Free Range Family

Sometimes when people ask me how many kids I have, I go with the cliche joke of most wives (MY MOM) and say, "I have two- my son and my husband." I often do feel like my husband is just another kid in the house- I have to drag him out of bed in the morning and yell at him to go to sleep at night, I have to remind him to do his "chores" around the house, I have to schedule all his appointments and remind him to go to them, I have to make sure he takes his medicine, and one of the most difficult I've found: I have to make sure he gets in his daily nutrients. This is particularly difficult because I have one of the most pickiest eaters ever! He doesn't like vegetables, most fruit, only really likes beef or chicken or pork, won't eat any leftovers (he thinks they're gross), and wants to survive only off of candy, pop and chips, etc. So I am always trying to find ways to slip in the nutrients he needs. For example, last night I made vegetable and meat spa

Can't wait for Alan's art class today at eleven! Its his last class of the month, and we are making paper bag puppets and doing a simple spring collage. Then at the end of class, we will have our art show for all Y members. Alan's been working on his colors and he'll impress all the girls at class lol, I just know it. :P And today is Lon's day off of work and my self proclaimed day off of blogging (even though I took a day off Sunday too lol). So please enjoy my Top 2 Tuesday and check out some archived blog posts today. I'm always adding new ones! Top Two Celebrity Hairstyles #1 Pixie Lott... Now I have honestly no idea who this celebrity is lol, but I always love the classic hippie braid headband look. :) I love how thick her braid is too! Love this hairstyle so much, and I haven't worn my hair like this for a while. Might wear it this way tomorrow. :) (This photo thanks to http://www.sugarscape.com) #2 Ashley Olson... Once again, its a brai

Arbor Day is a month away from tomorrow (April 29). Every year, I like to go and plant a tree somewhere with friends and family. The last seven years I've been planting trees at my father's friend's land. I recently came across a website that shocked me. I didn't ever think that websites would have a carbon footprint, but logically it does. So this year, I wanted to plant a tree to reduce the carbon footprint my family's blog makes. Here are the facts, courtesy of Mach's grün the creators of My Blog is Carbon Neutral initiative- Did you know??? According to a study by Alexander Wissner-Gross, PhD, an average website causes about 0.02g (0,0008oz.) of carbon dioxide for each visit. Assuming an average blog gets 15,000 visits a month, it has yearly carbon dioxide emissions of 3,6kg (8lb.). This can mainly be tracked back to the immense energy usage from (mainframe) computers, servers, and their cooling systems. But last summer, my father's friend's lan

I still have yet to find my Dhammapadda and my Tao Te Ching is away helping a dear friend in Laurel Montana, but thank goodness for the internet and Google! I found a wonderful mantra from another version of the Dhammapadda about happiness that I'd like to share with you. Hope you enjoy it, happy Monday! Peace! Happiness Let us live happily then, not hating those who hate us! Let us live happily then, among men who hate us let us dwell free from hatred! Let us live happily then, free from ailments among the ailing! Let us live happily then, among men who are ailing let us dwell free from ailments! Let us live happily then, free from greed among the greedy! Let us live happily then, among men who are greedy let us dwell free from greed! Let us live happily then, though we call nothing our own! We shall be like the bright gods, feeding on happiness! Victory breeds hatred, for the conquered is unhappy. He who has given up both victory and defeat, he, the contented, is happy. T

Hope everyone has a good Monday today! Today will not be busy for me, but this week I've got quite a lot of things to do. I work all week, have some last minute wedding planning to do with my maid of honor, I have to remember to sign Alan up for April art classes, we're going to try underwear on Alan, and I have a baby shower to go to on Saturday. Hopefully Saturday comes fast! :) And now, for my first Monday blog hop- Meet Me on Monday!! Crunchy or soft tacos? It depends really. I mostly will go for crunchy tacos, but every once and a while I will go for a soft shell taco. I also tend to like chicken tacos in soft shells and beef in crunchy shells, but when it comes down to it I'm not really that picky. Food is food lol. :) Do you scrapbook? I do, when I have the time lol. Which I haven't lately, at all! :P But I started getting really into scrapbooking when Alan was a baby. He has a really detailed baby book that I scrapbooked for him. I've been trying

