Horseback Riding! tons of pictures!

Yesterday we went to my friend Melanies house and went riding on her horse and pony. The kids had a lot of fun. Madison was scared at first and we couldn't even get her in with the horses at first. She agreed to go on the pony at first because he is smaller and didn't look so intimidating to her.


McKenzie on the other hand loved both the horse and the pony from the beginning. She loved them.....

She rode the pony first and did very well. Like I said she loved it!


So we put her on the horse and that was even better!

She looked like she had always been riding and not her first time. I was quite impressed with her. She wasn't scared one bit and didn't even get afraid when the pony ran after the horse. She held on and when she got back she had a huge smile on her face! She thought it was fun!


Joshua liked it but wasn't so excited about it. He was in kind of a weird mood yesterday.

He liked the horse best though also. He still didn't ride a lot and only rode the horse and the pony once. He had found some legos and was really into those. We couldn't get him away from them! He made a really cool design but somehow I didn't get a picture of it and am really disappointed about that. I really wanted to show it.




And Izzak? Look at his face. Can you tell what he thought of the horse? He loved it also and picked it up pretty quick. He was funny though. When he first got on the horse his first comment to the horse "please start slow, okay" haha to funny. Like the horse understood. He was okay pretty quick though and went riding a little more with Melanies son Austin.

Madison was an interesting story. We convinced her to get on the pony and she liked it but was still afraid of the big horse. I managed to convince her to get on with me after much convincing. Of course I had promised her she would be fine riding with me and mommy wouldn't let her get hurt right? Um yeah that was the idea. We had a little accident and fell off the horse together. Me being the mommy who promised she wouldn't get hurt wrenched myself around to keep her from hitting the ground herself which means I definetly hit. Yes today I am very sore! I hit my hip on my side and have a bruise there also hit my right shoulder and have a nice little bruise there to. Its okay though Madison is fine she landed on padding.


So when she fell after being told you would expect that she would never get back on a horse again, right? Nope after falling she thought the horse was great and wanted to get back on. Not the pony either he was to small she liked the horse!

But she wanted him to go fast she didn't want him to go slow.

Have a look at her riding him on video........

Maddie horseback riding 2 from my4kidsdunn on Vimeo

can you tell she liked it?

Saturday

So today was good. I went to lunch with my mother, grandma, sister and 2 nieces. We had a good lunch and talked alot. That was about it there. Sound exciting? Nope not really.

After that we went to the park where I met up with my friend Becky and her little boy Tanner. We had dinner at the park and the kids played.

Tanner had a dragonfly land on his hand and it stayed there for the longest time.

It was pretty cool. Every once in awhile it would fly off then come right back to him to sit on his finger. This lasted for probably a good half hour!

Then my kids decided they wanted to play badmiton.

They had fun but my favorite part? Just take a look at the next to videos....






Madison plays badmiton 2 from my4kidsdunn on Vimeo






Madison plays badmiton 3 from my4kidsdunn on Vimeo
Now isn't that cute?

Busy weekend ahead!

First of all thank you all for the comments on my last two posts. I really do appreciate them. More then you can understand, trust me!

I'm doing better today. I saw my doctor today and he put me on a new medication to help get some sleep. Thats part of my problem is I'm not sleeping much at all at night and that can just mess a person up! We will see how tonight goes once I go to bed which will be as soon as I finish this post.

Anyway, so I have a busy weekend planned. Tomorrow I have lunch with my mom, grandma, sister and neice for an late mothers day and early birthday lunch for my Grandmother it should be nice then we have to go to my Grandma's house to look through some pictures because I'm making a scrapbook for my grandmothers big 90th Birthday party in July. I don't know exactly where I'll get the time but I'll figure it out!

After that I am meeting with a friend from work and we will take the kids to the park to play probably most the evening. We are expecting really nice if not hot weather this weekend, yeah! Sunday and Monday I will be taking the kids to my friend Melanies house to play and for me and Melanie to just chat. She has a horse and a pony and the kids are looking forward to riding them.

Yesterday Melanie had a fundraiser for her daughter Kennedy who I've told you about at Papa's Pizza. The kids had a lot of fun and I enjoyed talking with adults during the evening for once. Hopefully they made some money from it because there are a lot of expences to go along with Kennedy's treatment.

