One Year Older and Wiser Too....

I am now 3 days in to my 29th year! It's weird to be on the far side of the twenties. It really didn't seem too long ago I was just beginning this decade. Recently we had the opportunity of celebrating an 80th birthday with Jacob's Grandma Falslev. How amazing it must be to look back on 80 years. That makes me still a baby, really. So I'm not going to say I'm old. It's all relative. Actually, something about approaching my 30's makes me feel like I'm really just beginning. Quite honestly, I would hate to offend my aged, more seasoned comrades out there. You see, if I'm old, then what does that make someone whose just ending their 50's? He he he. Love ya moms and dads!

So, speaking of birthdays, it was a good one. Jacob and I got a babysitter and headed on down to sunny St. George for a much needed afternoon sans kids. Now for anyone who is a little less familiar with my eternal companion, he is all farm. So for him to voluntarily a) go shopping with me, and b) on a sunny Saturday afternoon, was nothing but pure love. First stop: Old Navy. Jacob just followed me around like a little puppy exploring territory for the first time. As I perused the aisles I would often hear him make comments such as, "people really do this for fun?" I found a few things to try on, so we headed into the dressing room. Let me remind you, we had only been in the store about 15 minutes, so I was a bit baffled when Jacob sat down on the little bench, stretched out his legs and sighed, "Wow, I am so tired. My legs ache, and my back hurts." Yes, this is my husband who will be out on a farm hauling hay, riding a horse, wrestling cows, and shoveling manure from sun up to sun down. Then he adds, "I don't know how people do this all day." Huh? The best, however, came when we were about to leave the dressing room. He piped in with, "This is why I never try things on because it's such a pain to go put it all back if it doesn't fit." I looked at him a bit confused and told him we can just leave it at the front of the dressing room area and they will put it away for us. The look on Jacob's face was absolute disbelief. "They will?! That's why I never try things on because I don't want to deal with the hassle of having to go put it all back! Are you sure?" I went right up and handed my clothes to the nice employee who gladly took them for me. Jacob was stunned. I was cracking up! In our 5 years (almost- May 6th!) of marriage I never knew this about my husband. He was so very entertaining to shop with! You can only imagine how fun he was at the mall....! I LOVE YOU JACOB! Thank you for such a fun afternoon.

Has anyone ever eaten at the Texas Roadhouse? My oh my, it was the most amazing birthday dinner. Jacob had eaten there with work a few months ago and said it was really good, so while we were down in St. George, we gave it a try. I really can't begin to explain how delicious this meal was. Am I really ranting and raving about food? Yes, I do believe I am. It is so very deserving. As soon as we sat down, we were greeted with a basket of yummy, fluffy, rolls with a cinnamon honey butter to go on them. Right from the start my caloric intake for the day was completely out the window! To make matters worse, they just kept refilling the basket. Dangerous people, dangerous! So I ordered the ribs and steak. I sit here at the computer at a total loss of how to describe the taste of such a divine carniverous indulgence. I think Jacob got more amusement at me eating and savoring every bite than I did with him in the dressing room at Old Navy. If you ever want really good food, you now have my suggestion. I don't know if there are any up north, but come on down to see us, we'll go with you! Okay, maybe after we save some more pennies. A bit pricey, but YUM!

So, there it is, my birthday. Topped it off with a little dish at Cold Stone Creamery and called it a day. The best part really was just spending time with my sweet little family. Before I know it I'll be officially entering my 30's. Until then, I'll just enjoy another great year.

Getting up to speed

I am so proud to announce we now have high-speed internet! YAY! Wow, what a difference. So now when friends post the cute little videos of their kids on their blogs, I can actually watch them! Now I can get a post done in a decent amount of time. Next step is to learn how to download my own home videos..... whoa there, don't want to overdo it.

Easter was tons of fun. Saturday we just barely missed the city Easter egg hunt, so we just hopped on in to get some breakfast at IHOP. The rest of the day we colored the eggs and just had tons of fun together. The girls loved to color the eggs.

The Egg Hunt was also very popular. Candy is always a big hit! Kenna was thrilled to look out the window to see the eggs out on the grass and realize the Easter Bunny had made it to our house.