Worked from 8 to 4 today... Don't wanna talk about it. Ugggh. Let's just say, its been a LOOOONG day and I'm having a beer while I write this post. It was one of those days lol. :) When I got off of work, I had to meet Lon to pick up Alan at the Village Inn. Because of a last minute birthday party for me to do at my work, Alan had to go with his daddy to work. Alan was hanging out with Daddy, Aunt Nikki, Grandma Amber and Great Grandpa Floyd when I arrived. Aunt Nikki had given him a homemade peanut butter chocolate chip cookie and we joked that she was spoiling him. :P Daddy and Alan even made me a pepperoni and cheese pizza (to share with Alan lol). So Alan and I headed home for some good ol' Mama and Son time. :D We ate our pizza together and watched some Seasame Street DVDs. Alan kept saying, "Pizza?" and holding his slice up everytime Elmo would come on screen. Lol he normally shares his food with his friends at daycare, especially his bestie Korbin. :

Today was considerably better than yesterday. I woke up before both of my boys this morning, and had a wonderful meditation and impromtu pilates session in the living room. By the time Alan and Lon had awoke, I was refreshed and had breakfast fully ready for them. It was a great way to start the day as a family, and Lon appreciated it so much he offered to clean up and do the dishes. My husband doing the dishes, not while at work lol? Wha??? Unheard of! :P It was a nice thing to do though lol. Lon had to go to his therapy today instead of tomorrow, so Alan had to run wedding errands with me. I was slightly anxious about taking him around by myself (Alan can be quite the hassle in public, but will be an angel at home. Weird lol) but we had a little talk before we left about listening to mommy and what his reward would be-I was thinking of letting him play outside a bit today, because most of the snow had melted and the weather was decent. He acted like he understood me lol. And he act

I have had a very hectic and stressful day today, and don't feel like writing all that much. But then I remember what my therapist always used to tell me, writing is therapeutic. So I will do my best to get as much vented out as possible, without sounding too much like a whiner lol. I don't like to be negative but sometimes it is necessary. So please bear with me everyone. :) I was finally able to get my car from the mechanic's shop this morning. What a relief to have it back again! Snow has fallen and it would not be too much fun walking in this weather. But with the relief comes more financial stresses. As usual... :) We told the mechanic to only fix the mandatory thing, the brakes. And the mechanic followed my request, but had "bad news" for me. Grrrr. :\ According to him the power steering is leaking, my alignment is out, my oil is in desperate need of a change, and all four of my tires are bad. One I shouldn't even be driving on. He estimated the full c

Hope everyone is having a good Tuesday. Today is my self-proclaimed day off of blogging lol, but I will be participating in the Top Two Tuesday from now on also. Here's an update on my morning still- Sleeting outside, no caffeine in the house, grumpy baby and grumpy daddy. Ugggggggh!!! Lol enjoy this post, and check out some archived posts too! :D Have an awesome day!  Top Two Tuesday!! My Top Two Dream Rooms! #1 A studio room This may seem weird to some people, but I am a multimedia artist in many ways lol- I draw, I paint, I sculpt, I photograph and I also dance and sing. In my dream home, I want a room for Lon and I that has wooden floors for dancing on, a desk for my laptop computer with a photot printer, some ballet bars all along the inside wall, a decent amount of space to dance on, big windows lining the outside wall for natural sunlight, a big theater system for dancing, and a big cabinet in the corner for holding all of my art supplies. I desire this room so much

Because I've got another blog hop that I just got invited to! Whoo I'm so popular... Just kidding, pahahahahahaha! :D Okay so tonight after I got off of work and had put Alan to bed, I decided to watch The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnasuss on Starz because their wasn't much else on tv. And frankly, I really wanted to know what the eff was going on with this movie lol, because I had seen the previews and had been intrigued not only by the fact that it was an unreleased Heath Ledger movie, but by the sheer oddness of the commercial. And let me tell you, having just had finished it, I still have absolutely NO IDEA what happened lol. WTH???? :) I mean, I paid attention and got the idea of the Imaginarium and the Devil's contract and all that good stuff, but I still am super confused as to what really happened, when it was actually Heath Ledger and not Colin Ferrel or maybe even Johnny Depp? So confused!!! Anyone else feel this way after watching this movie? I really need so