Also Kelly sent me some pictures from his drive up to Alaska there was a particular one I found interesting.....

This picture was taken at a rest stop on his way up. I find it funny because around here rest stops are pretty posh places you know with things like flushing toilets and running water. Who wants to dump their own potty??? Weird......

I really do miss this guy......

Anyway like I said I have a busy weekend planned I will try to post our daily activities in the evening because you know I love taking pictures!

Also I mailed out my secret swapper package today and I had it sent priority so she should be receiving it tomorrow. I sure hope she likes it!

Lonestar I'm Already There

Its been 2 weeks since Kelly left for Alaska. We talk on the phone quite a bit. I call mostly because I need to hear his voice and him telling me he loves me. I know its only 4 months and its supposed to get easier but so far its not. I just really miss him. Especially in the evenings and at night.

Irritated!! or something..........

See this picture here? This is how I feel towards my fil right now.

Why?

Because he apparently thinks he knows everything.

The boys had a campout this weekend with their Ranger group. It was a father son campout and since their dad is in Alaska right now they asked Kellys dad to go with them. Okay so you all know that the boys both take different meds right? Well so does my fil. He had the meds and Izzak was instructed to give it to the leader to make sure they got them along with the instructions, the check for the trip and the permission slips. So if they were all in the same bag together why did he get everything but the meds? I'm still trying to figure that out. All I know is that my fil did not give the boys their meds this whole weekend. I know there are varying opinions on med for kids with ADHD but honestly with Joshua we had tried everything before deciding to put him on anything. He has no sense of consequences for one. I'm convinced without them he would have killed himself by now because of the crazy things he does. Also he is actually able to pay attention to teachers and get work done. Something that would have been good for this trip. My fil did not give him those and only comment. "I don't know why he takes those? He doesn't need them" Hmm not what I heard from the other leaders and that fact that Joshua lost his fishing pole, tackle box, Izzaks leatherman tool and several other not so cheap things because he runs from one thing to another and loses things and the tool and the fishing pole where lost to the lake. He was goofing around and the items fell in along with the orrs and almost the kids as well. Thats just one of the stories.

And Izzaks? Was his reflux meds. He already takes a pretty high dose of meds and has needed to have increased and another med added at the moment because his voice is going because he is refluxing so bad. He came home with no voice and I am now having to work on that more. He said he didn't think Izzak really has acid reflux because he ate speggetti and didn't get heartburn. His reflux was diagnosed after several tests to make sure with the top pediatric gastrointerologist in the area. She is very well respected.

So apparently he knows better then the child psychiatrist and pediatritian when it comes to Joshua. Also he seems to know better then tests and a gastrointerologist when it comes to Izzak.
He doesn't see why I have them on anything. He's also the one who tries to insist that Izzak doesn't have learning disabilities! You know if he knows so much about this stuff why does he have his low wage job and not a job as a psychiatrist, pediatrician, gastrointerologist and developmental specialist? I know they all make more money then he does.

So today? I got the boys back on their meds. Joshua had a bad day at school it takes a couple of days for the meds to really kick in. Izzak has no voice and missed school because he is refluxing so bad his voice is gone and that is not a good thing.

I would say something more to him but I don't think it matters. He feels he knows more and actually enjoys the argument no matter how much I try not to make it an argument. It makes me feel that there is no way the boys or girls for that matter can go somewhere with him for more then a couple of hours when they aren't due for any of their medications.

Which makes me the bad guy in everyones opinion. I was told recently that I don't try very hard to get along with my fil's new wife partly because I didn't buy her a mothers day card. Well she isn't my mother, she's not Kellys mother (oh no, don't even mess that up around Kelly! She is not his mother!), and she is not my kids grandmother nor does she act like it. In fact she has been very rude and many times inappropriat when talking to my kids but I'm the one who is not trying to make nice. How is that?

So what is your opinion? Am I getting to upset over this? Am I wrong? What would you do? I mean medications and such are important things, its just being responsible to make sure they have them.

Answering Peters question

After my last post I received a comment from Peter asking me......

Now come on be honest - did you - or did you not go down that slide!!!

