trying to post again...

Ok, this blogging website is making me MAD. I can apparently post small messages like "testing" and "trying again," but when I try to paste in a longer letter from word, it will not work. Takes me to a "page not found" screen. It's been doing this for several days which is why I haven't posted here in several days. Never used to have this problem. I need to call I guess and see what is going on, as the "help" wasn't actually any help.
Maybe I'll try real quick to see is something this long can successfully publish.

trying again?

testing, testing...

AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!
There. Primal scream is done with.
I have spent way, way, WAY too many of the last 24 hours working on this ridiculous slide show. I'm trying to come up with a nice way to present proofs to clients and I thought a slideshow might be nice. I could find a beautiful song to play for the soundtrack and display all my photos in a nice cohesive way. And maybe get some emotions flowing which will hopefully lead to a larger order! But I have had a heck of a time actually MAKING this slideshow. I stupidly thought powerpoint would be the way to go, but powerpoint really is not geared towards photography slide shows. And you can't save a musical soundtrack as part of the file. Actually you can sort of link a piece of music to the slideshow, but it isn't saved as part of the actual presentation. And the version of ppt on my computer is faulty and doesn't even allow this feature. It works on Ben's computer, but I couldn't figure out how to burn a cd (I was doing this at 2 AM and didn't think he'd appreciate me waking him up to ask him about it) on his computer, or even if you can.
So I downloaded some trial versions of a couple of different slideshow programs and experienced much, much, MUCH frustration with those (computer freezing up, trial versions just generally being really annoying), and finally at 3:30 AM gave up and went to bed. This morning a note I had posted on my photography website had been responded to and I found out that you can make slideshows with Photoshop, so I messed with that for about 3 hours and figured it out, only to realize that you cannot save it as an exe file. Only as a pdf file (which won't play music), or a wmv file which requires the user have windows media player installed. And I really wanted a stand-alone slideshow, one in which you just insert the cd and it plays-- no having to open up various windows and have the slideshow play inside the window. Supposedly Photoshop allows you to burn it as a vcd, but when I did this my dvd player didn't recognize it and even when I tried to play it back on my computer, my computer said it didn't recognize the file!! Arghhh!! So finally I just gave in and ordered PicturesToExe which is the program most other photographers are using. It was only $30 so not too bad. The place I ordered it from said the download info would be sent to my email account. However, it has been 9 hours and still nothing in my email. This is very annoying because I just wanted to finish this tonight!!!!!! I told Monday's client I would bring by the proofs tomorrow morning, so I really needed to have this done. Oh well. Once I figure this out, all future slideshows will be a snap, but this has been pretty torturous, all in all. When I eventually figure out how to save it as an .exe file I'll post it on my website and you can all see it.
Anyway, due to my being up obscenely late last night, I had a pretty tired day. As a result my kitchen table is covered with honey (ok, not COVERED, but pretty messy still) from the boys making snacks, there is crayon all over part of my kitchen wall (artistic impulse courtesy of Mosey), and the boys ate pretty much only popsicles all day. Bad mommy. I will be much better tomorrow. I'm going to go to bed real soon here and I will pay attention to my kids tomorrow and take them somewhere fun in the afternoon.
I have a funny story from the other day at Sam's club. We went there after school on Tuesday to get new tires on our van, and so we had some time to kill wandering around Sam's while they worked on the car. I was just chatting and joking with the boys, talking about kites and stuff. We got a new kite since our old kite was irretrievably lost up in Palm Beach when it got caught first in a mangrove forest and then in a palm tree. Joseph and Brigham were speculating on how high the kite would go, if it could go all the way up in outer space and then to heaven. Joseph than said, "What if we could build something so tall that it went all the way to heaven?" I said something like, "Wow, that would be pretty tall!" But Brigham immediately replied, "I think Jesus would be pretty surprised to see us!" Ha ha ha!! Yeah, and then we probably would never be able to understand each other again, to boot.
Joseph and Brigham have, over the past several weeks, developed this really frustrating competition over who gets to open the van door. It is always this scrambling race to see who gets there first, and then lots of protests and tears on the part of the slower brother. So we came up with a compromise that has actually been working pretty well-- Brigham opens the van door from the inside and Joseph opens it from the outside. I'm amazed, but it is working! Before, we had gotten to the point that even before we reached the gate to our neighborhood, Brigham and Joseph were climbing out of their carseats and scrambling over the back of the seat in front of them to try and be "ready" to open the door the instant we pulled into the driveway. I knew that had to stop and so I had put the child lock on, so neither of them could open it from the inside. But that just made the competition for opening the door from the outside even more intense. Anyway, I'm glad to have found a resolution (for now) to this problem.
My friend Rena is pregnant (have I told you before?), she actually found out here at my house when she and Janette were over to help me paint the upstairs hall about a month ago. And 2 weeks ago she found out she is having twins! Isn't that amazing? Her two best friends here (me and Janette) both have twins, and now she's having twins! She has a 9 year old son and a 3 year old daughter and wasn't really planning on having any more-- in fact she wondered if she even could since it took more than 4 years to get pregnant with her daughter. But here she is, having 2 more! She gets really sick like I do and has had a very rough time so far. She's lost 10 pounds and she's only 8 weeks. So I've been trying to have Emma (her daughter) over, and bring her over food and movies and stuff. I think I'll have Emma come over tomorrow afternoon and entertain my boys for a couple of hours. :-) She is really a good girl and my boys like playing with her. I have to say, though, it is pretty cool to sort of be able to relive my twin pregnancy through Rena, but not actually have to be pregnant!! They live in a small 2 bedroom condo, though, and her husband has put in for a transfer to Dallas so they're not sure how long they'll be here. He works for the government so it could be a while. I hope it is at least long enough for her to have her babies and get through the first few weeks. I would love to go over there and be a night-time nanny for the babies once a week or so. And I keep thinking how fun it will be to photograph twins!
All right, that's it for tonight. Gotta get to bed and catch up on some zzzz's. Have a fabulous Fridy everyone.