Motivational Monday Blog Hop!! Happy Monday everyone! This is my first time doing this, so enjoy! :D "Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you're riding through the ruts, don't complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don't bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. Wake up and live!" Bob Marley I really wanted to do a mantra from either the Dhammapadda or the Tao Te Ching, but I lent one of them to a good friend and have misplaced the other one, oddly enough. The next best thing I could think of was the always insightful Bob Marley. <3 This man is a genius in my eyes. He has pulled me out of some dark times in my life with his music and his everlasting love. <3 I will do a mantra next week though. I have the perfect one in mind! :D I hope everyone has a grand Monday! I can't wait to link up and read some new blogs! Peace!!

I love Sundays so much. Most weeks, its my only day off from work. This week was one of those weeks. And as most of you know, my family has a tradition known as Family Sundays. We simply spend our whole day together, doing fun family activities. :) Today, Alan woke up and Lon brought him to our bed for our usual morning snuggle. We watched Jake and the Never Land Pirates (Alan's new second favorite show- only behind Seasame Street lol). Then we got up and I made eggs while Alan and Lon made us toast with jelly (Alan helped by spreading the jelly on with a spoon! We were so proud!). We ate breakfast together and then started potty training. In between our morning play sessions, Alan went to the potty eight times again and we're very happy to say he went pee twice! :D We will continue with the first "step" (going potty at home with diapers, goal nothing in diapers) next week and hopefully the last week of March we will be able to start trying out potty training at Chi

Today was an busy but good day for my family and I. :) Unfortunately, I had to get up early this morning for work lol. But it looked like a nice day outside so I decided to walk to work, rather than wake up my husband and son to take me three blocks lol (Yes, my car is still in the shop and probably will be until Tuesday or Wednesday. Great! Thankfully for me, its springtime!) because that would have just been mean! My husband has been dealing with a lot of tooth and eye pain lately and has thus been losing a ton of sleep. And like I said previously, its only like three blocks. The walk was pleasant too. It was a little chilly, surprisingly, but the birds were singing and that sun was just a shining. I love Big Sky mornings. :) Today was Healthy Kids Day at the YMCA. This was a day that invites all children to come and participate in fun, healthy activities. They could take part in arts and crafts, hula hooping, carnival games, face painting, Despicable Me showing IN THE POOL, planti

Once again, I feel like the week just blew by! How does this continue to happen to me lol??? Oh wait, I know how... Because I'm a mom! :) My life has been crazy busy this week too. We've started potty training Alan, yesterday was Lon and I's anniversary, its that time of the month to pay bills, I had to go pick up my wedding dress and shoes from the steamer's, Lon's tooth is still hurting him so we had to take him back into the dentist, my car broke down so we're taking it to the shop and with all of that, I also have my art classes to teach and the rest of my job to work. Blah we are running around like crazy from dawn to dusk this week! That's okay though lol, at least it got us through the week fast and now I'm ready for the weekend!  This weekend we hope to get Alan outside a bunch (he loves this warm weather!) and do some spring cleaning around the apartment. You can totally tell we've been stuck inside here all winter with cabin fever, its a

And it is. <3 Today is our one year anniversary since Lon and I got married at the tax counter.  Yay! :D I am so happy right now and can't wait to enjoy a wonderful day with my beloved boys. Oh and happy Saint Patrick's Day to everyone also! :) We've been trying to teach Alan to say leprechaun today and so far haven't been successful lol. Maybe we should have started teaching him earlier??? :P But I digress, I'm making this post all about my wonderfully amazing husband. So here we go go!! (Dr. Suess anyone? Sorry, back to Lon lmao!) What can I say about you Lon??? There's so much to love... And so many words to express my love. Some that aren't all mine lol. Yes when I think of Lon, a lot of songs and lyrics come to mind. This is of course because music is such a big part of my life, even though I no longer create my own music. So I will probably just be throwing in random lyrics, and I will quotation them so no one is confused lol. :) "I'

