry syrup
By fall have a four month supply of food

Sewing

Crochet Kevin a large cozy afgahn for the master bedroom
Make a coordinating quilt
Sew 20 items on the machine
Crochet 20 items
Embroider a sampler
Embroider 2 items

Decorating

Paint kitchen, dining, frontroom, family room and halls
Purchase pictures needed for these rooms
Make coordinating curtains

Traditions

When the weather warms up, set up biweekly porch dates with Kevin
Go on a date with Kevin at least once a month
Continue anniversary weekend getaway with Kevin
Visit Mom’s grave with the kids and bring flowers we’ve grown and tell the children stories about her
Write two more stories about her
Begin a May Day tradition with the kids
By doing all of the work Saturday, create a peaceful and very different day on Sunday full of rest, relaxing and reading, also do not allow the children’s toys out of their rooms on Sunday, so the house will stay neater. Once or twice a month stay home after church instead of going to visit family.

Atmosphere

Play pretty background music more, find at least 7 CD’s that I love
Learn a little bit about scents and incorporate them into my home more

Organization

Continue with the Saturday cleanings,
As the children get better at keeping things in their places add more scrubbing into the Saturday schedule
Continue with our school schedules, get done with current year by the end of June,
Work with the children, so that they can take on more household responsibilities

Piano

Keep up with what Kamron can play

Writing

Add to my blog at least four entries a month

Health

Eat from the garden and/or farms for the whole growing season
After the baby is born, get my weight below 135 again
Help Kevin to get his weight below 200

Finance

Stick to my weekly budget, without going over
Make $500 from book sells

Reading

Square Foot Gardening
The New Testament
Birthing From Within
The New Vogue Sewing Book
Creating a Beautiful Home
School Education
Staying Healthy With the Seasons
The Mother At Home
Your Body’s Many Cries for Water
Teaching No Greater Call
The Hidden Art of Homemaking
Letters by Marjorie Pay Hinckly
Art of Homemaking
Pilgrim’s Progress
Little Men
Mere Christianity
Little Britches
Standing For Something
Lectures on Faith
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Twelfth Nigh
Spencer W. Kimball
Jesus the Christ
Educating the Wholehearted Child
Wild Days


School

Keep up with all classes and get A’s or B’s in all of them
Complete 10 more classes for a total of 15
Clep out of 2 classes, to leave only 3 left to complete my BA

Our Week

We have been able to stay home most of this week, which has been nice. New Year's Eve my mother-in-law had the three older kids over to spend the night with their cousins. Kevin and I got to play some new board games that we got for Christmas. When Nanny brought the kids back, Brennen was lethargic and had a fever. I kept track of it, but it never got over 101 so I decided to ride it out and not give him any medicine as it may be fighting something, in two days it was gone and he was back to himself. That morning Logan woke up with a fever, his got up to 102.6, so I did bring it down with medicine once. Other than that he wouldn't let me put him down and I held him for almost four days. By Saturday my floors were looking terrible, the kitchen was a mess and the fact that I hadn't found a place for all of the new Christmas toys the kids got was beginning to drive me crazy, but Logan still didn't want me to put him down, and I don't have a baby bacpack, as it got lost in the move. Kevin had appointments all day and by five, I felt like giving up. I had made a ham, but couldn't get ten minutes to make anything to go with it, so I said forget it and we just had cereal for dinner. Kevin finanlly got home and asked if I needed some help. I ever so kindly gave him a list, please fix the vacuum so I can clean the floors, stack the heavy boxes up in the garage, change the light bulbs in the kitchen, and so I don't have to cook in the dark. He immediately stacked the boxes, fixed the vacuum and proceeded to move all of the furniture and vacuum everything, I love his eye for detail! I put Logan in the bath with Kamron-the one place he was okay without me for a few minutes, then I got the ladder and changed the bulbs and scrubbed the kitchen, picked everything up in our room and my closet, the older three kids picked up everything in the rest of the house and cleaned the hard floor, tables and chairs. Aubrey curled up on the couch and fell asleep, while Kevin took the boys to fly airplanes on the bed and left me to get a little more work done. By the time the kids were in bed at 8:30, my house was clean and I felt so much better.

I woke this morning to a clean house and kids playing quietly in their rooms at 8:30. Our church time has switched to 1:00, which means sleeping in and relaxing mornings. I have worked on the scout budget and done the Relief Society Newsletter this morning. Kevin is in building a model of a brick house and windmill with Kamron. Aubrey has sat by me and sewn a teddy bear by hand until she was just finished and is now playing with Brennen and the stuffed elephant she made him for Christmas. I love Sundays. Kevin's family and the missionaries are coming over for dinner after church. I think we will have ham.