Texas Romneys

Is it too early to tell on your sister to Santa?

2010-02-12T21:44:00.000-08:00

Apparently not. This story involves two main characters and one piece of evidence.

The culprit:

(Does she look like she could ever do anything wrong?)

The tattleteller:

(Scott, not Daniel. Does he look like he would rat his sister out?)

The report:

This is a scan of the envelope and letter we found in our mailbox. Greg asks me, " Hey, what's this in the mail?" So we figured it must've been put in ther by Scott (he's the only one that can write somewhat coherent sentences, we are such the detectives). This is what we figured it said: envelope - From Scott to Santa (Sada), letter - Dear (D) Santa (Sada) Stacey was (wuz) no good (go). Greg and I were cracking up! When we asked Scott about it later he told us that he told Stacey if she didn't listen to him/do what he wants, he would write a letter to Santa! And he obviously was serious!

The moral of the story: Watch what you do around Scott, he'll tell Santa on you, and he really follows through!

What we did this (last) week with 4 kids and no Dad and a grandma half a week . .

2010-02-02T20:32:00.000-08:00

I started this post last week and thought I should finish it, even though it is about last week. Here is a picture of my mom and a shout out to her for all the hard labor and emotional trauma I put her through when she was here! I love her so much and me and the kids had so much fun with her and were sad to see her go. Because of the lateness of my baby arrival she actually got to see Chase born! The day of his birth we spent the whole day together, walked ALOT and went to a yummy sandwich shop. I really enjoyed spending the day with her, up until the time I was in hard labor (which in no way had anything to do with her :)). Also because of the lateness of my baby, Greg had to go out of town and my mom had to leave, so I was by myself for three days with four kids! Like I always say, there's no better way to get used to the fire than to throw yourself in the inferno, right? So here's what we did . . .

We held and kissed Chase alot. Daniel and Chase's kiss looks a little too close?

The kids and I spent alot of time in the office (getting alot of the business end of the year tax stuff done). Scott does homework and colors and Stacey colors and does puzzles. It's fun to have them in there with me until they start fighting over whose is better at coloring while I am on the phone, and then they get kicked out. I also put a picture of them in the bath, because I think they are so cute in the bath and I love the positioning of the cup in the picture! Maybe my standards have just gone way down, but I actually was super excited that everyone in the house was bathed and showered (me included). Whenever I do something now, I think ,"Oh good, I have 4 kids now, and they are all clean." or "wow, I have four kids now, and I still can get the laundry done, have a clean kitchen once a day, etc." I feel great just when I get "everyday" things done (or just wash my hair) Actually the couple of days that Greg was gone, people from my church took my kids for at least 3 hours everyday, and on Saturday, someone took my kids in the morning and in the afternoon so they were gone from 8 am to 6 pm. So I had one of the YW in my ward, Wyatte come over and we took newborn pics of Chase. It was so fun and I think she did a great job!

Here are some of my favorites . . .

We all love Chase and are glad he is here and we're glad our Dad is home too! It's great to all be together even though some of us aren't getting quite enough sleep some nights!

Baby Chase James Romney is here! FINALLY!!

2010-01-18T19:20:00.000-08:00

This is going to be a quick post, because I do want to do a REAL post about his birth and everything. But right now I just wanted to put some pictures up. He was born last Firday January 15, at 5:53 pm. He weighed 8 lbs. 13 oz. (not 13lb 5 oz. that my mom acidentally texted my whole family!). We love him and are glad he is here. I am just realizing I have alot of young kids and that the next couple months (year) of my life is going to be a little crazy. Crazy is good, right?

Jordan

2009-11-22T20:25:00.000-08:00

Ok, so alot of you have been asking about my trip and I know I've been home almost 3 weeks so I should'vr blogged by now, but I'm kindof having a blogging block (it happens often). My problem with blogging about this trip is I feel like it's hard to explain how cool it really was, it was a life changing experience for me and I have a hard time putting it into words. I'm starting with Jordan because that's the easiest for me to describe. Jordan is very different than Egypt and Israel for different reasons. You'll understand the difference when I get to the Egypt and Israel post. I'll just post some pics and hopefully it will sound half as interesting as it was.
This was one of the first stops we made in Jordan to eat lunch in the desert in a Bedouin tent. The Bedouin people are people who have lived in the desert off the land for thousands of years. There are alot of Bedouins in Egypt and Israel who still live in tents or basically shacks they built out of scraps of metal, wood, etc. (some of them have satelites on the outside!), but Jordan government has been trying to get the bedouins in Jordan to build houses and stay in one place so they can get an education. The bedouins in Jordan also have these tourist camps, like the ones we visited where people can come and camp out with them (you can see the tents are more modern) or come for lunch and a jeep ride (like us). They cooked the food underground that's why they are digging in the sand. The food was good, we just ate alot of the same foods most of the trip, pita bread, hummus, meat and rice.

Here's our jeep ride through the desert (basically we sitting in the back of pickup truck). Everyone was so nervous about me going on the jeep ride, but then when it was time to get in the trucks I was at the very end. The lower picture is Greg at the bathroom. We were all taking pictures of the guys because it just seemed so funny to us that we could see them while they were taking care of business. I guess some of us will just never grow out of thinking stuff like that is funny!

The jeep ride was beautiful, it actually reminded me of Moab and St. George, but it was all through sand. Lawrence of Arabia spent alot of time with the Bedouins and so they kept telling us the highlight of the ride was the face of Lawrence carved into the rock. I guess I had my expectations sortof high, because when we got out, I was thinking, "that little face! That's what we came to see?" Good thing Petra was the next day. At least the scenery was beautiful.

These next pictures are of Petra, which is one of the seven wonders of the world. It was seriously amazing! You hike through this cool canyon and there is this beautiful stone city that has been there for thousands of years. One of the temples is where they shot some of the Indiana Jones movies. For those of you who don't know Greg he loves talking to anybody! He made friends with a guy that was trying to sell us a ride on a donkey up to the Monastary (3 mile hike roundtrip), but ended up hanging out with Greg for awhile, notice another picture below of donkey guy. He also talking alot to some Bedouins who lived on the very top of the mountain and just sold stuff to tourists to make a living. It was so interesting to think of what there life was like just living outdoors all the time. Plus, to see the kids just playing on the edge of cliffs was just weird, but that's just how they live.

Here is a picture of a little boy and a pigeon. This kids was so cute and he just kept swinging this pigeon around and turing him upside down and stuff. It was pretty funny! It was probably one of those things you had to be there.

I don't know why you wouldn't want a picture of a camel drinking from a water bottle?

The top picture was a view of Israel from Jordan. And the bottom is of a girl making a mosiac, which are very popular in Jordan. We ordered a mosaic of Jesus' baptism in the river Jordan, but we still haven't gotten it. Hopefully it will turn out. The last picture is of Greg riding on the bus,obviously, we rode on the bus ALOT.

Stay tuned for Israel and Egypt.

1st Day of school and what the rest of us do at home

2009-10-09T20:59:00.001-07:00

Scott asked me one day, "Mom, what do you guys do while I'm at school?"

Well, we do lots of fun stuff, like walk around with laundry baskets on our heads and play with playdough (in our diaper of course). What else would we do?

By the way, the playdough we are using is edible peanut butter playdough and it was soooo good. Greg thought it was disgusting (big surprise), but I loved it. It almost tasted like peanut butter cookie dough and it wasn't super sticky so the kids had a lot of fun playing with it and it didn't make a huge mess. Cleaner than real playdough! Here's the recipe, if you want it : http://www.ourbestbites.com/2009/07/kids-week-peanut-butter-playdough.html

I know it's late, but here are Scott's first day of school pictures. So far, he has liked school. He had a couple of days the second week where he would cry and hold onto me right when the bus was coming and say he didn't want to go to school, but he always got on the bus! He says he has fun at school, but he can never remember what he does there! Some of my friends have told me that's typical with some kindergarteners and he's teacher says he's doing great at school! We miss him but it's so cool to see all the things he's learning! I still can't believe I have kids old enough to be in school!

Poor Stacey

2009-10-03T18:28:00.000-07:00

Here is a conversation I had with Stacey yesterday in the car.

Stacey: Mom, I won't like the new baby.

Me: Why not?

Stacey: Because he is a boy baby and I will only like a girl baby.

Me:I bet you will like him, you like Daniel and he is a boy.

Stacey: I KNOW MOM, but I will not like this baby because he's a boy, I will only like him if he's a girl. (pouty face)

Sorry Stace, this one REALLY is your Dad's fault!

Growing up too fast!

2009-09-24T20:01:00.000-07:00

All the time I think my kids are growing up too fast! But especially my baby! They really just don't stay babies for very long.

And how is it that one haircut makes you realize that they're really not a baby anymore :(

#4 Already?

2009-08-16T20:10:00.000-07:00

No it's not April Fools Day! I really am pregnant again! And it's another boy (poor Stacey)!

Here's how the pregnancy has gone so far: I went to my midwife at about 14 weeks for my first visit, and they couldn't find a heartbeat, so A WEEK LATER I had an ultrasound and the baby is find and we were able to see that it is a boy. I went by myself to the ultrasound (since we didn't know if the baby was ok, I didn't want my kids there) so on the way home I called Greg to tell him the news. Here's what happened when he told Scott:

Dad: Guess what Scott? The baby that is in Mom's tummy is a boy! You're going to have another brother.

