12 of 12 September

I can't believe it's been a whole month since I've blogged. I guess having two in school and one at home is keeping me busy enough... :) My goodness, I haven't even posted first day of school photos. What a bad mommy blogger I am.

Anywho - on to the main attraction: I present to you September 12th, 2011.


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I started off the day as usual, kissing Amanda goodbye, then Michael and then debating whether to drag my buttocks out of bed right then, or in another 5 minutes. (A morning person I am not). The littles had their own plans so I was not to have my extra 5 minutes. Breakfast, shower, everyone dressed and out the door to take Hayden to Pre-K. And that is when I remembered the date... but not my camera. I dropped off Hayden and got in the van only to get a phone call from the school nurse at Amanda's school.

1. Her throat didn't look any redder than it does in this black and white photo.
2. And she felt well enough to play a game of "oh my toes" (or whatever it's called).
3. The music we've been listening to in the van.
4. The "sick" child watching tv ever so quietly...ehhem.
5. On our way out again to pick Hayden up from school.
6. M is for Mouse! or Emers the Mouse as Amanda misheard me say.
7. Awww, they love each other! Sharing the love, sharing the germs. yay!
8. First signs of Florida Love Bug arrival... yuckers.
9. My lunch. Chicken nuggets and toast with blueberry jam - I know, sooo nutritious! If you look closely you'll see that one of my nuggets has a wing. or a nose.
10. Off to the library to pick up a book that's been on the hold list for at least 3 weeks.
11. Finally! The Help is in my hands,
12. Hubby came home early today 'cause he's sick. No really. He's gonna cough up a lung soon. Not like the other "sick" child in the house.

12 of 12 August

This was an awesome day for the 12 of 12 project! My hubby took the day off from work without telling anyone (but me) about it. Michael and I spent the night before packing up the van and hiding stuff under the seats so they wouldn't have a clue where we were going. Early the next morning Michael told the kids that his car wouldn't start so mommy was gonna have to drive him to work - and of course, they would have to come with us. We all got dressed and took a very, very long drive to "daddy's work". Around 2 hours later Hayden told us that we were going the wrong way to work. :) Another hour later we arrived at our destination: Anna Maria Island!

1. On the local bus to check out the island.
2. Samantha waiting for the bus.
3. Walking up the pier to the restaurant/popular fishing spot.
4. The wood planks of the pier
5. Pelican (they were amazing and eating quite well)
6. We saw lots of dolphins and a few up close!
7. a fish we saw a young boy catch - they threw it back for obvious reasons :)
8. Can't help but take pictures of this girl - love her eyes!
(didn't bring my camera to the beach and the camera phone pictures were kind of ehhh...)
9.- 12.  Stopped for ice cream before we left the island.

1 vehicle, 2 adults, 3 kids

For a while it was all cool. We scheduled our plans around having the van or driving daddy to and from work. We felt sort of efficient and a little more likely to get up and get dressed in the morning (all of us). But now that it's hot and the middle of summer vacation, it sort of stinks. And an inexpensive quick fix to the 91 Volvo sitting in our driveway is on the top of my prayer list.

What's on the top of yours?

Got tons on my mind lately. Our family has been coping with illness, automobile-money-pits, life-changing decision making, balding tires that sent us off-road and the summer blues just to name a few. I sure hope things take a turn for the better in the next couple of weeks! We could use some positive changes around here!

12 of 12 July!

Another less-eventful day in the Gove home

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1. Goodmorning Amanda! 2-3. Samantha is potty-training (nearly there! She only wears a diaper at night). Though this has led to lots of running around in just her underwear declaring that she is "Potteee-Twained" whilst doing a hula hoop like dance with her hand on her hips. It's priceless... and a little disturbing, hee-hee! 4. Hayden, ever the nudist... he sees no reason to wear clothes unless we are "going somewhere". sigh. 5. Making homemade blueberry waffles 6. Just about to eat them! 7-8. Making 2 kinds of fries... daddy likes the thin ones 9. Hayden redecorating the backyard 10. It's a jungle out there! 11-12. Hayden showing daddy all his hard work on the "treehouse".