Yesterday was uneventful for us except for Alan's art class. Lon doesn't work Tuesdays so he and Alan met me after my first class and we prepared for this next class together. I love that my husband is an artist because I can just give him directions and not have to worry about him. Which is good because I had about 25 shamrocks of various sizes to cut out in fifteen minutes lol. Oops! :P Class went great! Everyone was there, and all the toddlers participated in all of the projects with their parents/grandparents. Alan loved being the only boy in class, besides his daddy. He got to sit in between two of the girls and he thoroughly enjoyed helping them get their crayons, glue sticks, pompoms, glitters, and colored noodles for their crafts. I think everyone enjoyed making the 3D shamrocks the best because of all the gluing. Or maybe the Saint Patrick's Day drawings because they were allowed to draw with pencils. Or even the shamrock rainbows because of the coloring and text

So we've been kinda preparing Alan for potty training since Christmas. As gifts, he got an Elmo trainer potty, Elmo Goes Potty DVD, Elmo Potty books and a few other big boy toys. And everyday since then, Alan sits down to watch his DVD and then I will read the book and we talk about going potty. But now that its March and Alan's eighteen months, we have actually started potty training him. Today was first day and I was anticipating it not going over very well, but everything surprisingly went great! Thank goodness! I've been researching the best way to potty train a toddler since December, and I think I've developed a fool proof way which combines a lot of what people have told me with what I've read in books. My biggest concern was not making it too scary or too forcing it on him, because my son is such a free spirit he tends to revolt a little if I force to do things. So everything I'm doing is not immediate and not too demanding of him (honestly if he doesn

This morning, Alan woke up early (well not too early, except that we lost that hour with DST so that made it early) with me and we had a nice breakfast of Kix, strawberry granola bar, a waffle, scrambled eggs, and milk to drink.  We listened to music and read books, colored and played with cars. Lon worked til midnight last night so he needed to sleep in. Plus I enjoyed my special Mama and Son morning together. :) Lon loved waking up to fresh breakfast made by me (Yes we saved him some lol!). After we decided to go for a walk around the neighborhood. It looked absolutely gorgeous outside and the sunshine was calling us. So we put Alan in a light jacket and pants, and after some debate, I decided that the stroller would be best instead of putting Alan in boots so he could walk with us. So we put him in his baby stroller... And he hated it, somewhat. He fussed about being buckled in it, until we rolled him into the sunshine and outdoors! He thoroughly enjoyed walking down to Good Earth

I am horribly stressed about finances right now. Amidst all this wedding planning and preparation, we find out that we make too much to receive food stamps anymore. Thus they have revoked what little a month they were giving us and now we are in the hole BIG TIME. Let me tell you, we do NOT make too much to NEED food stamps. Even though my husband and I have jobs and each work 35+ hours a week, we still struggle every single month to make enough to cover rent, utilities, my car payment, car insurance (which just went up HARDCORE), cell phone bills, Lon's dental bill, Lon's therapy bill, Lon's medication, my therapy bill that we are in debt for, my medication and to pay back Lon's parents (we set up loan agreement with them to avoid bank interest among other things). We have been on food stamps since Alan was born, and though we do not rely all of our grocery budget on food stamps, they have helped us out a lot. We are also on WIC, which is also beneficial. But now, only

Wow, I totally cannot believe that Friday has come so fast. To me, it seemed like just yesterday it was Monday. I feel like I have no idea were the week has gone. Weird! :) Had quite a bit going on this week too- finished the last of my reception decoration shopping, Alan had his WIC appointment, Alan had his first art class, picked up my wedding dress and took it in for steaming, bought my wedding shoes (they're my something blue!), Alan had his doctor appointment, and I also worked all week. I'm glad that today I can spend it at home with my boys, before going in to the CW with Alan at three. Should be a good day! :D Also, my heart goes out to all those affected by the earthquakes and tsunamis. <3 How horrible it is to watch the devastation on television, I cannot begin to imagine what its like to be there. I will be praying for everyone affected tonight. Five Question Friday!!! 1. Do you know what your REAL hair color is? Yes I do, I've actually only dyed my