Scott: Yeah, that's awesome. (Pause) But when are we having a girl baby?

Stacey basically had the same response. Then we had to explain to them that this baby isn't coming out for a LONG time, and then we have to wait a LONG time again to have a girl baby and even THEN it may not be a girl baby.

Being the mom, I am happy with with a boy or girl, but I do feel bad for Stacey. I know she'd love to have a sister to play with. But I think it will be fun for Daniel to have a brother who is so close in age.

I'm feeling great now that the morning sickness part is over. I always forget how much I hate that part. I don't throw up alot but feel nauseated all day long! I would sometimes lay around in the morning and my kids would ask me, "when will the baby not make you feel sick anymore?" I have to admit, I felt pretty overwhelmed in the morning sickness stage with the fact of having four kids soon, but now that it has past and things are back to normal, I know I'll survive! You guys all know people who have suvived four kids right? :)

Budding Photographer and School Anxiety

2009-08-03T21:01:00.001-07:00

Don't you love when you open your pictures and see your kids have gotten a hold of the camera? I remember Scott taking this picture of me but I didn't realize they had taken the other ones. My favorite pictures are the ones where you can see up Scott's nose and the one where he is posing for the camera. It takes real talent to capture those moments. My kids defintely aren't amatuers. But since Greg never takes pictures, I guess the only way to get pictures of me is to have my kids take them :)

Here are some pics of Scott's preschool gradutation. Two friends from out ward who have kids Scott's age took turns doing preschool at their house. They did so many fun, cute and of course educational activities with the kids, and of course Scott loved it! It is fun to see hime grow up and I am amazed at how much he has already changed this summer!

He will start school in a couple of weeks (sob) and I have mixed feelings about it. He is so excited to go to school and I'm excited for him! But in Texas they have full day kindergarten, so he will leave our house (on a bus) around 7:15 and come home about 3:08. Doesn't that seem like a long day for a 5 year old? The other moms I have talked to said the kids come home exhausted for the first month or so and then they get used to it. I think it just makes me realize that he isn't mine, he is going to have his own life. I'm not getting dramatic, like he's leaving me soon or anything, it just makes me realize that I don't have complete control over his development anymore, I'm turning over the some of the control over to his teachers and peers! It's kindof scary!

Inspiration and Good Ideas

2009-07-26T20:36:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I've been out of the blogging world awhile and probably no one will even read this, but after blogging tonight I realized I want to do it more. I don't know why it is so hard for me to sit down at the computer and actually blog. Maybe because I worry it need to be funny or entertaining, etc. But I really want to start bloggin because when I was looking at some blogs tonight I realized how cool it is to remember how you were feeling that day and remembering the little things that happen. I KNOW I will forget the little things, and I really do want remember those and how it felt to be a mom at what ever stage of kids I'm going through. So thanks to those of you who have cool blogs who inspired me to want to blog more. (We'll see if I actually do it :)

Good idea #1: Fingerpainting in the bathtub! I found these bath paints at Wal-Mart and they were a blast and I didn't have to stress out that the kids were getting paint all over, I just washed it off of the shower wall after. Daniel even got to paint!

Good Idea #2: For Scott's party we had a Star Wars themed party and I went to Party City where light saber blowups were $6.99 each x 16 kids = not worth it! So I found the idea online of cutting pool noodles in half ($2 per noodle = $1 per kid), and covering the bottom with duct tape! The kids loved them, and I felt great that I threw a successful kid birthday party (that stuff stresses me out, but I love the internet, once I looked online I felt alot better, there were so many cool ideas! Plus, if you'll notice, Daniel is in his diaper in all the pictures. Seriously, what mom doesn't dress her kid for a party? A mom who has to put all of her mental energy into planning a party. The funny thing is that I do not get stressed out planning parties for adults, just kids.) So here are some pics of Scott's 5th birthday party!

Ok, so as I am posting this, I can't get my pictures to move down in the blog, so I just left them at the top. What's the deal? Does anyone else have a hard time dragging the pictures down? I'm just gonna leave them at the top for now, if any one else knows any blogging secrets, please share!

Ok, now for Scott! I love that kid so much! I really enjoy babies and toddlers, but I love also that Scott is older that we can have converstaions together and enjoy sports, coloring and watching him learn new things. He is a very sweet, loving boy and loves to spend time with the family. He makes me laugh and loves music and dancing. We have so much fun with him. He loves all sports and I worry he is going to have a hard time deciding which ones to play when he gets older. His first three words were mama, dada and football if that gives you any indication of how much he loves sports. I am so grateful for him! I would post a picture of him if I thought I could drag it down!

Look at me, I'm Sandra Dee

2009-04-15T19:40:00.000-07:00

That really has nothing to do with the post, but my aunt (I think it's from a movie, Barbara Streisand?) always says that when she has done something wonderful, and I thought that since I am blogging twice this week it was fitting. I made a promise to my friend Andrea that I would blog more, and I always keep my promises (or at least TRY to). So what is this blog about (drumroll, please)?

DisneyWorld!!!

We went to DisneyWorld a couple of weeks ago and I ACTUALLY took pictures. Here are some of the highlights . . .

We DROVE!! Can you believe it? Everyone thought we were crazy, but it really wasn't too bad! The kids watched movies and played with the fun trip stuff our friend Kelly got for them, and slept. The worst part of driving was the first night when Greg wanted to drive until 2 am and Daniel was screaming because he was so tired and wouldn't go to sleep. We finally stopped at about midnight and crashed! But it worked out fine because we only had about 5 hours to drive the next day. It's about 16 to 17 hours from where we live to Orlando.

Heres' ALL of our pictures with the characters. We didn't really see that many out an about. You had to wait in line to see most of them, so we waited in line once for the princesses for about 30 minutes, and we were done with that. I don't know if they do it differently at Disneyland, but we saw alot more characters out and about. Scott was sad to he didn't see Buzz Lightyear, he loved him at Disneyland. One fun thing that happened was that Stacey was Boo in the Monsters, Inc. show. What do you think, does she look like Boo?

I love the picture of Scott with the CARS characters because there is another boy in the picture because you had to wait in line 30 minutes to take pictures with them too! So I just had Scott go stand over by the cars, I'm sure the experience was just as meaniful . . .

Above is some pictures of some of the rides and petting the animals at Animal Kingdom.

So what does a one year old who can't walk, do at DisneyWorld?

These were the highlights of Daniels trip. Playing with the 3-D glasses at the shows, sitting in the stroller, getting grabbed, poked, and loved by Stacey when she sat behind him in the stroller. And grabbing Dad's hair while he sat on his shoulders when we had to park the stroller to wait in line for a show. Overall, he was a pretty good sport.

I titled this picture ANNOYED because this was the moment that Greg decided he had ENOUGH of DisneyWorld. We were at Epcot, and he wasn't too impressed with the park in general. We had a five day pass, so we had done Disney for 5 days strait so the overload was understandable. Needless to say, we all had a really fun exhausting time. I was grateful to have some time with just my little cute family. I really even had fun spending time talking with Greg in the car! It's just good to get away from all the distractions of everyday life and just chill with the fam!

Making things way worse . . .

2009-04-13T22:44:00.000-07:00

Ok, this is a random post, but I have been looking at other peoples blogs and I haven't posted in a really long time (ok, so that's an understatement), but I thought I shoud just post some random thought, since I get to overwhelmed with putting the pictures on (I'm a simple gal, ya know)

Ok, so I'm not a huge worrier, but I do worry sometimes. And when I worry, I tend to turn a ant hill into a mountain (is that how the saying goes?). Here's a couple of examples:

When I flew home from Utah with my kids on Sat. Our flight LEFT at 6:00 a.m. which means we had to leave the house by 4:00 or so. Trust me, I was not excited to first of all get my self up and then my three kids up and then sit with them on a plane for 3 hours plus airport time WITHOUT my husband. Plus, I started feeling sick the night before, so I was really thinking that I needed to get some rest so that I didn't fall apart the next day. So I went to bed about 11,to at least get about 5 hours. But guess what happened, I was so stressed out about getting some sleep that I COULD NOT sleep. It was driving me crazy! I would try and do yoga relaxation techniques to calm my mind, but then I would think of how bad the day would be so then I would get more worked up and not sleep! So basically what happened is I didn't sleep AT ALL, I got up and showered (I have to shower!) and got everyone else up and ended up sleeping for 45 minutes on the plane when we took off because all my kids fell asleep for a little bit.

The moral of this story is although I did feel like a zombie the whole next day (I did take a 2 hours nap in the afternoon), I didn't die. Believe me, the way I was stressing the night before, you would've thought that no sleep would kill me, but it didn't! So why did I waste my WHOLE night stressing about it?

The other thing I tend to stress about is my kids sleep. I feel like if they don't get enought sleep they are going to be terrible the next day, drive me crazy, blah, blah, blah. And sometime that does happen, but sometimes they SURPRISE me and act totally fine all day!

Is there anyone else out there like this? If, not then just give me the number of a good couselor.

One reason why I am asking is because Greg always says, Well if you can't sleep you must not be tired enough. But I swear that I get really tired, but if I stay up too long, I get more wired and can't fall asleep. I ALWAYS pay for it the next day! But I've never been the type of person who could fall asleep during a movie or with the lights on reading, I have to be in my bed with the lights off in my pajamas with my face washed. Is that just weird, or am I really not tired enough?