Today I had my first photo shoot with a non-family, non-friend (referral from Shanda). She had a 3 week old and a 3 year old. I think it went well, it was definitely a learning experience. Meaning I learned I need a wide angle lens! Their house had very small rooms and I was squished way up against the walls just trying to get a wide enough in-camera crop. The little girl was a doll. Really cute and was very patient with getting pictures taken. The baby was a little fussy, too bad I didn't catch him in that 2 week window where they are sleepy and can be moved around easily. Each time we moved him the mom had to rock him and settle him down. I still got lots of great shots, but I had brought a bunch of different props (baskets and such) that I didn't use because the baby wouldn't have tolerated being moved around that much. I also wanted to get some of the baby and mother, but again, just when I was getting that set up, the baby got fussy and needed to eat. Oh well! I just have to remind me that it's ok if I don't get EVERY single shot I have in mind. As long as I have a bunch of good ones for the mom to choose from, that is a success. I've only proofed half of them (I ended up with about 45 that I'll present as proofs), but I'll post a couple of my favorites.
Mosey is turning into a talker and singer! Oh my gosh, he is talking NONSTOP. The twins didn't start this early! What am I in for? He now gives me a running commentary of everything he is doing, seeing, or thinking. And naturally I must acknowledge each and every comment. LOL! But his singing is just the best. He listens to his brothers singing and picks it up real fast. Last week we were at Target, and Joseph and Brigham were singing "Follow the Prophet." Pretty soon I hear a little voice from behind us (Mosey always likes to tag along behind us, I feel bad and try to get him to walk WITH us, but he prefers to dawdle behind) singing, "Fowow da paw-fit, fowow da paw-fit, fowow da paw-fit, he knows da WAAAAY!" It is almost too cute for words. I need to find out if I can somehow record sound clips via the computer and post them so you guys can all hear. He also can sing the Scooby Doo song along with his brothers, although for now it is limited to "Scooby dooby doo, weh ah you," repeated ad nauseum.
Brigham and Joseph are doing well, too. They have all been healthy for a couple of weeks now, thank goodness. Although that reminds me, I got sick again last week! Thursday night, just after my RS presentation, I started feeling not-so-good. I thought it was just from being up too late 2 nights in a row, but on the way home I REALLY started not feeling good. I ended up throwing up several times that night and the next day I was pretty much glued to my bed. I tried to get up a few times but I was just so sick and weak and tired, I pretty much had to let the boys have the run of the house for the day. During this time Brigham and Joseph learned first-hand the power of gas expanding. They decided they were hungry (poor boys, I can't remember if I even got them any lunch, I probably didn't), and got out a single-serving Chef Boyardee Lasagna. It has a metal lid you peel off, then put the plastic lid back on and microwave it. The boys have seen me do this before, but I guess they didn't realize I had taken the metal lid off first! So they put the whole thing in, pressed a bunch of buttons on the microwave until it started going, and it went and went until ka-BOOM! Exploded Chef Boyardee in the microwave.
The good thing about microwaves, though, is that at least it confines the mess to a pretty small area!
I did teach the boys what they are supposed to do next time they want to make a snack, and I gave them a little lesson on the physics of gas expansion. I think they sort of got it.
Ok, one more story. This is from a week ago or so, I don't *think* I've shared it, but if I have, sorry, ignore it. The boys and I were watching a show on the history channel about the Irish mob. The show was talking about the gang wars over drug turf and the boys started asking me about it. First they asked what drugs were, so I explained that drugs are pills or powders or other medicines that people take. People think that it makes them feel good for a few minutes, but then they get addicted and after you get addicted to drugs, you turn into a bad guy. Is this a good explanation? Really it is true, it is the addiction to drugs that is responsible in one way or another for a huge percentage of crime in this country I think. And the boys are pretty tuned into the concept of bad guys. So then we had a little talk about only taking medicines and other things that your doctor gives to you, or that your mom or dad give to you. Brigham asked me, "How will I know if it is a good drug or a bad drug?" I told him I would make sure to teach him, and if he was ever unsure, he should just ask me or dad. After our conversation, Brigham announced to Ben and me, "I decided not to sell drugs when I grow up because I'm going to be a batman movie maker instead." Oh, good boy! So do you think 4 years old is like some sort of record for the earliest ever just-say-no-to-drugs discussion?
All right, that is it for tonight. Rosalynde, I hope you and Mara are safely home and that she is doing well.

Ok, here's one of Mosey, using the kit lens that came with the camera. Later on that day the 50 mm 1.8 lens that I ordered came, and I like that one much more for portraits because it is so sharp. But the kit lens still gives me results far better than what I'd get from my old camera. And it's good 'cuz it's a zoom lens and that's always helpful to have.

Here's one where I was practicing with the shallow depth-of-field capabilities of this camera. So cool!

Happy birthday Mara Gwen Welch!
I'm so excited to have a new little niece! So happy she arrived safely and healthy. And I'm so excited to go see her in 2 weeks! Yes, I bought plane tickets last night to go see the newly expanded Welch family April 7-10. I can't wait to see what she looks like and to hold a brand new infant again. Ben asked me today if I thought I'd come back from St. Louis wanting another baby. Well, I'm not sure about that, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to fall in love with Mara.
The other big news of the week, ok, maybe not quite so momentous as the birth of a baby, but pretty momentous for me anyway, is the arrival of my new camera!!!!!!
I'm not sure I told you guys of this thing I had going, because if it didn't end up working out I'd be pretty embarassed. But it did, so I'll tell the story now. A few months ago, as I was researching cameras and searching different internet sites to try and find the best price for the camera I wanted (a Canon EOS 20D digital SLR for anyone who cares), I came across a website with a button that said, "Click here to get this camera free!" So I clicked on it to see what it was, sure there was some kind of massive catch. Well, of course there was a massive catch, but it ended up being worth it to me. The camera was being offered by this internet company that is hired by all kinds of other companies to drive people to their websites. So anyway I had to fill out and complete 18 "offers" from this website, and after they were completed, they would send me this camera free. It took me 3 months to successfully complete all 18 offers, and it wasn't exactly free since some of the offers involved buying stuff. But all-in-all I think I spent around $250-$300 and I ended up with a $1400 camera and lens! And it was the exact camera I wanted.
Some of the offers were to apply for a credit card, and if accepted make a purchase and pay the first bill. I signed up for a Disney movie-of-the-month type thing. Ordered 30 day trials of 3 different herbal supplements. Signed up for a dental discount program (which is actually good since I don't think Ben's work offers Dental). Signed up for a whole bunch of internet stuff-- getting weekly emails about buying foreclosed houses, etc. I created a whole new email address for all of this so I wouldn't get flooded with junk email.
So the long story short is that I finished all of that, and got my camera! Now I'm ready to roll. I took a bunch of pictures this past weekend trying to get the hang of the camera, and I definitely still have a lot to learn but so far I love, love, love, love it!
I'm also building a little studio in our garage. I was thinking about trying to convert Brigham's bedroom into a studio, but actually he's been sleeping there a lot, and the garage will work just as well. I bought a humongous piece of MDF and I'm making a platform (just putting the MDF on double-stacked cinder blocks). I bought 2 boxes of laminate wood flooring and I'm going to make a faux-wood floor on the platform. I can then pull my backdrop down (I use a roll of white vinyl but I eventually will get various colors of seamless backdrop paper), clamp the bottom corners to a length of baseboard that I will attach to my platform, and voila! A beautiful wood floor and pretty wall to take pictures against. I've seen lots of pictures with this set up and you'd never guess it was all fake. I have my backdrop hanging from hooks I have inserted into the pegboard on the east wall of the garage. I got some gorgeous round chinese lanterns (one 32" diameter which is huge-- I'll use this as my key light, and another 12" diameter that I'll use either as fill or as a hair light). I am going to install this metal bracket thing on the garage ceiling and put in a bunch of S-hooks so I can adjust the positioning of the lanterns. I also have an old closet door that I have set up on one side where I can lean my reflectors (really just foam core board from Office Depot).
So, that is my studio-on-a-budget, or at least what it eventually will be. I'll take a picture of my set up when I'm done.
Oh my, this entire email has been completely about me. I'll have to tell some kid-stories tomorrow. For now I'll leave you with some pictures from my new camera.