Summertime

I don't have the problem most moms have with their kids when school lets out for the summer. I have yet to hear, "Mom, I'm BORED!" from any of them. However, they keep pretty busy destroying the house, and silence is a rare occurrence.

I decided between the hours of Disney garbage, swimming in the pool and fart noise contests (yes, all three of them participate...sigh), I should try to throw in at least one educational activity per week of summer vacation. Since we have like ZERO dinero for fun stuff, let alone a family vacation I thought this would ease my oldest daughters' fear of having "the worst summer E.V.E.R.!!!!".

So far we have gone to the Science Center (we have still have a month left of membership), Grown Marigolds in a pot (still in progress of course), visited PetSmart to check out the rats, guinea pigs, snakes, frogs, fish, snails, grasshoppers, birds, cats and dogs. My kids especially love watching the dogs being groomed and saying "awww! she's so cuuuute!" to every cat in every cage. Yesterday I took them to IKEA. Not gonna try and stretch that into an educational experience. The best thing about IKEA this time was that Samantha was tall enough and potty-trained (enough for an hour) so she and Hayden were able to go to the play center they have there and Amanda and I were able to shop together without having to chase down any Gove's Gone Rogue. 
It was nice to get in there and get what I needed to get without having to yell at anyone not to jump on the beds or play 'catch me if you can' among the glassware.  

Today the kids are hounding me to take them to Menchies for yogurt. I'm making them work for it though. Clean rooms and bathroom or NO FRO-YO! So there! 

I have a feeling the van will be staying in the driveway all day.

Summer Reading

So I've been reading a lot this spring/summer in an effort to spend less time in front of the tv. So far I have read Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli, Or Give Me Death, by Ann Rinaldi, An Ocean Apart; a World Away, by Lensey Namioka, and The Yearling, by Marjorie Rawlings. I realize most of these are Young Adult books but I'm okay with that. I still consider myself to be young-ish.

I'm also at the beginning of re-reading the Book of Mormon and hope to have it finished by the end of the summer. I've got a stack of books next to my bed that I hope to get through as well. Funny thing is, I found some of these books in a box that I got at the Scholastic Book warehouse down the street and had forgotten about... and one of the books is about organizing your home - which is what I was in the middle of doing to our bedroom - organizing. But you see what that led me to: blogging. Sigh... I'm so flighty lately. One day our bedroom will be clean and the books will be read and everything will be blogged - then what will I do?

12 of the 10th... say wha?

I went to Girls Camp on the 10th and for those of you who know anything about Girl Camp you KNOW that I barely slept, and had a heck of a lot more fun and photo opportunities on the 10th than I did on the 12th. The 12th was definitely my "day of rest" and my camera was far, far away from my thoughts. So this month, I am cheating for the sake of content. :)


I present to you my 12 on the 10th!



1-3. On my way to camp I couldn't help but stop and take a few pictures. The view, the sounds, even the smells out on the ranch were like a great big hug from God. 4. My first time shooting a gun. 5. I love 1st year girls! 6. Tiki torch + Wind = Burned Torch, 7-8. Pre-Testimony Meeting 9. The famous Holy Griddle 10-11. Testimony Meeting with our girls! 12. Happy camp leader!

Watch out... here they come...

I can't believe it's been a month since I last posted anything. My 12 of 12 never got posted because quite frankly it was a pretty boring day. I took pictures, but they all look the same. So I sort of lost the incentive to grid them and post them. I'm sure I'll get around to it some day. But in the meantime, here are some pictures I took tonight with the kiddos. Michael was at Scouts and the kids were begging to go to a particular park that has awesome climbing trees. It's a particularly awesome place to take photos so I brought my camera along just for fun.















Holy Thug-face, Hayden!

12 of 12 - May

This day could be summed up in three words: Playdoh, Legos, and Tree-trimming.

It was a very laid back day for Sammy-Sue and Hayden, while Amanda is not in any of these pictures because she was at school. At one point in the day I decided to take the chainsaw to our tree out front because it's branches have been dragging across the top of the minivan and driving me nuts. I later got in trouble with the hubby for leaving the clippings in the driveway.