By the way, it's nice to see you all again :)

Negative Nancy . . . Be Gone!!!

2008-11-06T22:20:00.000-08:00

Ok, I am feeling better, thanks to everyone who commented on my last blog, I really did just need a swift kick in the butt to get me going. So now I thought I would write a more positive post about all the things I love in my life right now . . .

1. I am more in love with my husband than I ever have been. Being married was such a big adjustment for me, and there were hard times. But I love looking back at our marraige and seeing all the joys and trials we have been through and seeing how close they have bonded us. It really does just keep getting better . . .

2. Seeing Scott learn so many new things and talking about his memories. I feel so amazed at the mind of a child, how they pick up things so fast and then they remember them. I feel so excited when he has friends come to play, because I remember how much fun I had playing with friends when I was younger. I love when he will remind me of fun times we had together, and I have so much joy in realizing he has so many happy memories of time he has spent with me and our family.

3. Bonding with Stacey. Stacey is so stubborn and she does things on her own time, you cannot force this child to do anything!! But it makes it that much sweeter when she wants to be close to you, because you know it's what she wants to do. I love going placer with her and spending time with just her. I feel like since she is the middle child she sometimes gets lost in the mix, so I love being able to sit and talk with her. She is quite the conversationalist.

4. Loving on Daniel. To say this kid is happy is a huge understatement. He always laughs and smiles at me, which makes me feel like I am his most favorite person in the world. I want to kiss and hold him all day, and I sometimes want to wake him up at night to play with him after he's gone to sleep (I seriously d0!).

5. Where we live. I absolutely love our house, I love our neighborhood, I love our ward, I love my friends here. Seriously, I have never felt so much at home as I feel here. I miss family and friends in Utah of course. But I KNOW I belong here. I have been so blessed by the people I know here, I really do have "family" in Texas.

6. The gospel. I feel like I know my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ so much better than I have for most of my life. I feel so much inspiration in my life, that comes from the Holy Ghost. I honestly don't know what I would so without it. I couldn't function.

7. Honesty. I feel like I have more honesty in my life than I have before. I feel like I can be honest with myself, it's ok for me to have strength and weaknesses. I don't feel like I have to be perfect or that relationships have to be perfect. Sometimes people fight, we get upset, hurt people's feelings and that's ok, nobody's perfect. We are all working together. For most of my life, I've been a people pleaser, but now I feel like I can be myself and tell people the truth (and not what they want to hear), and it's refreshing. At least I can be honest with myself and others and I feel free.

There are SOOO many more, I was gonna write about my family and Greg
s family, but there are too many amazing people to start on at 1:00 in the morning. That's a blog for another day . . .

Gone, Gone, Gone!

2008-11-04T21:28:00.000-08:00

Gone like a freight train, gone like yesterday, gone like (I can't remember the rest).

Yes, I have been gone from the blogging world for awhile. The main reason is because I had SO MANY fun people come visit me in October and Greg is out of town.

Basically, this is a venting blog (just a disclaimer). Not because I am jealous of anyone, the people I am mentioning in my blog I admire, but I just wonder how they do it. I feel like I never have time to blog, never have time to read, my house is never clean, I don't play with my kids enough, I don't bathe them everyday, I get mad at my kids, I'm not organized (that's an understatement, I am the complete opposite of organize, I basically feel like I live on the verge of chaos), I don't work out as much as I should, I don't get enough sleep, I don't make anything crafty or scrapbook (I can sew, I just don't feel like I have time to), don't read my scriptures enough, I can never remember to say my morning prayers, etc. Sometimes I just feel like I am one of those frogs in the boiling water and I am just swimming and swimming and barely keeping my head above the water.

And then I read other people's blogs and these are all the cool things they do: read at least 3 books a week, have triplets, run marathons and half marathons, have special needs kids that they are amazing with, shoot music videos, write books, teach parenting classes, scrapbook, sew, make crafts, cook yummy (and healthy) dinners every night, have all there kids do chores everyday, and so on. And alot of these people are moms who have just as many (or more) kids as I do, are wonderful moms who always do fun stuff with their kids, and some of them have part-time and full time jobs (really easy jobs like, school psychologist, nurse, medical transcriptionist, nurse, etc.)! And all I'm wondering of all you wonderful people out there who do all these cool things, is honestly, how do you have time? I love the people who do these things and admire them and want to be more like them for all the things they accomplish, but where would I find the time?

So this is an honest question to all of you out there doing all these "cool" things, is there some secret way for me to manage my time better? Please share it with me, I need help! I really didn't post this blog for everyone to write things like "oh Christy, you do so much, you're so amazing!" I really do want help!!

ALso, I screwed up my blog! How did I do that? I am also not very good at blogging! Can someone tell me how to fix it?

Sorry, I don't mean for this to be a negative post. I love my life, I have such a wonderful family and such amazing friends, I am truly blessed way beyond anything I deserve.

I just wish I wasn't so overwhelmed all the time . . .

Vacation over the Border

2008-09-11T20:52:00.000-07:00

I just got back from a fun-filled exhausting vacation.

First, we went to Spokane for a very fun, well-planned reunion. Unfortunately, I got sick (strepth throat) and didn't take any pictures. If you are just dying to see how much fun we had you can click here http://www.everydayromneys.blogspot.com/. It was at the Daines lake cabin at Hayden Lake. I seriously have the best in-laws! We all get along so well, and I WISH I lived closer to ALL of them!!

Next, we headed to Canada with just our family to see Vancouver. We stayed at the Sutton Place, a five star hotel at a 3 star price, thanks to hotels.com, thank you Greg! When we told our trolley driver where we were staying, he asked me if I was famous. That's seriously how nice this place was folks. Everyone looked at us like we were crazy we dragged our three snack covered, messy haired, homeless looking kids (we'd been in the car for 5 hours) to check-in to the hotel. It was I'm sure one of Greg's all-time favorite moments of our lives. Seriously, he loves to look ghetto in nice places. It's a weird quirk he has.

Here's a view from the hotel.

Ok, I have to admit, I don't usually take the shampoo and all the stuff from the hotels, but this seriously was nice stuff!! I could've stayed in this hotel all week!

In Vancouver, we rode the trolley around, played at Stanley park, and ate yummy crepes. Daniel fell asleep on the trolley and played with a straw the rest of the day(I know am not good at taking pictures, I'm working on it. Just don't read my blog for the pictures, just read it for the captivating story-telling). Then we had to leave that night to go on a ferry to Victoria.

We checked-in to our hotel at midnight in Victoria. So our kids were passed out until 11:00 the next day. In Victoria, we rode the trolley around (Greg likes taking the tour trolleys), fed a seal (the highlight of our day), and went on a whale watching tour. We also went to Buchart gardens, which is beautiful, but it was at night and my phone (I forgot my camera on the trip, does that surprise anyone?) doesn't have a flash so I couldn't take pictures. I'm sure they have a great web site, with better pictures than I could take anyways!

Next, it was on to Seattle, where we met my parents, my uncle and his family, and my brother and some of his friends for the BYU vs. Washington game. It was a really fun game to be at and I even took all my kids!! I don't know why I don't have any pictures of this! We had so much fun!! I think my dad took some pictures, when I get them from him, I'll post them later. So long blogging world . . .

Paved with Good Intentions

2008-08-24T21:48:00.000-07:00

I don't know if this blog will make me feel better or worse about myself, but I have been feeling overwhelmed so I thought I would put in my blog some of the things I did and didn't do this week.

I did feed my kids this week.

I didn't keep them or my kitchen clean while doing it. (At least the broom is out in this picture, at least I intended to clean it.)

Sidenote about Stacey:Holy cow that girl is one messy eater. At least once a day (really this is not an exaggeration), she spills yogurt, oatmeal, juice, etc. on the table AND on the floor! She also has the wonderful talent of table finger painting. This is where you take whatever is in front of you (yogurt is especially lovely) and dip your finger in it and make beautiful edible artwork all over the kitchen table. Hopefully on day this is a sport in the Olympics . . .

I did take 30 minutes (to get toys, snacks etc.) to get my kids in the stroller to go running stroller and then take a picture because they looked so darn cute. And then Greg came home so I decided to take them back out of the stroller and leave them with him. (It's hard enough for me to run let alone push two kids!!)

I still went running!! Just not with them!

I did sit down in my office to get all my bills done, but I didn't get any work done. Can you guess why? That's right, Daniel was in there with me!

But I did get some really cute pictures of Daniel!!!

I DID go to my 10 year high school reunion! Which was a blast!! Thanks to ya'll for planning it!

But I didn't get a new outfit or lose 10 pounds or rent a hummer or show up in a limo!! Am I lame or what?

Other cool thing that happened: Scott wrote his name all by himself! Way to go buddy!! He did such a good job!! I didn't even help him at all!

Other funny thing that happened: Stacey put this shirt on as a skirt, it was hilarious!

All in all, it wasn't a bad week!

Scott's world

2008-08-03T19:45:00.000-07:00

My friend Andrea did this post because with her daughter Skylar and I wanted to do it with Scott to see what he said.