Hey Everyone,
Happy St. Patricks Day! I hope everyone wore green and avoided getting pinched. The boys were pretty excited to wear green to school today, AND they got special snacks-- little cups of candy that they found "at the end of a rainbow." Their arts and crafts project involved painting a pot of gold, and their teacher wrote on each child's what he or she would do with a pot of gold. Joseph said he would "buy a light chaser" (I guess 3 aren't enough), and Brigham said he would "Go to Disneyworld and see Mickey Mouse." We'll definitely have to take the boys up there again sometime. Maybe for their birthday.
We had the missionaries over tonight, so I made a traditional Irish meal, thanks to allrecipes.com. I made Colcannon, a mashed potatoes/cabbage/leeks dish that I really liked-- much better than plain old mashed potatoes; Irish stew, which had carrots, parsnips, leeks, onions, potatoes, rosemary, and beef (supposed to be lamb but I couldn't find any lamb at the store); and Irish soda bread. It was all very good, except perhaps a bit too much rosemary in the stew. I think the rosemary would have gone very well with the lamb, but with the beef, a little less would have probably been better. For dessert we had mint-n-chip ice cream (you know, it's green). While the missionaries were here, I gave them a brief history of St. Patrick and of St. Patrick's Day. For any of you interested, here's what I learned:
St. Patrick was born in England in the late 4th or early 5th century A.D. At the age of 16 he was kidnapped by Irish marauders and taken to Ireland where he was a slave for 6 years. As a slave he worked mostly as a shepherd and it was during this time that he became deeply religious. After 6 years he escaped and fled back to England. After returning to England, he had a vision of sorts in which he was instructed to become a priest and go back to Ireland. 15 years later, after becoming a priest, he did return to Ireland as a missionary to minister to the small group of Christians in Ireland, and to convert many others. Ireland was a largely pagan country, with the people following a sort of nature-worshipping religion.
Patrick was a master at merging Christianity with the pre-existing Irish rituals and symbols familiar with the people of Ireland at the time. It was he who combined the sun (powerful Pagan symbol) with the Christian cross, to create the unique Celtic cross. He also encouraged the people to celebrate Easter with bonfires, a traditional ritual of spring in the old Pagan ways. He is said to have died on March 17, 460 A.D., which is why we celebrate St. Patrick's Day on March 17. He later became the patron saint of Ireland, and many myths have arisen surrounding St. Patrick. The most famous one is that he drove the serpents out of Ireland. However, this is certainly a myth as it appears there never have existed snakes on the island, at least not since the ice age.
St. Patrick's Day has been celebrated for centuries in Ireland, as a feast day in the midst of Lent. People would go to church services in the morning and then in the afternoon the celebrations would begin. St. Patrick's day became a holiday from Lent, with the people commonly eating meat and celebrating with a feast. Since St. Patrick spent his life as a missionary, St. Patrick's Day is traditionally a day of prayer for missionaries throughout the world (I thought this was really cool, especially since we had missionaries over for dinner!).
The first St. Patrick's Day Parade was actually held in New York City in 1780-something, when the Irishmen in the British Army marched in national solidarity. Since then, the St. Patrick's Day parade has become a global tradition, as has wearing green, the national color of Ireland.
So, now you know!
Ok, that's it for tonight. I'm really tired. I think I'm definitely experiencing MS fatigue because I just cannot seem to get enough sleep. I've been so exhausted and I've barely exercised at all this week, which is really bad because I start getting really depressed when I haven't worked out. I'm definitely going to workout tomorrow. I'm hoping it will help clear my brain, too, since I've also been feeling really fuzzy and just not totally right mentally. It's really bugging me. It is pretty subtle, though, so I can't tell for sure if it is just a combination of external factors getting to me, or if it is the M.S., or if it is all the drugs I'm taking, or what. But it is getting to me.
I was able to get a bunch of stuff taken care of today, though, including a persistent problem with our bank and our mortgage company. Our bank, Bank of America, keeps sending our mortgage payment to the wrong account number at Flagstar Bank. Luckily it is being sent to a non-existent account number, so the money is still there, but it shows up on our account as if we haven't submitted a payment, so I've been getting these nasty letters from the Loan counseling department at Flagstar, threatening all sorts of things if we don't pay up. So that has been a hassle trying to straighten out, and even more aggravating because this was supposedly all figured out 4 months ago and here we are again, the same exact problem cropping up. Right now I'm pretty mad at Bank of America, and pretty mad at Flagstar. Bank of America shouldn't be making a mistake like that, but Flagstar has been extremely rude to me on the phone whenever I've spoken with anyone. Even more maddening because it is NOT MY FAULT!! Grrrr...
I got a call from a girl in the Ft. Laud ward who wants me to photograph her 2 week old. But my camera is still in the shop! So I'm trying to find someone with a camera I an borrow, or a place that will rent me a camera for the day. Newborns have a very limited window of time where you can get really cute curled-up newborn poses, and that window closes right at about 2 weeks. If I can't find a camera soon I'm gonna miss that window! Hopefully I'll find something soon.
All right, that's it for tonight. Have a great weekend everyone.

I didn't mention (I don't think) that I got a new haircut a couple of weeks ago. The pictures are below. What do you think? It takes a little effort to make it look cute, but I really like it a lot. This is the shortest I have ever had my hair in my life! Well, since being a baby I guess.
I started working on a project today, going through all the videotapes I have taken, and labeling them with their contents. The long-term plan is to have them copied to DVD, but first I have to know what is on what. So I pulled out the one from the twins' birth today and it was so wonderful to watch it. I had never actually watched it since it was taken, so it was all brand-new to me. Wow, it was amazing to see those two little tiny babies. Actually even more amazing to see my huge belly just before they were born! Almost unreal. The boys were completely fascinated, too. Joseph asked for the first time which of them was born first and when I said he was, he said, "I KNEW I was born first!" Like I said, everything is a contest with him!
Mama, you remember how you were worried you didn't operate the camera right and missed filming a lot of stuff? Well, you can breathe easy (after 4.5 years), it all got on tape just fine.
My friend Rena is newly pregnant and has terrible morning (all-day, all-night) sickness, like I did with the twins and Mosey, and all these memories of being pregnant are coming back to me. I'm not sure if I miss all of that or if I'm really glad I'm not there now!
Oh yeah, I also didn't mention that I finished up all my qualifications for my new camera, sent in the forms and everything, and now I'm just waiting. I am so excited! My other camera is still being repaired so I've had to use my old Kodak and I'm really suffering... Please excuse the quality of the self-portraits of my new haircut, I promise it is the camera!
Ok, I have to go to bed, I am just so tired I can't think anymore.