We're at the doctor's office right now. Alan weighs 27 pounds exactly and is 32.5 inches tall. He loved seeing his doctor (they have a little friendship because she's known him since birth) and she once again said he was really advanced for his age. :) About the low iron count, she said that it should just be because he's a milk lover, and to cut down a sipper a day. No real concern needed (Phew!). Overall, Alan behaved really well, he only had a meltdown in the car on the way. Now my only concern is the shot. Hep A I hear is not a fun one. :( And this is my first time holding him for shots. **UPDATE** Alan's shot went okay. He only screamed about for a minute or two and now just is real fussy about his leg. I think he'll survive it and I'm glad I did too. :)

Only six and a half weeks away from our wedding, and we are *almost* done planning for it lol. We have all our bridesmaids' and groomsmens' outfits picked out and ordered, and the last of them just came in yesterday. My dress and accessories are also picked out and ordered, and I get to go get my dress tomorrow after Alan's doctor appointment!! :D Our flower girls and ring bearers (plus their two chaperons lol) are almost all the way picked out (only Aunt Nikki has to pick out her dress). Even our mothers have their dresses picked out. We ordered and now have our rings and I ordered all the flowers. I have our photographer scheduled (the one and only Bryson's Photo Studio) and the invitations are sent. Our venue is booked and we're praying to Mother Nature for good weather. All of our dates are scheduled- my bachelorette party, his bachelor party, my bridal shower, and the wedding reception. I've purchased almost all of the decorations and just need to get som

I am going to make this post a short one because my last two were so stinking long lol. Tomorrow is my son's first ever art class with me!! :D That's right, Alan will be attending my Y Arts- Be Creative class this month, as he is eighteen months! I am so elated and excited for this, I have been imagining this day forever. That's an artist for ya though lol. He will be taking my Parent/Toddler class with his father. What a great bonding experience this will be for my boys! I promised to do my best to just play the part of "teacher" lol, but I will admit this will be hard for me. :) I am just so excited! Our lesson for tomorrow is African art- we are making African finger paint masks and drawing safari animals. I am anxious about Alan finger painting lol, but I know Daddy will help him draw those animals real good. :) I read somewhere that with lots of practice eighteen month old children can draw circles and shapes. I hope if we show him enough, he'll pick tha

Today was Family Sunday for my family. Ooh how I love Family Sundays. <3 We spent it reading books, coloring, shopping for wedding decorations, and having dinner with Lon's family. Family Sunday was such a good day, and I loved that we were able to see Uncle Tyrler and Aunt Sam before they went back to Bozeman! I am so blessed to be able to spend time with my son, he is such an amazingly intelligent young boy. :) He learns at least fifty new things a day and always remembers new faces and names. It hard to believe he's only a year and a half! At eighteen months, Alan... -Weighs at least 28 pounds and is around 35 inches tall (I will not know actual size until I take him to his well baby check up, which I haven't scheduled yet lol. Can you say procrastinator??). -Is starting to learn to climb stairs on two feet, instead of both his hands and his feet. He has been walking now for nine months, and can run really well (unless he's really excited, then he loses all

What a wonderful day today is! Today is the eighteen month anniversary with one of my beloved boys and the thirty month anniversary with my other beloved boy. <3 Two and a half years ago, my husband and I started our crazy relationship together. And a year and a half ago, my perfectly amazing son Alan Mikael was born. :D Its been a wonderful two and a half life-changing years, and I wouldn't change them for anything in the world! My son and my husband are the two most important people in the world and I love them both so very dearly. What a joyous day!! :D In honor of my son's birth anniversary, I will share my birth story with you, fellow blog readers. **DISCLAIMER** Be wary though, this is a birth story. It will be somewhat graphic, its a birth story lol. I started having contractions Thursday, September 3, 2009 around 10 pm. I was 39 weeks and 5 days pregnant. Right from the beginning, my contractions were decently painful and were only about fifteen minutes apart.