1. What is something dad always says to you? go play tennis

2. What is something mom always says to you? When it's thundering, you cannot go outside without asking to go swimming.

3. What makes dad happy? When you give him a present

4. What makes mommy happy? Giving hugs

5. What makes dad sad? I don't know

6. What makes mommy sad? If you don't go to school and take a school bus

7. How does dad make you laugh? when we play funny games

8. How does mom make you laugh? she makes me music

9. How old is your dad? I don’t know.
10. How old is your mom? 4
11. How tall is your dad? 10

12. How tall is your mom? 14
13. What is daddy's favorite thing to do? play games with me

14. What is mom’s favorite thing to do? hold daniel

15. What does your dad do when you're not around? he looks for stuff
16. What does your mom do when you're not around? go in the car

17. What is your dad really good at? tennis
18. What is your mom really good at? soccer sports

19. What is your dad not very good at? hitting the ball, when he doesn't hit it high

20. What is your mom not very good at? basketball

21. What does your dad do for his job? work, kill spiders

22. What does your mom do for her job? work, kill spiders (never!), on the computer

23. What is your dad's favorite food? hot dogs with bread

24. What is your mom’s favorite food? tortillas (what!?!)

25. If your dad were a cartoon character, who would he be? Goofy

26. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? Minnie Mouse
27. How are you and your dad the same? We're both boys

28. How are you and your mom the same? when we match colors
29. How are you and your dad different? when we have different shirts on
30. How are you and your mom different? when we have different shirts on

The funniest one to me is the hot dogs and bread because when greg is on weight watchers he eats 4 fat-free hot dogs everyday (1 point each) and 4 slices of light bread (2 points), so Scott does see him eat it alot, no wonder he thinks it's his favorite food. I was surpirsed that Scott said tortillas for me, but I guess I don't usually eat sandwiches on bread, I usually do put it in a wrap, so I'm assuming that's where he got that answer from!! It's just funny to see how your kids see things!

Today when he told us what he learned in primary he said the learned about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints of the United States of America. Now that's a long name for a church!

There's somthing about Daniel . . .

2008-07-29T20:11:00.001-07:00

I'm kindof backtracking here, but I never posted any pics of Daniels blessing, but here are a couple of pics I took on my phone. My uncle Denny, the family photographer, took more but I can't get the disc to work :(

Okay, I need to brag about Daniel for a little bit. He is seiously the best, happiest baby ever!! I seriously can not get enough of him!! I want to hold him, kiss him, cuddle and play with him all the time. He has the cutest laugh and smile. I think he even looks cute when he has a blank stare on his face!! One day when I was preparing my lesson on Sunday and it was crunch time (I'm a procratinator, remember? Hopefully, no one in my ward reads this, I want to give them the impression that I prepare my lessons months in advance), so I asked Greg to keep Daniel in the living room while I shut my door and worked on my lesson, bccause I couldn't get anything done because I would see him smiling at me and then stop working on my lesson to go play with him! I don't know what it is about him, maybe just the fact that he is a baby or what, but I seriously can not get enough of that kid!!

Scott's 4 Birthday Bowling Bonanza and My Very Special Cake Decorating Talent

2008-07-09T19:43:00.000-07:00

Scott is four!! WE had such a fun day!! We let Scott pick an activity during the day and he picked bowling. Check out these cute pics.
My favorite part of bowling was the little bowling shoes they had for my kids!! They looked so cute in those shoes. Stacey is throwing a tantrum because she didn't get her own ball (she will turn 3 one day, right?)

Here's the exciting birthday breakfast, with Scott's choice of cereal, Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Later in the day, he got to watch a movie during quiet time with the boys.

Then on to Chuck E. Cheese for the birthday party . . .

The best thing about Chuck E. Cheese is that there is no setup and no cleaning up after!! The kids all had fun, with the exception of Daniel, who sat in his car seat almost all night. But he looked really cute doing it.

I don't want to take anything away from Scott's bday, but I wanted to show everyone my hidden (very amateur) cake decorating talent. Here is Scott's cake decorated by ME!!

The ball is a cake too (it's supposed to be a basketball and hoop)! My mom always made us homemade decorated cakes for our birthdays, so it was fun for me to make one of my own!!

Scott is so much fun, and I am so greatful to have him in our family! I can't believe he is already four!!

100 things about Christy . . .

2008-05-09T21:33:00.000-07:00

Sorry to the blogging world (especially you, Ryan, I know a good portion of the excitement in your life revovles around what is on my blog) for my long absence. At least this is a long, VERY informative blog!!

My friend Andrea (who I love reading her blog, her daughter Sklar is HILarious) did this and I thought it was really cool. Don't compare my 100 to hers though because she is way more talented and cool than I am!!

1. I have lived in Texas for 5 going on 6 years.
2. I thought I was only here for 3-5 years (per Greg's promises we would go back to Utah soon), but am glad we are still here, because I love it (Sorry friends & family in Utah, I still miss you lots)!!
3. I loved New Kids on the Block when I was 9 or 10 and had a florescent NKOTB fanny pack.
4. I met Greg at school at UVSC with his friend Justin. Justin actually talked to me first. I was staring at my orange (it's a long story why I was staring at the orange). The conversation started like this, "How's that orange?"
5. I lived in White Rock, NM until I was 10.
6. I was on a chess team in elementary school in NM, and I used to love playing chess with my dad. I only beat him once (and I think he let me win).
7. I LOVE kickboxing and want to be a teacher someday.
8. I love when you pick up newborn babies when they are sleeping or tired and they pull their legs up and scrunch into a ball, its so CUTE!
9. I eat alot of things I don't think taste good because they are healthy.
10. I love Dance Dance Revolution.
11. I love playing sports, but not watching them.
12. Two sports I have come to really like playing in the past 5 years: tennis and golf.
13. I like ketchup on mexican food (like burritos and tacos) better than salsa.
14. I love Harry Potter! I've read all the books at least twice except the last one.
15. My sister is the only one who has done (colored & cut) my hair in the last 5 years and she lives in Utah. Needless to say, you can tell how recently I have been to Utah by how my hair looks.
16. I am obsessed with my parents cabin in Sundance, it is one of the coolest places in the world!
17. I really want to go to Europe.
18. I drive a Toyota Sienna (it's a mini-van, come on I have 3 kids now!)
19. If I could have any car I wanted I would pick a FJ Cruiser.
20. I don't really care for motocycles, but I ride on them more often than probably most people because my husband loves them!
21. I started to really like Diet Dr. Pepper during my last pregnancy (I know, great time to start loving caffienated soda).
22. I've always wanted to live in a big city like boston or new york and live in an apt. and not have a car, and ride the subway everywhere.
23. I don't want to do that anymore now that I have kids.
24. I am very spacey and forgetful.
25. I love Masimoto's and Bahama Bucks shaved ice.
26. Greg used to buy me a ice cream called Dreyer's White Out when we were dating. It was white chocolate ice cream with white chocolate covered pretzel balls.
27. White Chocolate used to be my favorite, but now dark chocolate is.
28. I don't really like cooking, but I love baking.
29. One of my favorite treats is rice crispie treats!! I do weird things to try and make them more healthy so I don't feel guilty about eating the whole pan. Like last time I made them with puffed millet instead of rice crispies because it has more fiber. (It was really good)
30. Who am I kidding? There's still butter and marshmallows in it!
31. One of the reasons I love my husband is because he makes me feel like the most beautiful girl in the whole world!
32. I really came to love yoga in college, but haven't found a class I like in texas.
33. I hate sweeping.
34. I am obssessive about cleaning ear wax out of my ears (with a q-tip).
35. I love pedicures.
36. I played soccer growing up but was never very good at it.
37. I played forward my senior year, but didn't score any goals.
38. I have a cut up quilt in my sewing closet that I have been working (not working) on for 8-9 years.
39. I like wearing hats.
40. I can do my hair curly and strait.
41. I hate doing my hair.
42. Greg picked the temple we got married in (SLC).
43. I hate washing my face, so I use those PONDS cleaning wipe things. I just don't like when I'm washing my face with water and my shirt gets wet.
44. I have fantastic in-laws!
45. I worked with troubles teenage girls for my internships in college and loved it. I would really like to do that again.
46. I want to get my masters degree someday so I can be a licensed counseler.
47. I love donuts with sprinkles.
48. I love sprinkles.
49. My first job was working as a pharmacy technician at Macey's (love Macey's).
50. One of my favorite jobs was working as a pharmacy tech. at Utah Valley Hospital because I got to wear scrubs to work!!!
51. I am obsessed with the musical Wicked!
52. I also love the movie Phantom of the Opera.
53. I wish I could sing and dance well because my (non-realistic) dream is to be in musicals.
54. I have always been blessed with amazing friends!
55. Holy cow? Am I only at 55? (Andrea, how did you think of 100? I'm starting to think I'm not that interesting. . . )
56. One of the people that I knew for a very short time but made a big difference in my life and the way I view marriage and family was one of my professors in college, Davee Chandler.
57. My family (with my brothers and sisters) growing up seriously hardly EVER fought (I have people who can vouch for this).
58. Now that I have kids, I wonder how my parents pulled that off! My kids fight ALL the time.
59. I only have one blood related Grandma still alive and I love her so much!! She is amazing and so much fun!!
60. My Grandpa (Dad's dad) died before I was born.
61. My Grandpa Elkington (who married my Grandma after my grandpa died) has been such a wonderful grandpa to me, and has been such a blessing in my life as well.
62. I have 3 sisters and two brothers.
63. One of my favorite vacations growing up was going to Lake Powell in the summer.
64. My most memorable vacation was when I went to Cancun with my sisters and parents after I graduated high school.
65. My favorite restuarant is probably Cheesecake factory.
66. I got engaged on Pier 39 in San Francisco.
67. That is also the place where Greg told me he loved me for the first time (this is where you sigh and say, oh how cute)
68. I like golfing with Greg.
69. I don't really like playing tennis with him, but he is the only person I know who will play with me.
70. That's not mean because he doesn't like playing tennis with me either, because I'm not a challenge.
71. I've been to Canada twice for an hour when I went to Niagra Falls.
72. My favorite Canadian candy bar is Crunchie.
73. I am worried that too many off my 100 things revovle around my favorite foods.
74. I have had two of my kids natural and one with and epidural.
75. I have all of my kids now through a midwife.
76. One reason is insurance and the other is my recovery has been better.
77. I miss having the last name Hill.
78. I get sick of always having to spell the last name Romney.
79. Stacey has the same middle name as me: Diane.
80. I have tried to dye my hair darker, but honestly I really only like my hair blonde or with blonde highlights in it.
81. My calling right now is Relief Society teacher, and in the last 5 years that's the calling I've had for 4 years (in two different wards).
82. I always want to get a calling in Young Womens.
83. I go to Chik-fil-a and McDonald's at least once a week (for the kids, and so I don't have to make lunch).
84. I hate shopping at Wal-Mart, but I still go there because you can't beat the prices.
85. My favorite clothes store is American Eagle.
86. I am so bad at sending out thank you cards!
87. I have never sent out Christmas cards.
88. Honestly, those things just overwhelm me!! Just know I thank you and wish you a Merry Christmas for all the years to come!
89. I just finished reading These is My Words and am now reading Hoot.
90. If I was a teenager I would have a crush on Zac Efron (I like High School Musical). He seems so nice.
91. I am really bad at putting my laundry away! I always get it washed and folded but I never put it away.
92. I am not a very good house cleaner at all actually. But I have been ALOT better now than I have moved into my new house.
93. I would love to have a pool in my back yard (the summers are so HOTTT here).
94. I love miniature things.
95. I love baby animals.
96. I love playing outside with my kids.
97. I love reading with my kids.
98. I love the way kids see the world, and how they explain the world around them.
99. My mom made me a stuffed monkey when I was a baby, that I still have.
100. I have the best friends and family I could ever ask for (I am blessed way beyond anything I deserve)