First of all, happy belated birthday Elena! I hope your birthday was really great. Your cousins Brigham and Joseph can hardly wait to be 5 just like you! And soon you will be getting your best birthday present, a new little sister. Rosalynde, I hope you are doing well during these last few days. I can't wait to get "the call" that baby Mara is here.
Well, we have had a great few days! Ben's parents came on Wednesday night and left early yesterday morning. We did lots of things including going to Fairchild Gardens (a really beautiful tropical botanical gardens), Coral Castle, a tour of Ft. Lauderdale by boat, the beach (twice), Palm Beach, and lots of places in between!
The boys really, really loved having their grandparents here. Since they left, in all of the prayers (blessings on food included), thanks were given that grandma and grandpa could come.
Ben was scheduled to have Thursday and Friday off, but an emergency came up at work and he ended up really only getting Friday afternoon off. But we still managed to do just about everything we wanted. I hope we didn't completely wear out Kent, though!
I don't think I updated last week much at all, even before the Turners came, however. Mosey ended up with a double ear infection, so I'm still force-feeding him amoxicillin (only 2 more days of that torture, thank GOODNESS!-- No wonder so many bugs are becoming resistant to amoxicillin, 10 days of twice a day dosing in an uncooperative 2-year old is nigh-on impossible), I got strep throat AGAIN (and yes, I DID take my antibiotics as directed) and so ended up on another antibiotic, I painted the kitchen backsplash (wanted to do tile, but no time or money and I just got plain sick of the lavender sponge paint), rented a carpet cleaner and thoroughly cleaned carpets upstairs and down, touched up the paint in my bedroom and bathroom, and got the house pretty much clean by last Wednesday night. Whew! I still had several projects I really wanted to finish before Kent and Jackee got here, but oh well. What wasn't done was: weeding in front yard planters and new flowers put in big tree planters by driveway, garage cleaned out and organized (although this did mostly get done after they got here), cornice boxes in living room recovered, downstairs closet door repainted (the boys went at it with a knife more than a year ago and I still haven't repainted it), and new pictures printed out and hung in my newly painted stairway and hall. Oh well.
The outings we went on really were fun. At the Fairchild gardens, there was a huge art exhibit by an artist named Chihuly (can't remember his first name), who is a world-renowned glass blower. There were these fantastic glass pieces incorporated throughout the gardens, hanging from trees, "growing" from the ground, floating in the lakes. Really, really neat. Jackee and I went into a building where some of his smaller pieces for sale were on display. The pieces in that room were going for between $4000 and $40,000. No kidding! I stood their and watched while one lady looked around and decided to buy a $6,000 piece in the shape of a lily. It was pretty, but wow! $6,000 for a piece of glass.
At the Coral Castle, where we've been before, we were given a guided tour by this guy who must be the proprietor of the place or something, because he knew EVERYTHING and told us lots of really cool details that were not part of the regular tour script. And we saw a scarlett kingsnake (I think that's what it was-- it was either that or a coral snake, and a coral snake is extremely venomous, so I hope it wasn't that!!) slithering between 2 section of walls. Ben tried to catch it but it was too slithery. Seeing that snake was Joseph's favorite part of the day. We also caught a tree frog which we took home and kept until Sunday when we let it go. The boys thought it was very cool, how it would grab onto them and then make these enormous leaps onto walls or whatever.
At the second beach we went to, up in Palm Beach County (can't remember the name of that beach), we found so MANY shells! Also 2 beached jellyfish and a sea urchin. I thought the sea urchin was dead (it was washed up WAY up on the beach), so I took it home. I forgot to take it out of the car, though, and 2 days later it became horribly apparent that the poor thing had NOT been dead, but now obviously was. Yuck. Rotting sea creatures really smell horrible.
Kent and Jackee enjoyed being serenaded by the boys for nearly 2 hours on the way home from Palm Beach. Their song for the evening was the Scooby Doo theme song, which Ben had taught them. I doubt Kent or Jackee will be able to get that song out of their head for quite a while! Kent tried, to get them to start singing another song, but Scooby Doo prevailed.
Anyway, now we are trying to get back into the normal rhythm of life. Joseph is having a little bit of a hard time, mostly because when Grandma and Grandpa were here, he got to stay up late every night. Last night I tried to get him down at a decent hour, but he was still up till 10:00 PM pounding on my door crying to be let in. He finally fell asleep on the floor in the hall, poor guy. I'm trying very hard to get them out of the habit of sleeping in my bed. Anyway, today at school he was not at his best, and after school Miss Trudy wanted to talk to both of us. He has been rushing through some of his work, "scribble scrabbling," and she wanted to talk to him about doing his best. Joseph was embarassed and grumpy and did NOT behave well at all, at one point even trying to kick Miss Trudy! Oh no!! It wasn't really a real kick, I was holding him on my lap, and when Miss Trudy came and knelt in front of him, he sort of kicked out with his foot, I guess trying to push her away. But whatever, a kick is a kick. He got in big trouble and I made him stand in a corner until he apologized. He didn't ever apologize, but ended up instead accidentally bumping his head quite hard on a doorknob and was then crying really hard. I wasn't sure what to do and so I just picked him up and told him he would need to apologize tomorrow. I was pretty embarassed. Anyway, this evening Joseph made a very nice apology card for Miss Trudy and we had a good talk about taking his time and doing his best and never, ever, EVER kicking a teacher again. I think he got the picture.
The problem with him is that right now EVERYTHING is a race for him. A race to see who can get dressed first, who can open the car door first, who can get buckled first, who can finish eating first, etc., etc. I suppose this comes from always having a twin brother there to compete with. He told me today he was scribble scrabbling on his work because Eric was trying to beat him and he wanted to finish first. So I talked to him about how schoolwork is not a race, and it is better to do a good job than to be fast. We practiced what he would do if someone tried to race him (tell them it was not a race, and/or move to a different table). So I hope things will improve. I worked with him on his coloring today, something he has always lagged behind on compared to Brigham. Brigham loves coloring and is very good with his hands, and so I've never had to really "teach" him how to color, etc. But I think Joseph just needed some explanation as to how to color, and what it means to do a good job coloring (staying in the lines and filling in all the white spaces). I guess I never thought coloring had to be "taught!"
Ok, this has gone on way too long. At least now I feel like I am kind of up to date on my daily updates! I promise tomorrow's won't be nearly as long or boring.
I'm going to post a bunch of pictures on my blog, but they probably won't be up until tomorrow.

Ugh. I have strep throat. I was hoping not, but by this afternoon there really wasn't much of a question and a throat swab confirmed it. Actually, it's ok since at least the ab's should knock it right out!
Anyway, I'm drugged up on some hydrocodone and I'm going to try to sleep. I hope when I wake up I'll feel like a new person.

Hello Everyone,

First of all, happy belated birthdays to Benjamin and Daddy! Benjamin, I wish I could say I thought of you at 5:22 PM (2:22 PM CA time) on the 23rd, which is the exact time you were born, but alas, I was in the throes of caring for sick kids and I did not catch the moment. However, I was aware it was your birthday and now you are officially of Missionary age! Wow! Can you believe you are actually 19? I imagine for a boy, that is such a momentous, anticipated age. Do you remember being a little kid and thinking how grown up the missionary elders were? I remember being startled at 19 when I realized that the boys MY AGE were now on missions. And now all these elders seem so young... I read about your day in your email and I'm glad it was a good one. You continue to be an inspiration to me and I couldn't ask for a better brother.

Daddy, happy birthday to you, too! I know it was your birthday yesterday, and after I sent off my email last night, I felt bad that I hadn't mentioned it. But my internet connection went down again, and so that was that. Did you have a good day? Did your soccer players realize it was your birthday? I must say that you are definitely the youngest 57 year old that I know. Actually, when I mention my parents' ages to my friends, they are all shocked that you are both so young. I guess I must seem old or something! I just hope and pray that I am as energetic and productive and active as you are when I am 57 years old.

Anyway, now for a long and boring update. We seem to have Internet access again. For several days the connection would come and go randomly (mostly go). I even called the cable company to try and get someone out here, but today it has been working almost continuously all day, so maybe it has magically fixed itself.
Ok, so I should give some highlights of the last week. Brigham and Moses got sick last Wednesday morning, both of them throwing up. And of course just one day after I finally finished all my laundry, including blankets and towels! Oh well. That part of the illness only lasted a few hours, though, and by the afternoon they were feeling better. However, by evening Brigham developed a fever and a cough. I left Ben with the boys and went to my exercise class which we have started back up. Our previous teacher couldn't do it anymore since Wednesday nights were like her only night she could spend at home, so I have been nominated to be the instructor. I think it went well and hopefully people will keep coming!

Brigham had a really rough night that night, waking up and coughing so hard that he actually lost the muscular strength even to cough anymore. He just kept letting out these really pathetic-sounding groans as he tried unsuccessfully to cough. Poor little guy. Needless to say, neither he nor I got much sleep that night.

I had kept both boys home from school on Wednesday, and they stayed home on Thursday, too. Brigham battled a fever and cough for a couple of days. On Friday he seemed better, so I sent him and Joseph to school. However in the afternoon he was feverish again, so I guess I really shouldn't have sent him... It was a special day at school, though, because their teacher was being evaluated for her state license and the boys got to stay an extra hour, eat a sack lunch they brought, and even have rest time on blankets they brought from home. They both wanted to go, and it was so fun packing their little sack lunches-- I believe this was the first time I have packed them a school lunch.

After school I took them to Burger King to play at the play place (we only bought drinks since they had eaten lunch), but Brigham quickly began not feeling so good. After a while he just lay down on the bench and told me he was too tired to play anymore. So we went home and I bought "Batman Begins" from Comcast On-demand and we spent a quiet afternoon at home. In the evening Ben came home from work, also feeling pretty miserable. My plan was to have Mosey and Brigham stay home with Ben and go to sleep, and I'd take Joseph on a "date," since he had been cooped up inside so much the past few days. But by the time we were ready to go, Brigham really wanted to go, too, and so I took all 3 boys. We went to Dairy Queen for ice cream sundaes and then grocery shopping. Fun date, huh?

Saturday I went to a Stake Relief Society enrichment meeting, which was a series of classes on relationships. They were very excellent and I came back feeling quite renewed. However, poor Ben was still feeling awful and so the boys had sort of had the run of the house and it showed... I attempted to clean up a bit and then the boys were just at each others' throats having been inside all day, so we decided to take them to the park.