I promise not to tell.......

Okay I wasn't going to share those pictures but yes both my friend and I both went down several times and it was fun except I fell getting down the first time because it was much faster then I expected it to be!

Me

My friend.

See I do get into the pictures sometimes. I am a kid at heart most things you see my kids doing when they are playing I am usually doing it right along with them. I am just usually the one behind the camera!

My Moms Day and picture overload!

So I will finally tell you and show you my mothers day this year! Aren't you so excited! I have just a few pictures to show you so it may take a bit!


First is Madisons gift she painted me a pictures of a bouquet of flowers and wrote happy mothers day on the back to cute! She also gave me a little tiny daisy plant that she painted the sides for me.

Joshua actually sewed me a bag for his gifts in his class. I don't know how his teacher did it but I can't imagine teaching 29 kids how to use a sewing machine...especially hyper little boys!

He did a really good job of it though and I love it! He even made a card with his picture in front showing me that he actually sewed it himself.

Here is the inside of his card he says I'm a super #1 mom!

McKenzie decorated a bag for me with a cute little shashay in it for to put somewhere to make things smell nice I thought it was pretty and loved the ladybug on the bag. She also made me this little flower card each petal says I love you Mom on it and inside she writes why she does.

After my friend got home from church we took her 3 kids and my 4 kids to a play land. They loved it and it was huge there was so many slides for them to go and things to climb they were busy for 2 hours straight before they started wearing down.

Joshua is ver good at pretending to be behind bars don't you think

Look at that face Kenzie has! She looks like she is having fun doesn't she!

What happens when you get 7 kids and a padded floor with sides? A wrestling match of course. They do look like they are having fun don't they? Izzak is on the bottom of this and Madison is in there somewhere.

And last Saturday Emma made my day when I got home to check my mail and found these cards she sent I don't know how she can say she isn't very good because I love them and think they are great! I don't know if I could give them away! I'm sure I would have to give them to special people and the friends one I've decided is my own from Emma.

So because I don't think I've shared enough pictures I will leave you with my favorite picture from Sunday at the playland.

I love this one and it is my wallpaper on my computer screen right now because I just can't get enough of seeing it!!

Doesn't Maddie lOok like she is having a great day?

Stupid Blogger!

Okay so I'm trying to post about what we did on mothers day because we had a lot of fun even though Kelly was gone but blogger will not cooperate with me! I have pictures to share and they won't go on. I promise if it gets better tomorrow I will have it posted.

Also Kelly has pics from his drive up and as soon as he sends them to me I want to share those also.

He's doing well. He got into an apartment today which is making him feel better already. He seemed to be getting a little stressed the other day but sounds so much better today. He has had a couple of interviews so cross your fingers he will hear something soon. We had a good talk this evening and I am feeling pretty good right now.

I will have my first night ever completely alone on Saturday though so we will see how that goes. The boys leave tomorrow after school for a camp out with their ranger group and the girls are spending saturday night at my parents house. I have this feeling I will end up on the computer or something all night unable to get to sleep.

Izzaks Spring choir concert

Izzak had his spring choir concert this evening they have actually come a long way since the beggining of the school year and sounded pretty good for sixth graders. Izzak even got to announce one of the songs he did well and I was so proud of him for getting up there and reading in front of all those people. Remember he has learning disabilities so this was a huge thing for him to do. I posted the video below.






Izzak's choir concert from my4kidsdunn on Vimeo

By the way he was trying to say prodigy and when you hear people chuckle he is saying "I can't say that word". Tell me if you caught him yawning near the beginning of the song! He always does that!

Also please don't forget to wear yellow tomorrow for those you know or will know someday with cancer. I made sure the kids and I will all be able to wear yellow tomorrow and will post pics of everyone tomorrow evening.

This weeks Fun Monday is brought to us by Willowtree .

'Again this is one of those stickybeak posts. You could also get a bit creative photographically speaking if you wanted to. So here it is, I would like to see your favourite Coffee Mug. But wait there's more, I'd also like to see your favourite glasses for a) non alcoholic drinks and b) alcoholic drinks. If you want extra credit you could also post your favourite plate. Note I said favourite, not best'.

