First Day of School

Dawson and Emmalee started school on August 3rd. They were both pretty ecited. So far they seem to have really great Teachers. I am happy that the way Dawson's teacher runs her class seems to work well with Dawson.

Last year he was constantly losing homework, not finishing and getting distracted and unfocused all the time. He had seemed that way in years past, but I attributed it to age. Well now at 8 I knew it was more. His Dr diagnosed him with ADD. It isn't the bouncing off the walls hyper ADHD. He just has trouble focusing. Unfortunantley he got it from his Madre (Sorry Dawson).

His Dr. suggested medication. I was mixed on what to do. On one hand I knew exactly what he was going through, and meds could help. Yet I feel weird giving my 8 year old medication. It just makes me a little nervous.

Mike and I decided to modify some things and see how he does that way first. It has not been easy or gone exactly like we would want it to, but for now no meds. This teacher is very organized, and expects a lot but doesn't seem to overwhelm the kids. I am very happy so far.

Emmalee LOVES her teacher. She talks about her all the time. It is really cute. I don't know what it is about Emm, but she always seems to bond well with her tecahers. She was teacher's pet in kindy. Her tecaher alaways tol me that if she could have 30 Emmalee's in her class she would be the happiest teacher ever. I wish she would bring more of that cooperative attitude home :) She does at times.

Emmalee lost her top 2 teeth the first 2 days of school. She looks and sounds so dang cute with those missing teeth. Her teeth are so strange they NEVER go through that transitional "jiggly" stage. She just wakes up with a tooth barely hanging on for dear life. She was afraid to pull them. Mike always tricks her that he is going to just look and he wiggles them out. It doesn't even hurt her.

Here is my toothless wonder, lol


I wanted to do comparison pictures from pre-k till now of the first day of school to see how they have changed:

Emmalee pre k, Kindy, 1st grade:


Dawson Pre-K, Kindy, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade:

Pictures of our House.

So we are renting for now, but we plan on being here for another year or so.

These pictures are from when we first moved in. I am almost finished decorating and will post updated pics soon. We had just moved in so I didn't get all the rooms and there is a bit of clutter :).

Here is the front of the house!


Front room/Entrance


I LOVE this little Niche:


The Kitchen, undecorated and in full use:






The stairs that I fell in love with!










View from upstairs

Loft/aka Playroom

Kids bathroom


I will post more tomorrow!

I bet you're shocked that...

after almost one year I am actually posting!!! We are alive and well. Alot has happened and I have a TON of posts to catch up one. I will try and sum up some of it before then.

Last December Mike sent me a text while he was at work. It said: "What are your thoughts on moving to Tucson?". I thought "hmmmm...okay...". So I called him. He told me that he was offered the job as the head engineer at the Tucson office.

Now from that point in my life, my thoughts on Tucson involved downtown Tucson, a car wreck(no I was NOT driving, lol) and going out in the middle of now where to sight see when I was a kid. So yeah I had NEVER thought of moving there.

Still I knew that an opportunity had presented itself and I began thinking and praying about it. Shockingly the answer came very quickly for both of us. YES, we were moving to..GULP..Tucson.

We were given till mid March or Early April to move. I spent a lot of Jan and Feb house hunting, organizing, packing and helping Mike with some home improvements that our Mesa house needed. Oh and STRESSING.

I knew without a doubt that Heavenly Father wanted us accept this move. Still there were things weighing heavily on me: gettingthe house ready to rent, finding a renter, finding a house in Tucson, leaving family and friends in Mesa and uprooting my kiddos. I know in reality it isn't the most traumatic move..we are stil 2 hours from Mesa, but still it is scary when you only know a handful of people there.

In Feb Mike and I headed out on one of our many, house hunting trips. We started in East Tucson and Vail. East Tucson still had somewhat of a Tucson feel to me and I didn't like that. Some of the homes we foiund there were reasonably priced, but close to a Prison or the Ait Force bas or to not so nice areas. We looked in that are twice with no luck. I kept questsioning why we were supposed to move there.

Then the third time we went to a little town that we ha no idea how to even say. We drove into Rancho Sahuarita and I fell in love instantly. It felt like home. It is a nice little family community. It has a handful or parks, 3 pools and a water park. It has walking trails EVERYWHERE and it is 15 minutes from Tucson and seperated by miles of reservation, so no chance of becoming CITY.

From that point on thing began to roll into place. We found a house, we found renters, we finished our marathon of home improvments. It was NOT an easy time, I am glad it is over, but it was ALL worth it.

We love it here. The Ward was welcoming from the moment we walked in. I love the ward. The schools are very small and friendly. We have had so much fun and made some wonderful friends.