Have I told you about Joseph's obsession with the rock climbing park? There is a park up the road from us that borders onto the Rock Creek lake. There are large coral rocks that line the northern bank of the lake, and there is a cat that has lived there for some time. People leave cans of cat food out for her and she seems to be doing quite well. I always see her when I go jogging. Anyway, Joseph has discovered this cat and is totally infatuated with her! We went to the park last Wednesday and he was wearing his batman cape and hood. We went to see the cat and she just stared and stared at Joseph. I told Joseph that the cat must think he is another cat because his batman hood has ears that look like cat ears. So anyway, every day Joseph has been begging to go back to the park so he could see the cat again. We did go a couple of times this last week, but only saw the cat once. I think she hides in the rocks during the heat of the day.

After the rock climbing park, where we did successfully see the cat, we drove out to a park on the intercoastal waterway where there is a boardwalk leading out through a mangrove forest and ending on a beautiful area of open water surrounded by mangrove islands. It would have been so nice if it weren't for the darn sandflies!! There are no mosquitoes this time of year, but the sandflies were awful. They are these eensy weensy little flies-- smaller than gnats almost, but they bite! You might not even notice one bite, but when there are dozens landing on you and biting you all the time, they get very, very annoying. Luckily they do not leave any lasting welts. So anyway we practically ran down the boardwalk to the end, looked at the beautiful sunset for a couple of minutes, and then ran back. The boys all fell asleep in the car on the way back, so it was a successful outing.

Today I woke up with a terrible sore throat. I have the most irritation-prone tonsils ever! There have been countless times when I have just wished and wished I didn't have tonsils. When I get allergies, my tonsils are most affected. Sore throat-- same thing. So I've been pretty sick today with my throat feeling like it is swollen half-shut. I stayed home from church and slept a little while, but woke up with a pounding headache and couldn't get back to sleep. Ben took the boys to church (and got them ready, too-- thanks Ben!), and stayed after church nearly 2 hours for 5 baptisms. Can you believe it? And these are new members, too, not children already in our ward or anything. The missionaries are doing really well here.

So anyway, here it is Sunday night. I've straightened up a bit to be ready for cleaning in the morning, although there is still a big mess of toys in Mosey's room which I will tackle first thing tomorrow.

Ok, I will attach a few pictures from this past week if my Internet connection holds up. My camera is at the shop now, hopefully getting fixed, so I've had to dig out my old Kodak EasyShare. Man, it is tough to go back to that camera! No zooming capabilities, no way to adjust any settings or anything. But it's still ok and is enabling me to practice with natural window light, which I am getting more and more intrigued with.

All right, that's enough for tonight. Have a good week everyone!

Hey everyone,
For those who are wondering, my finger is doing fine. :-) It just feels a little bruised, but other than that I'm amazed at how little it hurts!
Yesterday was President's Day so the boys were home from school. We did errands including a Sam's Club run, where I treated the boys to pizza. After we got through the line and were finding a place to sit, a lady came up to me (she had been behind us in line) and told me I have the most well-behaved boys she had ever seen at Sam's club! I told her thank you and she said it was a real pleasure to see little boys acting like gentlemen. Yay! Poopy songs notwithstanding, someone thinks my boys are gentlemen! I have to give them credit, they are very well behaved when we are out and about (which is probably why I like to take them out so much-- they are better out than at home!).
Today was cleaning day (since there was no school yesterday), and when we were at Rena's house, she showed me this clipping from a catalog and told me that her son Carter (9 years old) was looking through the catalog and cut out the picture, showed it to her and said, "Hey mom, doesn't this look just like Gabby?" I scanned the picture so you can see (above) and I totally laughed out loud. Yeah, I look like that-- IN MY DREAMS!! But still it was flattering. Completely and totally wrong, but flattering!
Ok, enough brags about myself and my boys. Here's some real honesty. Mosey was being really whiny this afternoon. He was looking at a valentines picture of Rose that the Bradfords sent us (thanks guys!), and kept trying to bend it. I took it away from him several times and told him "No bending the picture!" but he persisted. And yes, he did know exactly what I was saying to him. So finally I took it away from him and put it up, and he threw the biggest tantrum! Tears and everything. I figured he was tired, maybe, so I took him upstairs to try and get him to take a nap. Dozens of songs and stories later, he was no closer to sleep. To make matters worse, Brigham and Joseph came to play in the next room (adjoined by those sliding doors). And then, predictably, they started to fight. As usual, Joseph was doing little things to annoy Brigham and Brigham was completely overreacting and yelling (really shouting!) at me every minute or so, "Hey Mom, Joseph is messing up my train tracks!" "Hey mom, Joseph is putting the tent over my cars!" "Hey mom, Joseph is messing up the blanket on my bed." Try to hear that in your mind's ear in the *most* shrill, whiny, 4-year-old voice that you can imagine. And he cannot just stop there. He must continue to shout this at the top of his lungs until I respond by saying, "Joseph, stop messing up the train tracks!" "Joseph, move that tent to the hallway!" "Joseph, put the blanket back on the bed!" You get the picture. And trying to get a 2 year old down for a nap in the middle of all of this back-and-forth shouting is just really not happening. I was getting more and more frustrated and finally Brigham is yelling for the 100th time about a "stain" on his bed and he needs me to was his sheets and blankets RIGHT NOW, and I just lost it. So there I am literally SCREAMING from Mosey's room, "BE QUIET!!! I DON'T CARE WHAT IS GOING ON, JUST BE QUIET NOW!! I WILL HELP YOU AFTER MOSEY'S ASLEEP BUT UNTIL THEN I CAN'T HEAR YOU. STOP WHINING AND JUST BE QUIET!!!!" Yeah, great Gabrielle. Great way to teach your children to be quiet and well-behaved, by screaming like a banshee. Anyway, they finally were quiet, and Mosey finally did fall asleep, and just as I was extricating myself from him to leave the room, Brigham came up to the door and was crying. In between sobs he said, "Mom, I can't stop crying. I'm trying to be quiet but I can't stop crying."
Ok, bad mommy moment. Really, really bad mommy moment. So I pick him up, take him in my room, lay next to him and hold him and comfort and reassure him as best I can until he is calm. Ugh. So I've been feeling really guilty for the rest of the day. Oh well, tomorrow is another day and another chance to do better, right? And I'm not really emotionally scarring my children for life, right??
Ok, that's it for tonight. Hope you are all having more even-tempered days than I am!

Oh man, we'll see how well I can type tonight. I had a little "accident" with my sewing machine tonight... I was mending a sheet (one of my little scamps, you can guess which one, had the bright idea to cut his sheet in HALF! What was he thinking?), and was in a little too much of a rush and somehow managed to impale my left index finger on the needle. Yep, through the nail and out the other side. It took me a while to even get extricated from the sewing machine, and then I had a needle stuck through my finger! Ben called a guy in our ward who is doing his medical residency and he recommended not going to the ER (I only wanted to go hoping they'd numb up my finger before pulling the needle out), but to just pull the thing out and then disinfect and bandage it up. I took a darvocet from after my c-section (knew I kept those for a reason), and iced my finger up as best I could, and then Ben took some pliers and pulled it out. YOUCH!!!!!!! Seriously, this was the most painful thing I've had for quite a while! But the darvocet is kicking in now and all I've got is a dull throb.
So that was the excitement for today. Other than that it was a pretty average Sunday. Yesterday I slept most of the day, and Ben took care of the boys all day long. I was pretty wiped out from the week. Friday we went to the beach and then there was horrific traffic on the way home so I took the boys to eat at Denny's and then went home. They were asleep by the time we got home, and I went to be shortly afterwards. Saturday I don't know what was going on (MS fatigue, most likely) and I just couldn't get myself up. I woke up several times, but sleep just pulled me under again and again. Anyway it was really good to catch up on some sleep and I know the boys had a good time with Ben. They went to the park, tried to catch iguanas, went to see Curious George, and then came back to our house for a delicious dinner of frozen pizza while Melissa and I went to get pedicures. It was my first time ever getting a pedicure! It was very nice, even if my right foot is mostly numb. But when I was finished, I totally and completely forgot to pay. I don't know what was wrong with me. I'm seriously operating at about 1/2 capacity these days. I drove Melissa home, and it was only then that it occurred to me that I forgot to pay! So I raced back to the mall, ran in, and thankfully the place was still open (20 minutes after closing). I paid and apologized profusely and left a big tip. But I felt so bad! I know they must have been totally talking trash about me after I walked out of there. Ugh, I'll never be able to show my face in there again... Seriously, the MS brain fog is a real thing. Scary.
So anyway, that was our weekend in a nutshell. I tried out my camera after letting it dry out several days, and it is not working... Actually everything seems to work on it except the ability to take a picture! The LCD screen works, the menu and functions buttons all work, the flash card didn't lose any pictures, but I just couldn't get the LCD screen to actually show anything through the lens and when I pressed the shutter, the camera recorded only a black exposure. Sigh... So I'll have to send it in I guess to be fixed.
Ok, I'm really out of it now from the darvocet so I better go to bed. Here's to a better day tomorrow!!