I made it!!! Yeah!!!

Who does he (Daniel) look like?

2008-05-02T20:09:00.000-07:00

You know how people are always asking you who your kids look like, and you have no idea. With Daniel sometimes I look at him and see Scott, sometimes I'll see a baby picture of Stacey and think, "no, wait Daniel looks like Stacey." I don't think that Scott and Stacey look anything alike, but people have told me you can TOTALLY tell they are brother and sister. I've had people tell me that Scott looks exactly like me and I can see the Hill side in him, but I don't know if he looks alot like me or more like my brothers. So I am opening up the question to the blogging world, who does he look like? Sorry there is no picture with Greg and Daniel, just refer to other pics to compare (he's at a baseball game right now). Let me know . . .

March 2008 - A blur

2008-04-11T13:00:00.000-07:00

Hey all! He's so cute huh? I've made it through my first month with a newborn!! The last month really has been a blur. Life with a newborn for me has gone pretty fast but all the days seem to run together from lack of nighttime sleep. Although I am happy to say that Daniel for the last two nights has slept 8 hours straight (10:00 pm. - 6:00 pm.) . So after my first two nights of decent sleep, I felt I has enough energy to blog. This blog is going to be pretty random though because my camera is lost again (really it is, I know, who loses their camera this much?), so the pictures are the ones that I took with my phone.

After Daniel was born, my mom flew down for a week which was so nice, so I could lay in bed for the first few days, plus I didn't have to do my dishes for a week! Thanks mom, you really are a lifesaver, I couldn't have done it without you, especially because Daniel slept an average of like 4 hours at night the first week of his life! We had a really fun St. Patrick's Day celebration that my mom put on, and the kids had alot of fun hanging out with Grandma.

Then later in the month, Greg's mom (Grnadma Nut) flew down for a week too! Am I spoiled or what? The kids had a great time with her! We went to the zoo, and basically just hung out all week. But it was a very fun, relaxing visit! Daniel loved being held by his grandma! Thanks Karen for all the help and fun when you were here!

These are the silly zoo pictures we took. Can you believe we all fit on one turtle?

Scott also started Blast Ball. For those of you who don't know about the exciteing game of Blast ball, it is intense, let me tell you! All this kids hit from a tee, and the opposing team stand in a line on the pitchers mound and take turns fielding the ball and throw it to first. There are no outs and no score, even though at Scott's game today, the kid on the other team standing by Scott said, "There's no way your gonna win!" Scott didn't say anything back because he is such a polite boy, but he could've said, "Well, no duh, because theres no score!" Anyways, he loves it, plus they look so CUTE in there uniforms!!! For some reason Scott sticks his tongue out when he hits and runs, I'm sure too intimidate the other team. That's probably why that one kid was taunting him, because he was sooo intimidated!

Well, now I'm in trouble becase my phone is having trouble exporting pictures to my computer. I really have to find my camera . . . .

Daniel Andrew Romney

2008-03-13T15:42:00.001-07:00

He's here finally!!! Daniel Andrew Romney was born March 12, 2008 @ 8:52 pm. He weighed 10 lbs. 2 oz and was 22 inches long. As you will see from the pictures, he is a very big boy!

I had my normal checkup on Tues. of this week and did a non-stress test on the baby (because I was over due) and Daniel was fine but I still had to have an ultrasound on Wed. to make sure everything was ok. When I went to get the ultrasound Daniel was still fine but my fluid was a little low and the blood flow through the umbilical cord was not as high as they would've liked. So they called my midwife at the birth center and told her I should probably try to deliver the baby today. I got to the birth center at about 2 p.m. and through "natural" inducing techniques we were able to get labor going and I delivered him at 8:52 p.m.

We are at home now (you don't stay overnight at the birth center) and everything is going great. My mom is her watching the kids for me so me and Daniel have slept all day to recover from yesterday. We are all grateful he is here.

40 Weeks and Beyond

2008-03-05T13:41:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer: This is going to be a pretty whiny, cynical blog, so for those of you who know and prefer me as happy-go-lucky Christy, please feel free to check my blog again in 1-2 weeks, when there will be a picture of that Christy will be smiling with her new baby in her arms!

Okay, okay so now I am officially "overdue", and I thought I would post my favorite things about being 40 weeks and beyond for those people "who always have there babies early" so they can know how much fun it is. And also for those of us who are always overdue, maybe you can relate and tell me a story of someone being over due that is worse than mine to make me feel better.

1. Only 3 maternity shirts fit me now, so when I'm going out of my house I have to try and remember who I saw 3 days ago and if I was wearing the same shirt so people don't know I can only fit into three shirts. Plus, the shirts I have been washing over and over now are coming unthreaded around the belly line, which makes me feel even better.

2. EVERYWHERE you go, people ask when are you due, and you get to say, "yesterday, last week, etc." and a see look of horror cross their face. Then it's always, "well, is your doctor going to induce you?" Then I get to explain the whole birthing center, midwife thing and then you get the whole "you are crazy" look. Usually they walk away muttering something under their breath.

3. I cry my head off everytime I leave my weekly check-up because again NOTHING IS HAPPENING in my uterus that even indicates I will go into labor anytime soon. Thanks mom for talking to me on the way home (I think she was worried she will have to fly down to keep me from going into depression and when the baby comes!).

4. Greg tells me when I get home from the appointment (still crying, I've read you can only really cry for 45 minutes at a time, but I have disproved that theory MANY times), "you should always plan on going late, you're ALWAYS late." When I explain to him that every labor is different and most people have some kids early and some days late, he says. "well, YOU just need to plan on always going late, you wil NEVER go early." Thanks, hon. After this discussion we changed my due date to March 20th on the calendar, so that now I can be surprised if I go earlier than that.

People really do say some of the funniest things when you are pregnant. One of the new funny things someone said to me a couple days ago, after asking when I was due, "Oh, you're due that soon, you shouldn't be out. I don't like when people go out that close to there due date you could get hit by a car. When I was 9 months pregnant, I almost got hit by a car." What? Why? Because you can't walk as fast? I'm sure if I was threatened by oncoming traffic, I could go pretty fast for a pregnant lady. "Okay, I'll try and be careful, " I said.

Really, though I am grateful to have a healthy baby and I know that is the most important thing, so I will continue to wait (just maybe not patiently). We are all excited to have a new baby in the house. Even Scott will ask me everyday, "Mom, when is your baby coming out?" Scott, not you too!

Week without Greg

2008-03-02T18:31:00.000-08:00

Okay I wasn't as good at taking picutres as I thought, but I did take this one of us having heart shaped muffins with srpinkles that me and the kids made together. It was one of my "good mom moments." Trust me, those seem to be happening less and less the longer I am pregnant.