This last year has shown me how the Lord has a plan and we have to trust him..even when it is hard. He made a way for us and I am so thankful for it.

I am hoping that over the next month I can get caught up on the last year :)

My Brave Little Man

So I can no longer be in the "None of my kid's has broken a bone club". Mike and Peyton love to wrestle. Peyton is by far our toughest kid and he has a blast. On Wednsday, Mike and Peyton were wrestling on our bed. Mike likes to lift him up and pretend to throw him on the bed. Well Peyton put his arm down the wrong way and at the wrong time and his arm broke.

Mike said "I just broke his arm!". I was in shock. We hurried and got things packed to take him to the ER. Mike had to find a replacement for mutual and I called and found someone to watch Dawson and Emmalee (THANK YOU LAURRI!!).

We went to Banner Desert. I have been there twice for children's ER visits. I have also been to a few other hospitals ER's for the kids. I LOVE Banner Desert. They have a whole ER wing just for kids. Peyton was taken back within 10 minutes.

They did X-Rays (which I will scan and add here soon). and both bones were broken a bit below the elbow. So a very old Orthopedic Dr. came to set and cast him up. His hands were shaking as he was cutting the bandage that goes under the cast. Mike and I looked at eachother a bit concerned. The Nurses gave him some light anestecia and he was knocked out, with his eyes open and he was SNORING. It was freaky looking.

The Dr set his bones back in place perfectly (even with shaky hands). He added the cast. Then Mike, the nurse and I just waited for him to wake up. He started responding a few minutes later when he heard my voice. About ten minutes later he started blowing me kisses. It melted my heart that after all that he had just went through, he would think to blow Mommy kisses. We waited a bit longer for him to recover and finally left for hm after midnight.

I was so amazed at how strong he was. He whimpered at first and I think it was more because Mike and I were freaking out. He was smiley and silly while we waited in the private ER room. He watched Spongebob (thank goodness for him!) and giggled with us. The Nurses and Dr's were amazed and called him a 'model patient". They told us that most kids w/ broken bones are hysterical and uncooperative. Not my lil' man.

Since he has been home he tells me it doesn't hurt. Infact the only time he complains about it hurting is while I am undressing/dressing him or moving him. He hasn't let him stopped him from playing or laughing or anything.

I just pray it heals quick and NEVER happens again.


Here he is settling into his room. Look at how calm he is:




Right after getting his Morphine:



Chillin' and watching Spongebob:


Waking up from the bone setting/casting:



Popsicle time:

My obsession (okay one of them).

Hi my name is Patti and I am addicted to coupon shopping. I had a dry spell (lazy spell) for a while, but I am back to doing hard core coupon clipping. This last week I have spent about $400 and pratically restocked my whole pantry. It is nice to know that for the next month or two I will only need to restock on cheap stuff and buy perishables. I need to save money with Christmas coming and my Van being on it's last leg.

























Mike and I have really been striving to listen to the prophet and get out of debt and try to save money. I will be honest, it is so hard. I love money, I love to spend money and I love "stuff". Usually it is stuff for the house or Mike or the kids (sometimes for myself). It is very hard for me not to spend money. I have been trying harder lately. Praying helps a lot. Setting goals helps alot too.

Mike on the other hand can keep a $20 bill in his pocket for weeks or months. I usually have to talk him into spending money. It is funny how different we are. I am thankful that we can help balance eachother out. The key is that we are trying very hard to do the finances together. For a long time it was just me and let me tell you having me do the budget is like sending a bull in the china shop. I am no good at organizing and figuring things out. So now we are making it a team effort. It has been good for us.

Anyways I have been rambling. I just wonder what are your strategies for saving money, or not spending it??

A birthday and a Baptism!

August was so busy with school, Dawson's birthday and his Baptism. I can't believe that my 6 lb, 5 oz baby boy is 8 years old! It seems like just yesterday he was snuggling in my arms, now he is well over 4 feet tall. How did that happen?

I can't even describe what an incredibly spiritual experience it is to see your child get baptized. It really touches you and makes you realize how significant and important that step is in our lives. There are no words at all that can express what I felt. I did cry, alot, lol.

Here is Dawson with Mike:

Here is our happy family:










The Gospel is True!


Here are some pics from his immeadiate family, friends and family birthday party (yes he had 3 this year!). We did cupcakes and presents on his birthday. For his friend party we made pizza, had cupcakes and they played Mario Kart. Let me tell you it gets pretty crazy with a bunch of 7 and 8 year old boys under one roof. we survived and it was a lot of fun. Then we had a birthday/baptism celebration right after his baptism for our families, followed by Texas Roadhouse with Mike's parent's. It was a fun two weeks of Dawson celebrations!