Not much to report on today. Pretty normal day-- school, Target run, home, cleaning, solving fights, etc. When Ben came home we went to Treetops park for a picnic dinner until the ranger came and kicked us out (park closes at sundown which was 6:12 today, apparently, and the ranger was by at 6:14 to tell us to leave!). We went to another park and afterwards drove around for a while, to the grocery store to get a few necessities, to the missionaries because they needed a ride to someone's house, to the gas station, and then pretty much home. Thank goodness the boys were asleep by the time we came home.
Lets see. Oh, there was one interesting thing-- when we were on our way to the missionaries' apartment, Joseph started singing a song. Can you guess what it was about? Yup, you guessed it, poop! This song went on and on-- Joseph and Brigham both took turns making up verses. The verses went something like this: "Pooping at home, pooping at school, pooping on the dog, pooping on the cat, every day everyone poops! Pooping on the potty, pooping in your undies, pooping on the bed, pooping outside, poop is everywhere!" Anyway, you get the picture. And the whole time, when one boy was singing, the other boy was laughing hysterically. I'm really not sure what to do about this. I think it is very normal 4-year-old behavior. If I had only ONE 4 year old, my tactic would be to ignore him completely and this would probably end the problem. However, with 2, each one gets exactly the response he wants from the other, so the thing just keeps going and going! But I have a feeling if I get after them about it too much, it will only become a bigger problem. Any advice? I guess my plan is to ignore it as much as possible when the singing or poop-talking only occurs at home or in the car. But if it starts happening in public, I'll get after them. Why can't they be singing about dinosaurs or even Spiderman and Batman??
Oh, and here is a PSA for all of you out there: If you have a numb leg, be very careful when shaving your legs. I now have a nice big cut on the back of my right knee. It is ugly, but hey, at least it doesn't hurt!!! (You know, numb and all...)
All right, I'm going to bed. I'm going to try very hard to be in a better mood tomorrow. It is outing day so that at least is something to look forward to.

Hello, hello, hello!
For those who are wondering about my doctor's appointment, the short story is that it didn't happen. The long story is that the address I had for the doctor was wrong. He used to work with this one practice in Kendall, but when I got there (late anyway), the receptionist informed me he no longer worked there. So Mosey and I went back to the car (and I couldn't find where I parked so that was an adventure in and of itself) and drove to the other hospital across town where his new office is. I called his office on the way, but only got the receptionist's voice mail. I explained the situation and said I was going to go there anyway just so I'd know where the office was, and I would reschedule the appointment. So we got there, and it was impossible to park, we actually got the LAST empty parking space in a 6-level parking garage, and walked a mile, it seemed, and finally found the right office. But when I got there, the receptionist had no record of me ever even making an appointment! The only thing she could figure was that one of the hospital volunteers must have been taking phone calls while she was away from her desk, and she obviously didn't know how to make appointments. So anyway, I made a new appointment for March 2. It is just as well, I guess, since I still haven't been able to get my medical records from my old doctor. I'm just going to show up there tomorrow and MAKE someone get them for me!
So anyway, poor Mosey was in the car pretty much all morning. I took him to BK to play in the playland as a reward. He LOVES the BK playland, and still didn't want to leave after we'd been there nearly 2 hours. Mosey also discovered the thrill of elevator rides. He LOVES elevators! In all of our wanderings this morning we took 8 different elevator rides. He would only come out of the elevator when I promised him we'd go find another one. In fact, he was very upset to get in the car after the first hospital because he wanted to go back and ride the elevator again. I told him we were going to drive to another hospital to find more elevators and then he was fine. :-) Whenever the elevator would start and stop he would get this intent look on his face and sort of bend his knees and then do his best attempt at a jump while yelling, "Fun!" He's a funny boy.
Joseph and Brigham stayed at the Curtises after school until I came to pick them up. This afternoon we mostly played outside and then went to the gym when Ben came home. I haven't been to the gym in more than a week so it was good to go back. This whole MS thing has made me quite upset. I'm like half depressed about it and half angry about it. But there is absolutely nothing I can do except make the best of it, and so I am just going to go about my normal life the best I can. Yeah, my leg is numb and weak, but I'm going to go work out anyway! I did 3 miles on the treadmill at about an 8:30 pace (except for the last half mile where I pushed it to a 7:54 pace) which is actually a decent speed for me. There were a couple times when I was a bit wobbly and had to grab onto the side, and when I was done my legs were not happy with me. Both feet were numb and I couldn't walk very coordinatedly, but at least while I was running I seemed pretty good. Then I did some regular arm and shoulder exercises and tried to do back and abs. I like to use this piece of equipment that you can use to work the lower back, obliques, and abs, but the problem is it puts weight and pressure on my hips and lower back, and my right hip and right side of my lower back is really not feeling good. It is hard to explain. I'm half-numb on my skin, but the muscles are really sensitive. It is not a good combination.
BUT, I will stop complaining because at the MS clinic today (the real one), I saw a guy probably in his late 30's who has to shuffle along with a walker, and from the looks of it has also lost bladder control. So I am NOT going to let myself wallow in self-pity when I am still fully functional!
Anyway, it is almost time for me to call in to the conference call to hear Benjamin's mission call! Ben predicts he will be called to Brazil. I think my guess is Checkoslovakia (I'm sure I spelled that wrong). We will soon find out!
Have a good Thursday everyone.