I'm not sure if the next pictures are embarrassing, pathetic, or downright cool! One of the fun things I did the night before Greg came home was have a SOLO GIRL'S NIGHT! I got a babysitter and went shopping at the craft store, ate at Panera Bread (thier french onion soup is so good!), and went to the temple. I was thinking that I might feel dumb sitting by myself at Panera Bread eating dinner. But when I got there, I realized there were lots of people sitting by themselves, you just had to have a laptop you were using. I didn't have a laptop, but I did have my new cool phone that Greg got me for Valentine's Day that is Wi-Fi compatible. So I checked my email while I ate at Panera. I did feel dumb asking people to take my picture (but I knew Ryan & Jessica would be proud), but I already had the excuse if people asked me why I would tell them I was on one of those picture scavenger hunts. It really was a fun, relaxing night and I was grateful to get to go to the temple one more time before I have my baby!

The last day Greg was gone we went to a party for one of Scott's friends Evan. Here are pics of the kids there. Scott LOVES birthday cake and ate 3 pieces and would've eaten more if I would've let him.

Belly Pictures

2008-02-29T21:37:00.000-08:00

Okay, so I promised some of you belly pictures. Please note that the fact that I am posting pictures on my blog 9 months pregnant means I feel some very strong love for those of you out there. The other wonderful thing about this pictures is that since Greg was out of town Scott was the photographer. Scott loves taking pictures and usually takes them when I'm out of the room. I have posted some of Scott's other photography masterpieces at the end of the blog.

Here's when I was trying to coach Scott on how to take the pictures (Don't get the lower half of my body, just get the top half). I figured this is probably really how I look the last month of pregnancy, annoyed.

Here's some of Scott's other masterpieces:

Stacey's B-day

2008-02-27T12:30:00.000-08:00

Stacey's birthday was a little sad this year as far as party planning went. We didn't really have a party that day, we just had cake and ice cream for her that night. She did get some cute clothes from her Grandma Hill and a very cute Cinderella dress up outfit from her Grandma Nut. She had a fun day, but Scott still reminds me often that we still need to have a REAL party for Stacey. Hopefully he will forget and not remind her that her 2nd birthday was lame, since she can't remember!

For those of you who don't know Stacey, I will tell you about her. She is alot of fun and has alot of energy (I mean alot). She is very independent and determined at everything she does (it takes me about 10 minutes to get her dressed because she wants to do it). Her favorite saying is "by myself." She has a love/hate relationship with her brother, maybe that's normal I never had an older brother. She is her daddy's princess, and has him wrapped around her little finger. She loves singing "I am a Child of God" really loud. Scott yells at her to stop singing in the car because no one can hear the music when she is singing. She loves princesses, babies and puzzles. I love her so much and am glad to be her mom.

Here she is wearing one of the baby's hats. It was really funny when she put it on, I thought she looked like a little thug rapper girl!

I found my camera cord!!!

2008-02-25T19:41:00.000-08:00

Okay, all I know you have been waiting and checking my blog everyday for the pictures of our new house, so here they are. These are actually the day we moved in. I will take pictures later this week of how everything looks now (much better). And guess what I really will because Greg is out of town this week so I have lots of free night time to blog. So watch out blogging world, this is going to be a record week of blogging for me!!!

The first picture is the front of the house (obviously). The second is the family room, they were building a bookshelf, it is finished now. Nexy pictures are entryway, kitchen, dining room and living room.

I'll take some pictures of the kids rooms also and post them later, they turned out really cute.

One of our new favorite things about our house is our master tub. We love it! The reason I had to post this picture of Greg was because he took his first bubble bath in our tub and put too many bubbles in the first place, but then he turned the jets on and they kept getting bigger. I had to grab a bowl from the kitchen and scoop them into the shower! It was really funny! The kids love the bath too, and I like it because they play (fight) in the tub while I am in the shower (usually yelling at them to stop fighting).

We really love our new house and have such a wonderful ward and neighbors!! It has been a huge blessing for us to live here!

P.S. Andrea, I have been meaning to take a picture of my belly and I will post it just for you!

Tagged

2008-02-11T10:36:00.001-08:00

Hey I have never been tagged before, it seem kindof fun, so here I go:

10 years ago: I was a high school senior at Timpanogos High. I played soccer and worked as a Pharmacy Technician at Macey's grocery story.

5 things on my list to do today: 1) Shower 2) Unpack at least one box 3) Call Verizon about our phone service 4) Do FHE 5) Laundry

Things I enjoy: 1) Reading 2) Taking Naps 3) playing sports (not watching) 4) Kickboxing 5) Going out to dinner 6)Pedicures

What would I do if I were a billionaire? Build a pool, sell our business, go back to school to get my masters, Do community service, buy a vacation home

Three of my bad habits: getting distracted easily, not being organized, not shaving my legs very often

Places I have lived: White Rock, NM Orem, Utah Salt Lake City, Utah Vienna, Virginia Las Vegas, NV Lewisville & Carrollton, TX

5 jobs I have had: 1) Pharmacy Tech 2)Hostess and server at Rodizio Grill and Ruby Tuesday 3)Girl's counselor at NewHaven 4)Payroll and accounting person for our company (which I have no experience in at all!)

5 things people don't know about me: (these are hard)
1) I love Donuts!!! I don't eat them that much because I can develop a serious addiction to them.
2) I enjoy being by myself.
3) I have terrible handwriting. (It looks like a boy's, even Greg's is better than mine)
4) I like sewing, I just can't find the time to do it.
5) I love baking, especially muffins. It doesn't matter what kind, I love blueberry, banana, bran etc. If you ever need a good muffin recipe, I have tried tons and have really good ones!

So I guess now you tag 5 more people. I am tagging Brooke, Jessica, Megan, Meridith and Brooke J.

P.S. Pictures of the new house are coming, I just can't find my camera cord. It's still in a box somewhere.
5)

Did we really go to Hawaii?

2008-01-06T21:17:00.000-08:00

Okay, I know I am horrible at taking pictures (believe it or not, I am actually BETTER now that I blog, it's sad). Here is my proof: out of all these pictures, there are only a couple that even show we were in Hawaii. So if any of you doubt that I was actually in Hawaii for Christmas, at this point, I have no proof. I do however have some great photographers in my family and I will get some of there pictures to prove that we went to Hawaii. Having said that, I think the pictures I took are still cute.

These pictures are of my family learning the hula at the Polynesian Cultural Center. Scott and Stacey were on the stage and were being ridiculously cute. Notice we are all wearing identical shirts except Stacey, who is almost two and managed to get pooh on her shirt literally 5 minutes before we left for the PCC. I mean you expect that from a newborn, but a 2 year old, give me a break! The PCC was so much fun, really, go there if you ever get a chance, the shows are alot of fun and some of them are hilarious!

Christmas morning

For Christmas my aunts and grandparents booked a snorkeling tour for us and (how great is this) babysitters for our kids. Here is all of us looking cute in our life jackets. Notice I am not in the picture. There is no way in my entire life that I will ever post a picture of me in my blog in a swimsuit, especially being pregnant. I am quite happy to take the pictures. The snorkeling tour was so much fun! We got to see sea turtles and fish up close and our tour guide took us to a shark cave. Cool, huh?

The first pic is Pearl Harbor, and the second is the train at the Dole Pineapple Plantation. The rest of the pictures are watching and doing fireworks in our pjs.

The trip was alot of fun. We are so grateful to all of our family which made it such a wonderful Christmas trip!

Blogging from Hawaii

2007-12-26T10:36:00.000-08:00

Yes, we are in Hawaii for Christmas, and yes, I realize I am one of the luckiest people ever to be in Hawaii for Christmas. We are staying in Laie, Oahu and are seriously like one mile from the temple, BYU-Hawaii, and the Polynesian Cultural Center. We are staying one the beach and are having a blast to say the least.

Mostly we have spent most of our time here shopping for Christmas, playing games, and playing on the beach. The water is really warm (not for you Amy, you probably wouldn't swim), and so the kids have loved playing in it, and I even went body boarding. I felt VERY brave. Although I didn't go body boarding yesterday, after seeing Greg (6'4" 290 lbs) get tossed about 8 times under the waves, I figured it wasn't worth risking the life of my unborn child to catch a couple of HUGE waves. I 'll wait for the wussy waves to come back.

I really enjoyed our Christmas eve, we went to the Polynesian Cultural Center. It was so much fun! I had never been there before, but they do a REALLY good job at helping you see how the Polynesian people live. They are so fun and friendly! We learned to Hula dance, even Scott and Stacey learned. I have a really cute picture but I have to get to a scanner!

We also went to church on Sunday to a ward down here, and it really had such a neat feeling there. I just feels like one big family. I could see how people fall in love with it down here and want to stay, although something kindof freaks me out about living on an island (Is that weird?).

While I have been down here I realized that Greg should've been born Hawaiian. Greg loves the feeling of the people here. He seriously would fit in so well here, and here are the reasons why (from what I've observed here):

1. Hawaiian's are laid back and they wear casual, comfy clothes most of the time.
2. They are big on family, family get togethers, and those get togethers having lots of food.
3. Many Hawaiian's are big guys, so you can find lots of huge bball shorts here.
4. They are always joking and laughing, and are very friendly.

I'll post pics later, but I thought I'd update ya'll on our trip so far!

Breakfast with Santa

2007-12-13T12:59:00.000-08:00

The City of Lewisville has a Christmas celebration called Breakfast with Santa. It is this cute festival with booths, rides, petting zoos, ice sculptures, local Christmas performances, etc. It also has Breakfast and Santa, but not at the same place. Santa is over across the street, not anywhere near the breakfast tent, which I thought was kindof deceiving to name their celebration Breakfast with Santa! Santa was only there half the day also, and people would start lining up about an hour before Santa got there, so needless to say, our kids didn't see Santa.