The only downfall to Easter was that we didn't get to spend this beautiful holiday with family. But how grateful we are to our Savior who makes it possible for us to be together forever. What a wonderful day it was to remember the great events of Easter and try to teach our girls the miracle of Christ's resurrection. I truly know He lives.

The other night while I was cleaning up dinner, I played a CD of some of the girls' fun little animal songs and I looked over to find Kenna singing to the honey bear. The picture didn't take good enough to show her little cross-eyes because she had the bear right in her face. My little diva:

And last but not least is an Israelsen classic. We needed to move our goats down the street to a new pen, so what better to do than to load up the whole fam-dam (baby goats included) into the truck and head on down the road? HA! This is what life is all about folks. Too bad the mama goat didn't get to join us in the truck. She had to ride on the flat-bed trailer. In the back. Tied up with bale twine. Classic. Watch out, here come the Israelsens! The whole way Jacob was worried I was going to be so embarrassed and was quite certain he had failed as a husband and father, but I LOVE IT! Thanks Jacob for always taking us on such great adventures! The girls are lucky to have such a great daddy.

GOOD RIDDANCE

Good Riddance to last week! It was the horrible-terrible-no-good-very-bad-week at our house. Let's recap: It started innocently with just a regular old cold for Kenna. A snotty nose, the works. Nothing too out of the ordinary. Well, that wouldn't be enough of course. We needed to add an eye infection to the bunch. Kenna's poor eyes were red and full of boogers. So, we hopped on the prescription train with the eye drops. Anyone tried to put eye drops into the eyes of a 3 year-old peacefully? I doubt it. It got to the point that Jacob pretty much had to sit on Kenna to hold her arms and legs down, then I would restrain her head in between my legs and try to pry her little eyeballs open long enough to drop the medicine down in. Follow that up with lots of loves reasurring her that we really do love her, despite our actions to the contrary. Keep in mind that Allie is always doing whatever Kenna is doing, so it was only appropriate that she got the cold also, followed up by the green-booger-red-eye infection. Nice. In fact, one morning she woke up and one of her eyes was pretty much swollen shut. Now we had two little ladies to traumatize with eye drops. Kenna always volunteered Allie to go to the slaughter house first. True love right there, my friends. Well, what would make the week even better without a good old ear infection? Add an antibacterial med to the mix. Fortunately Kenna liked the taste of it. Unfortunately, she got the runs. Needless to say, we had some extra laundry. So, what would be expected next? Allie to get the ear infection, of course. So I had Allie a Dr.'s appointment on Tuesday afternoon to look at her ears. In the midst of getting ready for the appointment, I set down the little baby I watch when all of the sudden- AAHHHRRRGGGHHH @#$#$%&^%#$%^$@!##@$! My lower back went out on me, and for the amount of pain it caused, I was really thinking a little baby had popped out right above my tail bone. I sat there on my hands and knees trying not to pass out while the pain got to a manageable point. All I could do was cry! So I slowly got up. I moved really slow and thought that maybe I could manage through the day if I just took it really easy. Well, after kinking it just right again and sending the most horrific pain through my lower back, I called Jacob in tears desperate for help. Thus began two days of Mr. Mom. Between the Dr. visit for Allie, the chiropractor appointment for me, the shopping for prescriptions, taking the girls to Scouts, cooking (aka heading out to get hamburgers) poopy diapers (which was my comic relief), tears and screams, Jacob was wondering if his sanity would ever return. Let's just say, he would much rather be doing a LOT of other things. He did so great though, and I was so very grateful for his help. You know, moms are just best at being moms and dads are best at being dads. Fortunately, life is getting back to normal the way it should be. I don't think I'll complain about housework and diapers too much more, now I'm just grateful I can do it. You really don't know what you have until it's gone. I can gratefully say this week has been much better. Knock on wood.

Knuckleheads

I gave birth to two cute little knuckleheads. There really is not much more to life than eating cookie dough, riding on a tricycle with a crazy headband, and eating cereal in a hat and snowpants. We sure have fun with these two little squirts!

Comments

To all my fellow blogging friends and family, can I just tell y'all I love your blogs? I love being able to pop in and catch up on people's lives. So to all you out there who wonder if I really know you exist- I do! To read all the blogs I want and to leave comments is just not in my cards with really slow internet and two little chillens. Somehow some of you wonder moms out there can do it! There have been so many times I have been in the middle of writing a comment to someone and I end up pushing a wrong button or I have little hands who turn off the computer on me and that is just the end of it. Just know I do pop in and check on ya. Thanks so much for leaving me such fun little comments, they really mean a lot to me. Maybe sometime I can buckle down and bite the bullet to pay for faster internet and I will be a comment crazed woman!