With so many kids in the house I don't really have much in the way of favorite glasses but I do have my favorite coffee cup. It of course is a Starbucks coffee cup insulated and most mornings it is fill with my favorite Peppermint Mocha!

This is also were it is generally found in the mornings as it follows me everywhere on my way to and from work. Its a great travel cup and actually keeps my coffee nice and warm because I don't drink it very quick, I like ot savor it.

Of course one also needs a back up and if I am unable to use this one this one always comes in handy also

The first one is my favorite though.

I do have more to talk about the weekend mostly it was fun. I have lots of pictures to share!

Please don't miss the post below this one. It is one that is very important to me!

Livestrong Day this Wednesday May 16

Please encourage everyone you know to wear yellow to support the upcoming national LiveSTRONG Day on Wednesday May 16, 2007! Over 200 delegates from each state will be on Capitol Hill meeting with congressional members demanding a change in national priorities. We need to make cancer a national priority. 1 out of every 4 deaths in this country is due to cancer. At any point in a given day, over 40,000 children will be receiving cancer treatments. Childhood cancer claims more lives each year than Cystic Fibrosis, Muscular Dystrophy, AIDS, asthma and juvenile diabetes combined. In the span of a decade, only ONE new cancer drug has been developed for pediatric patients. Everyday, 1500 lives are lost due to cancer (that is a 9/11 happening every two days).

Again, please show your support for those who have battled or who are currently battling this disease by wearing yellow.

For more information, please visit www.livestrong.org.

I've commented before about my friend Melanie and her daughter Kennedy who was diagnosed with Leukemia 2 years ago and is still in treatment. Please click on the link with her name above and read the story she has posted. I know some will understand the feeling of it even more so and we can all appreciate it I'm sure. I know it hits home with me! She has comments turned off right now but has a guest book that you can leave a message on because her comments section doesn't always work anyway.

Kelly *Update* He called!

So we are okay I actually slept by myself last night. Shocking I know but they kids were tired and actually put themselves to bed.

I'm a little worried though. When he left he told me he would call Wednesday night but I haven't heard from him yet. When I try to call his cell phone it goes straight to his voicemail. I know its probably just that he is not getting service in Canada or something with our cell provider but I just want to hear his voice and things are going well. I'm one of those people with a very active imagination so it tends to go where it should not! I just worry that something could have happened and I wouldn't know. He should be up there by Sunday at the latest is what he said before he left so I'm going to keep convincing myself everything is fine until then because I know he would have service once he is in Anchorage.

We do have plans for the weekend to keep us busy. On Saturday I will be going to have lunch with my mom and neice for planning for my Grandmothers 90th bday party in June and then after that the kids and I will be going over to my friend Hannahs house to visit with the kids. On Sunday a friend of mine and I will be taking the kids to a play area we have heard about to check it out. That should be fun and I'm sure I will have pictures to post from that.

Again thank you guys for all your supportive comments. I wish you all were close by so I could talk to you in person.

*Update*

He just called just outside of Palmer Alaska. He said that he tried calling but his phone wouldn't work until he got there.

Whew.....I'm much more relieved now I think I can take a breath.

Thank you

First of all I wanted to thank you all for your comments lately, they mean a lot to me to know people out there really care. Also those of you who left comments on Izzaks blog are awesome! Really I mean it. He really loved getting them and not only that he was actually wanting to read them himself and he hates to read.

Kelly left the house about 5:30 this morning I woke up with him to see him go. Izzak did to. Honestly it was one of the hardest things for me not to beg him to just stay here but I know why he is going and hopefully things will be better for us after all this. I did go to work. I figured it would be better for me to go and stay busy so I could get my mind on something else otherwise I probably would have ended up staying in bed all day feeling sorry for myself and thats not good for me or my kids.

You see I can be high maintenance. Not in the sense of wanting things or gifts or anything but I require a lot of attention mostly from my hubby and he knows that. He is very good about giving it to me. My favorite gift from him is a night alone together just talking and hanging out together. That is why this is hard for me. I know we will be fine we can do this and its not like he is completely gone he is accessible by phone for know and I know if something happened he would be here as soon as a plane could get him here. Its just the fact that I have only rarely slept in my own bed by myself a few times since I was 18 and four months of not having him to cuddle up to ..... well thats hard for me. Also to be honest and this is going to sound silly since I am 29+3 but ....okay heres my secret.....I'm still afraid of the dark! How sad is that? I convince my kids every night that there is nothing to be afraid of in the dark and I am afraid of it myself... It's just weird. That and I love having my hubby next to me to cuddle up to.