Our kids did get to go in some of the bounce houses, and of course, the pony ride. Some of you might think that this is an easy process, getting your child onto the pony ride. But not for Scott Romney. Because he is probably one of the biggest three year olds anyone has ever seen, he had to get weighed to ride the pony. He had to weigh under 65 pounds, and he luckily weighed in at ONLY 55 pounds (remember he is three)! Here he is proudly riding his horse!

REALLY having a boy!

2007-12-10T13:24:00.000-08:00

Due to the confusion that has occurred from my previous blog, I realized that I had forgotten to post on my blog that I actually am having a baby boy (Due March 5th, which for me means around March 20th). You can tell from the size of my stomach when you see me!

I like the name Daniel Isaiah Romney (so we can call him little Danny Romney, its so CUTE!), but Greg likes Daniel, but not Isaiah for a middle name (he thinks it sounds to biblical). So we'll see what his name ends up being!

I am really excited to be having a boy and have been feeling great for the last couple of months. I am a little overwhelmed at the idea of having 3 kids under the age of four, but I know I will be glad they are close in age when they are older. So that's the scoop . . .

Thanksgiving & Such, Only a Week Late

2007-12-02T06:44:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I am posting our Thanksgiving pictures and it is only Dec. 2. The blogging world should be proud (I'm sure I didn't impress Ryan and Jessica though). We went to California for Thanksgiving and it really was a very nice relaxing trip. Usually on a trip with kids, I usually come home more tired than when I left, but I really relaxed this trip. It was alot of fun. Here are some Thanksgiving pics.

We stayed at Greg's parents for Thanksgiving, but we actually had dinner at the Sherrills' (close family friends, Jessica's dad Mike and his wife Jeanie) house. The dinner was amazing made by Jeanie, Meridith, and Karen (I didn't help at all, I'll tell you why later). And Jessica made 6 wonderful pies (I gained almost 5 pounds over Thanksgiving!). We enjoyed some activities and walks outside due to the nice California weather. One of the things we did outside was ride on Jeanie's go-cart. Scott loved it. It was everything Thanksgiving is supposed to be.

Here's the reason I didn't help with Thanksgiving, because we spent the night before Thanksgiving (Our Anniversary) in San Fransisco. Thanks Karen and Jeff for watching our kids, we had a fun time staying in a hotel that overlooked the Bay, going to Cheesecake factory for a yummy dinner, walking around Pier 39 and going to Ghiridelhi Chocolate Factory for Hot Chocolate. We went with our friends Steve and Kelly (Greg grew up with Steve). It was a great night!!! It's been 6 great years!

The kids has alot of fun with their cousins. Scott loved holding his cousin Pheonix (Pheonix is seriously the happiest baby in the world). Stacey and Paige have a love hate relationship and seem to always want to play with the same toy at the exact same time. Scott has a lot of fun with his cousin Jane, and I liked playing in the Turkey Bowl with Emma and Gabe!

Okay, last thing I promise, this blog is getting long. The other SUPER fun thing we did was go to Scaramento with Karen after all the other families left. We went to this train museum with all these huge trains, it was so much fun! After that we had a nice dinner at a local hole in the wall, Marie Calenders! Thanks everyone for a fun Thanksgiving!

Having a Boy!

2007-11-26T08:38:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone, Thanksgiving photos are coming, we are just still in California, so I will post about it when we go home in case anything really exciting happens in the next two days that I just HAVE to post about.

I thought I'd share my typical "boy" moment. Scott found a caterpillar in the back yard and brought it in, he was letting it crawl on his arm. Here's how the conversation went, "Mom, look I found a caterpillar outside."

Me, "Oh, wow that's neat!"

Scott, "He wants to live inside with us."

Me, "Caterpillars can't live inside they have to live outside."

Scott, "Why? (I'm sure you are surprised by this question, Ryan)"

Me, "Because all their food is outside, they don't have anything to eat inside."

Scott, "No, he needs to live inside with us, because he is a nice caterpillar and I will share my food with him."

It was just a typical, what you think of when you will have a boy moment. You know, like they will always get dirty, like bug and sports and boy things like that. The ending to the story is that the caterpillar did go live back outside.

South Carolina

2007-11-18T06:51:00.000-08:00

About a week ago we went to Myrtle Beach California with my parents and my younger sister Kaylee. We had alot of fun. We went to Sumtner which was where my mom lived when she was in Junior High and High School. It was neat to see where she grew up. I'd never been to that part of the country before.

We flew into North Carolina and went and visited the Duke University campus, it was really pretty with lots of trees and really cool looking older buildings. We visited a beautiful garden in the middle of campus.

Another fun thing we did was go to Ripley's Aquarium(Pics Above). We got to pet sting rays and touch these other weird crustacean things. I don't remember what it was called. But it was a really fun place, the kids loved it. Scott is giving the diver in the tank five in one of the pictures and Stacey is doing excactly what I've told them to do by putting her fingers in her mouth after petting the sting rays.

These pics were taken at Fort Moultrie. It is a fort that is at Charleston, which was a really cool town to see. It had tons of huge houses right on the bay which were huge (one was 24,000 sq. feet, puchased for 200,000 back on the 1700 or 1800's), because they were all owned by rich shipping merchants back in the day. We also ate at a yummy seafood restuarant and some yummy crab. Scott was the one who really wanted to go to the crab restaurant and have crab ( I think he learned to like crab when we went crabbing in Oregon). Needless to say Greg, who is a seafood hater, is not too thrilled for Scott's new found love of seafood, and didn't really enjoy the crab restaurant.

We also spent alot of time swimming at the hotel pools and the beach. I don't have any pics of these (I'd always forget my camera). We had alot of fun!

Halloween!

2007-11-02T06:29:00.000-07:00

Ok, so here's my kids in there costumes! It's early in the morning and I'm feeling sick, so this probably won't have any interesting commentary, feel free to look at the pics and move on.

We went to a trunk or treat on the saturday night before Halloween, and then of course trick-or-treating on Halloween with a bunch of our friends.

Stacey was a fuzzy chick and looked hilariously cute when she ran in her costume, and Scott was a dragon. I am just glad to have kids so Halloween is fun again! Next year maybe I will get more into the spirit and dress up too!

Spooky Spokane

2007-10-24T20:12:00.001-07:00

Okay, okay so Spokane wasn't really that spooky, I'm just trying to get into the Halloween spirit. Here are some things we really on our trip:

Is there a kid on the planet who doesn't like Chuck E. Cheese?

We drove down from Spokane to visit my Uncle Denny and his family. Denny and Rebecca took us to Chuck E. Cheese and Scott thought he was in heaven because Denny got 200 tokens! He just couldn't believe that eveytime he kept coming back to the table we would give him MORE tokens! Greg and my cousins, Tyler and Zac, figured out how to win like 100 tickets at a time from this one machine if they played it right. Scott ended up getting a pretty cool toy (relative to Chuck E. Cheese toys), when I was younger the biggest thing I could buy with my tickets was the parachute guys with a death wish (have you seen what their parachutes do?).

We had alot of fun seeing Denny and his family!

Park Fun

We all went to the duck park one day with half of the Daines and half of the Romneys. We had alot of fun, although the duck pond was somewhat stressful because you had to worry about your kids getting too close to the ledge. I swear I took more pictures of this activity but this was the only one I had!

Game Night

I know Ryan and Jessica had somthing really cute planned for this blog, but I just know I can't live up to their blogging expertise (I couldn't even figure out how to delete a picture, so I tried to make it really small so you wouldn't notice it. I really struggle with this blogging thing sometimes), so I'm just going to give you the highlights of game night.

1. The food - of course! I claimed that I was completely stuffed to the brim at dinner. But it's funny how yummy desserts are put in front of me and my stomach can grow 3 sizes (kindof like the grinch's heart that Christmas day).

2. The game where the punishment for losing is spelling you name in the air with your butt. Needless to say I tried VERY hard not to lose at this game. I'm not a shy person, but one of the LAST things I want is 8 people staring at my butt while I am attempting to shake it. Luckily I did not lose and we quit after Grant lost.

3. Grant writing his name in the air with his butt. He did it in Ryan's face, you had to be there!

4. Pirates' Dice (Otherwise known as liar's dice) - Why is pirates' dice so fun? You'll have to play for yourself to see why! (I like this cool pirates cups and dice with skull and crossbones, it makes me feel like a real pirate)

Thanks guys for the fun night!

We did alot of other fun things in Spokane like going to the Children's musuem and eating lots of yummy food that we didn't have to cook!

To the Daines and Romneys, thanks for letting us come!

We're Baaaack!!!

2007-10-20T19:51:00.000-07:00

Sorry, about the long lapses in blogs, we have been out of town on and off lately. Here are a couple photos of our trip to San Antonio when we went to see Ryan and Jessica (who came to see us after their cruise), and the Sherrills (Matt, Janelle, Caroline & Talmage) who live in San Antonio.

This is the kids in the car. Stacey fell asleep so we took a picture of her (I couldn't figure out how to rotate it)and Scott wanted us to take a picture of him asleep. You can tell he is in a deep sleep . . .