Happy Valentine's Day!!
I hope all of you had a good day. I was thinking back on Valentine's Days of yore, and it was always pretty much a "blah" holiday for me. I never was really bitter or anything, but it just wasn't that great I guess. Except for when I was really little and the whole class had to give Valentine's cards to everyone else and then you got candy... :-) Although I seem to remember a few classes in which the teacher was just really dumb and didn't require all the kids to bring cards for everyone else, and I do remember feeling a little sad when I didn't get as many as others, but that's all in the past now. Valentine's Day with a husband is much better! We're really not huge into Valentine's Day anyway (we didn't exchange gifts or anything), but at least there is someone to say Happy Valentine's Day to and to give and get a hug!
Anyway, yesterday afternoon I was thinking about what I would get for the boys' Valentine's party at school, and I was going to just get some generic Batman valentines or something, but then I had a good idea! So I dragged the boys upstairs for pictures, and they were moderately cooperative, and then I spent last night working on it and managed to get them printed at Walgreens before school today. I'll post the results above. I thought they turned out way cute! I'm slowly but surely learning photoshop. There's probably way faster/easier ways to do some of the things I'm doing, but oh well.
This morning after I dropped the boys off at school I took Mosey upstairs for a Valentine's photo session, and those turned out cute too. I'll get some hard copies printed out for the grandparents reading this! Anyone else who wants a hard copy, let me know and I'll mail you one, too. It only costs me like 30 cents or something to get them printed out so it's not a big deal.
Yesterday the big boys were in quite the mood. I had to get after them quite a bit. We did some errands and I should have known they wouldn't be the most fun errands for them (JoAnn's, Michael's), but still they were stinkers. Then we went to Home Depot which they normally do like but one of the employees there came up to me right after we walked in and told me the boys couldn't sit on the cart (one of those low push carts for carrying big things). I just looked at him and said, "I don't think it is humanly possibly for me to *prevent* them from riding on this." So the guy leaned down and told the boys they had to get off, which they did, except for Mosey. I was just right on the edge of losing it with someone, you know how that feels? Like the next person who crosses me is just going to GET IT. And it just bugged the heck out of me to have some guy tell me that my little kids can't ride on this cart. I mean, come on! It is 6 inches off the ground! And there is just me and 3 kids, please. And if they really are concerned about liability issues (which I'm sure is the basis behind the no-kids-riding rule), they ought to know it is FAR safer for the boys AND for the merchandise if they are confined on the cart and not straggling behind me pulling things off the shelves and stuff. Oh well. Anyway, Joseph got really pouty about not being able to ride, and so as soon as I turned into an aisle, I just told the boys to get back on, which they did, and they were good the rest of the time.
The very sad thing that happened today was that Joseph (in a VERY bad mood because he was up too late last night and had eaten way, way, WAY too much candy) dropped my camera into a bucket of water. On purpose. I was very upset, to put it mildly. I don't think I have ever been so mad at him. I banished him to his room for a very long time until it was time to clean up. As soon as Ben came home he put the boys in the van to go get the missionaries, and of course Joseph fell asleep before they even got back.
Sigh... So I took the batteries out and opened it up as much as possible and I'll let it dry for a few days before trying it out again, but it got really wet. I'm afraid it's not going to make it... I do have a warranty on it, which is good, but still, I am NOT HAPPY. I take pictures almost every day and this is going to leave me without a camera for quite some time.
Anyway, we had the missionaries over for dinner. I did a pink-themed dinner for Valentine's day. Brown sugar-glazed salmon, spaghetti with tomato-cream sauce (evaporated milk instead of cream, btw), strawberry jello with sliced strawberries and cool whip, and then pink-iced sugar cookies and strawberry frozen yogurt for dessert. The boys and the Curtis girls helped to cut out the cookies and decorate them this afternoon. I guess the salmon was a hit because at first all 3 sisters (one was with them on an exchange) declined the salmon saying they really didn't like fish. But then the elders went on and on about it and in the end 2 of the 3 sisters tried it and liked it and went back for seconds! Yay!
Tomorrow morning I have my doctor's appointment. I tried to get my medical records from the other doctor's office but in typical fashion, I was only able to leave a voice mail message for the person in the records office, and also typically, no one called me back. Grrr. My leg is getting worse, though, which is not good. It is actually causing me some pain all the way up to my hip. And I noticed today that the L'hermittes sign is coming back a little, too. Darn it! At least this is giving me a little extra burst of motivation to get medicated and soon!
Hope y'all have a great Wednesday.

Bummed, bummed, bummed.
My right leg is acting up quite a bit. Noticed it yesterday and a lot more today. The numbness in my toes never totally went away from my last MS attack, although I really only noticed it when exercising. But now my toes are going numb on/off, and my right foot feels freezing cold all the time (it's not actually cold when I touch it with my hand, but in my foot it feels freezing), and I'm getting those weird tingly/pins&needles/cut-off circulation sensations in my lower leg.
Please, PLEASE let this just be a little thing that does not turn into a full-fledged flare-up! I just got over the last one! Aren't I supposed to have more than 3 months between flareups? It also scares me a lot that maybe this is indicative that my MS is not going to be a really slow-progressing kind. Ugh.
Anyway, for those of you who have been wondering/nagging, I DO have an appointment with my new doctor at 9:45 AM Wednesday morning. Tomorrow I'm going to get my records from the other doctor's office (hoping not to get the run-around on this).
This whole thing is just very frustrating.
On a happier note, we had a great day in Orlando yesterday. We drove up with our ward's youth so they could do baptisms, and I got a session in as well. Only negative was that I had promised the boys we would go either to Downtown Disney or to Oldtown, but the weather was nasty up there. Cold and blustery and rainy. So we kept waiting for the weather to clear up a little and it never did. We did go to the Florida Mall where there was a cool Playmobil store with a bunch of toys out on display for the kids to play around with, and then we ate at Ruby Tuesday, so I think it was ok with them. The boys behaved wonderfully in the car all the way up and down. Joseph actually fell asleep almost as soon as we started back home, and before he fell asleep we told him we would drive by Oldtown to see if it was still open and if there were any rides he could go on. But he fell asleep so we just drove home. Of course, he woke up when we got home and was just so disappointed about not getting to go to Oldtown. His eyes welled up with tears and soon there were these muffled sobs coming from the backseat of the car. Ugh! I just hate disappointing my little guy like that. It hurts my heart. I promised him we'd go for a boat-ride in the lake this morning before church. Of course then we woke up and the weather was cold and miserable HERE, but he was a pretty good sport about it. We WILL go on a boat ride as soon as it warms up a bit.
I've been very naughty with my eating the past couple of weeks, and now have 1.6 lbs to lose again. Sounds like nothing, I know, but it took me like 6 weeks to lose those last 1.6 lbs last time! So starting this morning I am being very good again. Part of the problem was not exercising much last week. And now with my leg being all weird, I'm worried that's going to cut in on my exercise too. Oh well, not thinking about that right now...
I did a photo-shoot with Melissa's 12 year old son last Thursday. It was just at sunset so the light was very orange. I like the lighting, but not the orange cast at all. This is another way in which I am limited by my current camera-- on a better SLR, I could do a white balance in which I calibrate my camera to compensate for color-casts. But anyway, the picture above is one of the ones I did last Thursday. I still need to finish proofing the rest of them, but I thought they were pretty good, especially with a subject who wasn't completely thrilled at being photographed!
The boys were totally hyper tonight just before bedtime. Joseph made up a new new version of "Ring Around the Rosies" which he shouted at full volume while jumping wildly on the bed-- in his birthday suit, no less, having just come from the tub:
Ring around the rosies
Pocket full of poopies
Poopy! Poopy!
We all fall down!
Lovely, eh? Ah, being the mother of 3 boys is always entertaining! This morning Brigham and Joseph were wrestling around yelling, "You're poopy!" "No, I'm not poopy, YOU'RE poopy!" "No, YOU'RE poopy!"
Please! Enough with the poop already! Can I please go 5 minutes without having to think about poop??
Oh, one more thing. Yesterday I went to the distribution center on the Temple grounds and got those books of scripture stories, you know the ones illustrated comic-book style? There's 3 of them, one for the OT, one for the NT, and one for the BofM. Well, the boys seem to like them quite a lot! I'm glad, as I've been trying to find ways to introduce more scripture stories to them. They wanted to read Noah's ark tonight which we did, but then the story of Abraham comes right after and that led into an interesting discussion of God commanding Abraham to sacrifice his son. A little difficult to explain to 4 year olds. Heck, I still don't understand that one!
Anyway, that's it for tonight. I'm going to try extra-hard to go to bed on time to try to nip this MS flareup in the bud.

Hey Everyone,
Another late Sunday night (Monday morning). So what is new?
Actually, there is something new around here, a very welcome new, I might add! Mosey peed in the potty!! He had taken off his diaper (nothing new there), and peed on the floor. I told him next time he should pee on the potty. A little while later, there he was, sitting on the potty. I think it was just for fun, really. So I told him that if he peed on the potty, he would get a treat. A minute later, there he was, proud as can be, with his first potty success! Is it possible that the end of diapers could be in sight??
Today was a pretty average Sunday. Kids were pretty good, church was good. I spent quite a while uploading some pictures so I hope you enjoy them!
I'm ending now because I really have to go to bed. Have a good Monday everyone!