Izzak has been doing okay he is taking his anxiety meds though regularly I spoke to his dr and after monday we don't want to lose control of it again as he can go downhill really fast. He seems fine though today and I hope to only have to give him the meds for a couple weeks at most and then just as needed.

The others are fine with it at the moment. A little extra clingy but fine otherwise. Kenzie did something at school today and I think she strained her neck though so she has been laying on the couch with a heat pad on her neck all evening. Yesterday I had bought a scrapbook for Kelly to take so I printed up some recent pics of the kids and gave them what they needed and let them go wild. He really liked it but he did tear up while going through it.

Again thank you all for your comments. That is one of the things I like about this blog. I feel like I can poor my heart out and people are there to let me know they are listening. I really love you guys.........

He left this morning for Alaska........

Thats all I really can say right now..................

Fun Monday and more on Kelly and Alaska

This weeks Fun Monday comes from Vicky and she wanted to go back to the first Fun Monday and this is what she said Next week is my turn to host Monday Funday again. We'll need Spring pictures from your front door please, and also could you take a picture out your backdoor to satisfy my nosy sweet tooth?

This was pretty easy to do today because we are having fabulous weather and are finally seeing some sun! So I had no problem taking pictures of our outside.

Of course we have 4 kids so of course our front and backyard looks like we have kids. Notice the picture with the spoon? Yes whenever we feel like we are running low on spoons I always know where they probably have ended up because certain children in this house have found that they make great shovels. I can't say to much because I put my mother through this same thing by stealing her spoons all the time when I was a kid also. I never taught them this though so I have no idea how they figured it out! It must be a kid thing.....

Also with the digging they have been playing at pulling some of the weeds lately and do you notice the truck full of weeds? I guess filling the toy truck makes it more fun. If only I could convince them to pick all the weeds and not just the "fun" ones, whichever those are....

Of course since Kelly is getting ready to leave for Alaska on Wednesday we have his trailor in the driveway as well ready for him to go. The trailor is ready but I'm not so sure we are ready for him to go....





On that topic I had a question as to why Kelly is going up 4 months ahead of the rest of us from my last post. Well its complicated but alot of it really has to do with the fact he actually doesn't have a job up there yet or a place to stay beyond the first couple of days. We are doing this kind of in a strange way I guess. We feel strongly that this is what we are supposed to do for our family everything esle is working in our favor to go so we are sending Kelly up ahead of us on faith basically. The thing is we can't just pick up the whole family and go. We can't risk any time without medical insurance and I am the one carrying it right now. With our kids its just not a good idea. Also I don't want to pull them out of school before the end of the year. If I continue to work though we still have a steady income till his is coming in regularly. I have to stay hear in Oregon right now due to some family obligations that I have for this summer. And just a whole lot of stuff....I said it was complicated there is a lot more to it but its hard to explain.

Also on the note of Kelly leaving on Wednesday. I am doing okay with it I know that it is what we decided together I'm just kind of freaking out about it right now. I know we will be fine and I can handle it though. I'm not sure how much the kids really get it. It pretty much dawned on Izzak today at school and he pretty much lost it and had to come home lucky Dad was home and they got to spend the day together and hopefully that helped a little. Joshua and the girls? I don't think they really understand that he is going to be gone that long. They still don't always have a full sense of time.

I do ask that you keep Kelly in your thoughts during his drive and I will let people know when he is there and that he got there okay. Also the one I am worried about is Izzak. After his reaction today I am a little worried about him. He has anxiety issues and usually they come out pretty bad so we are trying to figure out how to keep him mellow or feeling okay about it and talk about how it will be when we move. He hasn't posted anything in his blog lately but I will see if I can get him to write something or do something on it. If you feel like it he loves getting comments directed toward him and if you don't mind could you leave him a message on his blog? I know he would love it!

*Update* Izzak did write a bit on his blog.