Here are some pictures of the things we did in San Antonio. One of them is at the Alamo, and the other pictures are on a boat. The boat is in a river at a cool place in San Antonio called the River Walk. It's this man-made river with hotels and restaurant all around it. It's fun to let the kids walk around and see the ducks andride the little tour boat. We had lots of fun and no one fell in the water.

We also went to Spokane for a week after that, but Jessica taught me about blogging and she said that she only posts about once a day otherwise people won't read your other blogs, just your top one. So you will just have to sit on the edge of your seats until tomorrow or the next day until I post a blog about our Spokane trip. I know it will be hard, but I will try to make it worth the wait.

P.S. Can you rotate pictures in this blogging program?

Ode to BYU!!!

2007-09-28T19:33:00.001-07:00

This picture was taken last year in Las Vegas at the Mountain West Tournament. I posted this picture to help you understand just how big of a fan of BYU my husband is (even though he only went there for a year and didn't graduate from there!)! The reason I posted this picture right now is that Greg is currently in New Mexico for the BYU game there. Two weeks ago we drove to Tulsa, OK for the BYU game there (which was really, really sad). So even though we don't live in Utah, he has been to 3 BYU games this season.

I'd just like you BYU graduates (especially that live in Utah) to really take a close look at yourselves, and ask "How many BYU games have I attended this year?" If it's less than three, don't you think you should really make some changes in your life, and really focus on supporting your school. You can call Greg if you need any moral support. It's just something to think about.

Also, since Greg was out of town we had TV dinners for dinner. The kids thought they were in heaven, mostly because there were star sprinkles to go on their pudding. They didn't even like the pudding, maybe I should start putting star sprinkles on other things (veggies) . . . Audrey, it's something to think about.

Lazy Me!

2007-09-21T13:31:00.000-07:00

I just recently discoved a new lifestyle change that's really working for me, it's called wear a hat 3 days a week = only have to wash your hair 2 -3 times a week. Seriously though, since I am a mom, I HATE getting ready. By the time I shower, put my makeup on and blow dry my hair, my kids have:
1. Taken every cereal box out of the pantry and taken the inside bag out of the box and spilled cereal in almost every room in the house.
2. Put my makeup, lotions, deordorants, etc. in various rooms in the house.
3. Emptied all the clothes out of at least one drawer of my dresser.
4. Smeared one of my lip glosses into the carpet.

Okay, so this doesn't happen everytime, but my kids do at least one to two of these while I am getting ready! Props go out to you mom's that get ready everyday (and give me some tips)!

One other good thing that has come from the new hair washing/hat policy is that whenever I wear a hat Stacey wants to wear one too! Then I don't have to do her hair either!

P.S. What is a good way to get an 19 month old to sit still so you can do her hair?

Happy Stacey!

2007-09-21T13:19:00.000-07:00

Stacey is a really happy girl. She loves laughing and smiling! I was going through pictures and found that she is the happiest when eating treats! I'm sure none of you out there have kids like this! I just thought these pictures were funny. FYI I don't think that is a booger in Stacey's nose in the above pics. We were at the beach so I think it's sand. Being the responsible mom that I am I'm sure I wouldn't have left her nose unwiped. If you look at a close-up of her and it does look like a booger, I'm pretty sure that my mom and dad were watching her at the time.

Potty Training Fun/Not Fun

2007-09-21T13:06:00.000-07:00

This week we are potty training! I know most of you are thinking "It's about time!" We've spent a lot of time at home this week, but Scott has done pretty well (I don't really have anything to compare it too since he's my first). We went through like 6 pairs of underwear the first day. But everyday since then he has only had one accident per day. Thankfully none of them were out in public. He still hasn't gone #2 on the potty, but most people have said that's normal, at least we're making progress.

After day one, my sister-in-law suggested getting juice boxes and giving him lots of liquids so that he would go more pee at one time. So when Scott woke up on Tuesday morning and first we HAD Capri-Suns in the fridge and two that he was getting one for breakfast, he was to say the least, surprised. So he asked me "Mom, why did you get this juice at the store?"

I said, "So that it would help you go pee."

Scott, "So this juice will go in here (mouth), and come out down here (you know where).

Me, "Yeah, you drink this and your body turns it into pee to come out down there."

Scott, "Oh."

The next day: Scott, "Mom, I can't go pee, I need the pee juice (Capri-Suns) to help me."

Everyday he now asks for pee juice when his pee doesn't come out. We've tried explaining to him that all liquids get turned into pee. But now he is conviced that there is somthing special about Capri-Suns. So don't be surprised if you hear Scott call a Capri-Sun "pee juice."

Zoo Memories

2007-09-13T18:58:00.000-07:00

This year I decided to get a zoo pass. It was only $59 for a family pass for the whole year. So we go about once a month and the kids love it. Plus it is one of the only things to do in Dallas when people come to visit.
One of our favorite exhibits is the peguins because they swim up to glass. I think it is really cool! My sister Kaylee came with is this summer and she liked it too because peguins are her favorite animal (She has a picture of a peguin in her wallet. This isn't a joke, it's a fact to help you understand how much she really LOVES peguins!).
Scott always says that his favorite animals are the elephants and the giraffes. Maybe it's because they are the biggest animals in the zoo. I think that Scott feels a special connection to them because they really understand what it's like to be bigger than everyone you know.

This gorilla seriously sits by this glass all the time. He is there everytime we go. One time he was entertaining some kids by picking his nose and eating it for them. The kids were laughing hysterically. He seems like a really smart gorilla . . .

This is my cousin Katie. She came to stay with us for a couple days. We had so much fun with her. My kids love her!

Scott and Stacey

2007-09-13T18:45:00.000-07:00

Scott and Stacey are like most brothers and sisters, best friends and times and mortal enemies at others. Since we don't usually take pictures of the mortal enemies moments. Here are some of them being best friends. Above they are watching a movie in Scott's room.

This was taken back in July the day that Harry Potter 7 came out. My aunts (of course) sent me (at least I think it was for me, I was the only one reading Harry Potter) a package of Harry Potter goodies to celebrate the occasion. Scott is wearing the Harry Potter glasses and eating the gummy slugs. Needless to say, the picture shows how much of the goodies I got to enjoy!

P.S. Scott does love the Harry Potter movies. I wonder if you can inherit an obsession with Harry Potter?

Pics, pics and more pics

2007-09-13T18:31:00.000-07:00

Some of these are old pics but I thought I would just put lots of random pics on to catch up from the last couple of months. The one above is Scott and Stacey and their cousin Carter at the Oregon coast in June. They are holding the loot from one of the treasure hunts they had. (The theme of the renunion was Pirates of the Carribean. If any of you know my aunts, you know they go all out at reunions, it was a blast!) The one above that is me and my parents on the beach (notice my skull & crossbones bandanna). I'm going to start another post because I can't figure out how to get the pics to go below the text. Don't worry I am going to Spokane and I will have Ryan and Jessica teach me how to blog more efficeintly (i before e except after c?.

Lizard Fun

2007-08-16T19:55:00.000-07:00

Okay, okay all I know our blog is lame so far (although on Ryan abd Jessica's I'm sure it says something about us being cool). But I'm working on it. I haven't posted for awhile because I have pics I wanted to post, but I finally thought, I'll just write this one while I work on the picture thing.

My one really good excuse (I think) for taking so long is that my body is reacting very strangely during this pregnancy. After having stomach pains for about a month, I figured out I my stomach is reacting badly to grains and milk, which I am now refraining from eating. And although I am very greatful to not have stomach pains comparable to labor, I am now suffering on a diet of strictly fruit, salads, eggs and chicken breast. All I want is a bowl of cereal!

Ok so now for the intersting part of my blog. Today when I went to give the kids a bath, my two naked kids standing outside the bath notified me of a small lizard in the bathtub. Which of course was a huge ordeal. We woke up Dad to see if he would take care of the lizard, but it's hard to get Greg to speak when he gets up from a nap, so taking care of a lizard was obviously out of the question. So the brave mom got the lizard to run onto a plate (which I was planning on running outside with to let the lizard go), but the lizard panicked when he was outside of the tub and ran and jumped of the plate into the toilet. So while me and the two naked kids were screaming and the lizard was attempting to climb out of the toilet (he got close) we flushed the toilet. I felt really bad about flushing him down the toilet, but maybe he was a swiming lizard and now has a new home! We'll just believe that for now!

Entering the Blogging World

2007-07-28T12:35:00.000-07:00

Today I decided to start a blog due to the influences of two people. The first is my friend Audrey, who, although I can't blame her, sent me a taunting email about all of the pics and updates I send to her (this was a sarcastic remark). So I started thinking about a blog. And then lately I have been visiting the other Romney's blog (Ryan and Jessica's) and it looks pretty fun. So the compulsive part of me signed up for a blog without even thinking. Now I feel alot of pressure to write alot and take more pics of my family so I can post them online. We'll see how I do . . .

To update everyone on our family, we have two kids and one on the way (in March a long, long ways away). Scott is 3 and Stacey is 18 months old (yeah, Nursery)! We live in Lewisville, Texas and we have for 5 years now. Wow, that sounds like a long time! Greg works in Pest Control and I help him a little bit. We really like living in Texas but we feel very far away from out friends and family! Hopefully this blog will help us keep in touch better. Now I'm off to figure out how to put pictures on here.

P.S. this is the most recent family picture of us I could find (last halloween). I SERIOUSLY don't think you guys understand how BAD I am at taking pics of my family. I now vow to do better from this moment on . . .