Anyhow, what's new with us? Well, my sweet little Allie is not only getting her 4 incisors (yep, those lovely razor sharp snags) but she is also getting in second- year molars! All 4 of them, too. You're a bit early my child! Perhaps it's better to get it all done at once, huh? She just can be really grumpy. Of course I would too if I had the same dental woes.

So I started watching a little 6 month old during the day. So far it's been good. She actually is a pretty good baby and the girls love her. It will be good to get a little extra cash coming in. Jacob gets worried it will get me baby hungry, but so far I am perfectly happy to let her go home every afternoon! I still remember all too well how grumpy my babies are. Who knows, maybe the baby bug will just sneak up and bite me one of these days.

Dinner

Sometimes I am just not at the top of my culinary game. I go through spurts where my menus are planned, my shopping is done, and dinners are great. Then there are other times, such as now, where I find myself stuck in the dinner dilemma. Before I know it, the clock says it's 5 and I really have no idea what to cook. Even worse, nothin' is sounding like it's gonna hit the spot. So I flip thoughtlessly through my cookbooks hoping something new and yummy will pop out at me and I will just magically have all the ingredients. Hmmm. Cold cereal anyone? Okay, that's pathetic. So last night, to try and break up the humdrum of the not-so-hot-dinner week, I attempted a chicken and rice casserole. Sounds easy enough, huh? I've had plenty of casserole successes in the past. Well, at the last minute I decided to add a touch of catalina dressing hoping it would add a little zing to the dish. Let's just say upon pulling the casserole out of the oven, it was PINK. With a little orange cheese on top. At first I thought I could get away with it because it was close to Valentine's day, and maybe Jacob would think I was being festive. It tasted okay, it was edible at least. When I asked Jacob what he thought, he pretended that I was talking to someone else hoping he wouldn't have to answer. His smile and his lack of eye contact clued me off that he was really trying hard to decide how honest he was going to be. The look on his face did it and all I could do was laugh my guts out. He immediately joined in. So there we sat at the dinner table, laughing hysterically at what honest-to-goodness looked like someone had eaten a bunch of valentine's candy followed up by chicken and rice casserole and then had vomited on our plates. I had tears in my eyes I was laughing so hard. Bless your sweet little heart Jacob for trying so hard to protect my feelings. But, I can admit when truly, dinner looks like throw up. Aaah, we had a good laugh anyway. And a bowl of cereal.

Today

Today I went to lunch with my fellow sistas in the Relief Society Presidency so daddy got the girls for lunch. Afterward, I caught up with them at the library. Let's just say my girls and the library don't jive. I tried to pull Allie away from the little puzzle she was playing with- SCREAM! Then we walked over to the movie aisle to meet up with Jacob and Kenna who were looking to check out a movie for Kenna. Well, Kenna saw us, came running over to show us her movie and SLIP- her legs came right out from under her and she landed right on her tushy- SCREAM! (Thanks mostly to me for letting a very insistent Kenna wear her slippery sparkle silver shoes today). Then we went back over to the movies and Allie wanted to pull out every single movie. So of course when I try to keep her from destroying the movie aisle I inevitably get- SCREAM! Now, my girls just don't scream. They have the lung capacity of opera stars. I always thought Kenna was loud, but Allie can really give her a run for her money. In fact, when my parents were watching her, my dad was seriously considering ear plugs. No, really, he was. In the library I was starting to worry more about paying for broken windows than I was for the destruction in the movie section. I was just waiting to get kicked out. Wow. Definitely an Israelsen trait. He he he.

After the library we decided to venture into the Dollar Store where we found Kenna a pack of cute little headbands. She can't wear just ONE. Behold, her masterpiece.

Kenna's new thing is learning about "bad words." The word most often confronted is "stupid," and Kenna is the don't-say-stupid-nazi. So Kenna reminds me a few times a day that she is not saying "stupid." I told her the only time she can say stupid is when she is talking about the dogs. Not sure if that's gonna work out or not....