Here is Ben and his boys at the beach at Key Biscayne a couple of weeks ago.

Here are Brigham and Joseph looking at the jellyfish we found stranded on the sand. Mosey is running to come take a look too!

Here is a closer picture of the jellyfish we found beached on a sandbar. We thought it was dead, but when nudged, it would sort of pulsate a little. Ben was kind enough to "nudge" it back to the water, although he wanted to just do away with it since those are nasty stinging little buggers!

Brigham and Joseph showing off their little "worms." Not sure what they were, they were sort of like tiny millipedes. They curled up into little coils when disturbed, but then would start crawling around. Brigham and Joseph were just entranced.

Here is Joseph with his worm. He was so interested in everything about it. Here he is trying to feed it a leaf he picked. I don't think it liked it, though.

Just thought you'd get a kick out of Brigham's current "posed smile." When I ask him to look at the camera and smile, this is what I get. Cute, huh? I always have to trick him and take a pic right when he looks over at me, or tell him something funny or something to get a more natural smile. But I still think his fake smile is pretty cute.

Here is Brigham with his beloved worm. Yes, this is the same one that met his unfortunate end when Brigham accidentally pulled him in half... :-( But Brigham was so protective of him for the hour or so before that!

Here is Mosey RUNNING to me with his bag of cheese crackers. I just love the way little kids run at this age.

Mosey had such a fun day at Parrot Jungle-- look at that smile!

The Goat trying to see if Mosey has any food in his hand.

Mosey checking out the cow.

The cow checking out Mosey's fingers...

Major success today!! The event we have all been waiting for, and feared would never happened, finally happened! Joseph pooped in the potty!!! He has had such a phobia for such a long time. He has been perfectly trained, don't get me wrong, he just goes and gets a pullup for poops. A week ago or so we were at Target and he saw these little potty chairs that he liked and said maybe he wouldn't be afraid if we got that one, so I did. The last several days, he has sat on the potty a few times, but wouldn't go. Finally this morning, he was looking for the pullups but couldn't find them. He said to Brigham that he was going to go on the potty (Ben was listening from upstairs), and sure enough, success! We were very proud of him, and went to Dave and Busters for lunch (this has been his incentive now for quite some time). So, maybe we *won't* have a 16 year old still using pullups.
We actually had been thinking of going to Dave and Busters last night, but decided on Chuck E Cheese instead because D&B was likely to be very crowded on Saturday night. Chuck E Cheese was quite crowded as it was. Ben was wonderful and played games with the boys so I could just sit and talk with Melissa (Curtises went with us). The big boys fell asleep on the way home, thank goodness. I knew they were tired because Fridays are outing days so we had been on the go all day.
I had WW in the morning (still on track), then after school I took the boys to "Color Me Mine," a pottery painting place for kids. Grandma Jackee made these darling plates for me when the boys were almost 2 years old, with their hand and foot prints. I wanted to make one for Mosey, too, so that's what they did. The place didn't have the exact same kind of plate, but I think it will be ok. Brigham painted a little frog and Joseph painted a shark. We'll pick them up next Wednesday after they've been fired. I felt a little bad because Mosey was pretty fussy while we were in there. I'm sure part of it was because I was paying more attention to making his plate than I was to him! Sad, because it should have been the other way around. He was also tired, though, because he fell asleep almost immediately when we got in the car. We went to the dinosaur park and the big boys played while I read in the car with Mosey. Then we went over to the rock climbing park and Mosey would probably have slept longer, but Joseph woke him up. Mostly because he wanted me to push him on the swing and I wouldn't because I had to stay in the car with Mosey. Anyway, it was ok though because I met another mom pushing her twin boys on the swing. Her boys are 9 days older than Mosey so it was fun to talk about having twins, and all that. She had 2 older girls, too, and had originally gotten pregnant with triplets. Spontaneous triplets are really rare! Sadly, the little girl died in utero at about 6.5 months, but her boys were born healthy at 34 weeks. I'm not really one to start chatting it up with other moms at the park, but I was glad I had the chance to talk to her.
Tonight was the "sock hop" at the church, our annual adults-only activity. I've been thinking that these sorts of "50's nights" are getting pretty outdated since most of the members of our ward were not alive in the 50's! But it turned out to be pretty fun. Ben and I learned to do the "pretzel" and the "electric slide." I finally got the hang of the hula hoop!! Seriously, this is such a victory. I have NEVER been able to do the hula hoop, but tonight I finally got it! It is pretty good exercise for the abs, actually. Maybe I'll go out and buy one.
Well, that is it for tonight. I think Ben and I are going to watch "Hitch" before I have to send it back (trial Netflix membership). Have a great Sunday everyone!

Happy Birthday Abraham!!! I told Ben last night that you were going to be 17 years old and he was just amazed. Ben first met you 10 years ago (well, in a few months anyway), when you were only 7. Pretty hard to believe you are only a year away from being an emancipated adult. I hope you had a good day. Too bad you weren't born Feb. 3 because then it would be on Friday and you could really go out and celebrate! I was trying to remember my 17th birthday, and you know? I can't remember! I know it was just days away from the first day of school my senior year, and we may even have been on vacation or something. But I do remember *being* 17 and feeling like at last I was an "older teenager" and was getting some respect! LOL
Well, Feb. 2 for me this year was a little tough. No particular reason why, just feeling very tired and lethargic and unmotivated and impatient. Not a good combination. I'm pretty sure the reason is because I didn't exercise yesterday or this morning (my alarm went off at 6 AM and I just *couldn't* make myself get up), and even missing a couple of days makes my anxiety level skyrocket. I didn't go this afternoon either and I really should have. It's funny how even after 2 days of not working out, and even though I absolutely KNOW it will make me feel better, I just lose the motivation to go. But I am going running tomorrow morning I have decided 100%. Nothing will stop me. And I'm going to bed in a half hour so that I will not be so tired tomorrow!
So this afternoon I pretty much did nothing. I went treasure-hunting with the boys after school, one last run around Embassy lakes before the trash trucks come tomorrow. I'm trying to get a bike for Ben, now that all the rest of us have one. I found a pretty good cruiser bike that is in good shape except for some rust on the handlebar and flat tires. Ben's not much of a bike rider, but I thought it would be fun for us all to have bikes. And if they are free bikes, all the better! I won't feel guilty if we don't use them much. So, is there any product I can buy to remove the rust from the chrome? I assume I'll have to spray the handlebars again with some chrome paint. Maybe I'll make that my project tomorrow.
By the time Ben came home this afternoon I was feeling really discouraged. The house was messy, I hadn't really gotten anything done, and I just had NO motivation. But Ben helped out a lot and got the boys busy picking things up and we got the house very clean in just an hour or so. Thank you Ben!!
And now all 3 boys are asleep in Brigham's bed. I'll have to sneak up there and take a picture before they all end up migrating to our bed, which will undoubtedly happen during the night.
Yesterday I gave all 3 boys haircuts and they look great. Brigham and Joseph are perfect about getting their hair cut, but Mosey wasn't too happy. He let me do it, though, and there's not even too many jagged spots from when he wouldn't hold still.
Huh, I guess that's all I have to say for tonight. I hope everyone enjoys Friday!
Oh yeah, the picture is from a couple weeks ago on Key Biscayne. It was getting pretty dark and my flash wasn't on and the picture was taken by some lady who came up and volunteered since I was taking pictures of Ben and the boys. That explains the camera-shake and the horizontal composition when the picture clearly calls for a vertical shot! Oh well. It's fun to get pictures of all of us anyway. I have a bunch of other fun pictures from that day which I will post tomorrow.