Once again I am playing catch up with my blogging. The weather here in Texas is crazy. It can be 35 degrees one day and the next 70 (I'm not exaggerating!). Well two weeks ago we had an ice day. That's right people an ice day, no school and all. Hey I'm not complaining I loved having the day off but in most places in the country a little ice would not shut down an entire metroplex. Anyways, it was fun while it lasted that morning because by noon most of it had melted. Here are some pictures of us tubing down the street and down drive ways. We had a blast.

Kevin pulling Jacob down the street.

Jacob and me.

Kevin trying to use a wheel-less skateboard, I'm thankful that did not end in a trip to the ER.


Actual proof that it was cold enough for icicles on our house.

I was called a couple of weeks ago by the stake and asked to go to girls camp, yay!!! I'm so excited. I am the leader over the YCL's (youth camp leaders) basically the 5th and 6th year girls. We are going to a new camp this year and the bathrooms are inside our cabins, wahooooo! No more walking across a dark field to a toilet. Many of you may know that I have a problem with going to the bathroom. The problem basically consists of not being able to go without a toilet to sit on. I literally cannot go outside so I am thankful that the cabins are equipped with a bathroom and air conditioning. I know it doesn't sound much like camp but we are making our own food this year where in the past we just went to the mess hall and it was ready. So spoiled I know!

I feel sometimes life is just too busy. I guess I should be thankful for all that I am involved in but at times it feels overwhelming. I really need to be better with time management and doing a little each day. I think sometimes how am I going to do it all but my Heavenly Father continues to bless me and my family and some how all turns out well. I've been subbing in a different class every day which I love because I get to teach but I'm kind of wanting to go back to OCS for a few days to get a break, next week I think I will be back in OCS that is if nobody asks me to sub for them. I feel blessed to work at such a wonderful school with such amazing people. I love that Jacob and I go to school together and come home together. I go almost everyday and visit him while he is eating lunch and I often see him in the hallways, right now he thinks it's great to have me there that won't last forever. A few weeks ago he told me that he was embarrassed when I gave him a hug and a kiss in front of his class in the morning so now we do that outside before we go in the building. He still wants loves from his mom just not in front of everyone, my baby is growing up.

Pay It Forward

I'm participating in a Pay It Forward Exchange. Who wants to play? I will send a handmade gift to the first three people who leave a comment on my blog requesting to join this Pay It Forward Exchange. You will receive your gift within a month from leaving your comment. The only thing you have to do in return is pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog. I signed up for this fun exchange on my friend Tara's blog. (She was one of my closest friends in Las Vegas, love her!) She made me the cutest apron. I can't guarantee my gift will be anything amazing, but who cares if it is FREE! Remember, you have to have a blog to participate and must Pay it Forward on your site as well. Who's ready to play?

Things on my mind...

OK I am going to take a second to ramble on about some things I have been thinking about the last few days. First of all last night my mom, Jacob, and I went to the movies to see Mall Cop (stupid but funny) as I am walking up to hand the guy my ticket I realize the people in front of me, a family with two young children, a girl probably around 5 or 6 and a boy I would guess to be 8 or 9, were walking (as a family) into see Notorious! What the crap are they thinking taking their children to see this movie. Seriously that should be considered child abuse! And people wonder why their kids end up the way they do. Who takes your kid to see a rated R movie about a rapper who was shot dead because of the life that he led...anyway, it took everything in me to just walk right by and not say anything. Now I am going to ramble about our new president! Seriously the thought of Obama makes me want to vomit in my mouth! As most of you know I am not fond of him in any way. Figuring that he is our president I told myself I better get used to the fact that he is going to be around for a while. So I watched the inauguration and tried to find the positive in him. He seems to be a nice guy, has a great family, and can public speak really well. Well that is where my fondness of him stops. Already in his first week in office he is planning on signing the Freedom of Choice Act. This act will allow all forms of abortion, including late term abortions. This literally makes me ill. How is it ok to allow women to have an abortion when the child they are aborting could survive if given proper medical care. This is called murder people! How about we teach more about not getting yourself pregnant in the first place. I could go on and on about this one but I should stop I can feel myself getting really angry. So with that said as Bill O'Reilly would say people need to stop "drinking the koolaid," and realize what kind of person they have elected to be our president. He is a creep and he makes me sick!!! This is the land of the free so I can say that right?

Jacob Opening His Wii

OK I finally got this video to load. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do, probably not but here it is anyway:

Here are a couple of pictures of Breanna's grave last Saturday. Jacob picked out the flowers in the vase. He has designated himself as the ONLY one who can pick out the flowers that go in the vase. The pink roses laying down are from the Koenigs and the yellow ones are from Wendy, Dave, and family. My Dad, Cheryl, and Derrick sent the pink standing roses, they were absolutely beautiful. The bees were loving the roses. Most of the flowers around the baby land area are fake so having some real ones attracted a lot of bees. Jacob was not too fond of them. It was a very cold and windy day, but not as cold as it was that day 2 years ago. We had unusally low temperatures that year with a lot of freezing rain and snow. I'm thankful that we were able to go and spend time with eachother and with family.

This Saturday will be 2 years since our sweet little girl Breanna died. I can't believe it has already been that long. There is not a day that goes by that I don't think about her. I think about what age she would be and what she would look like. My heart still aches for her and I wish every day that I had our baby girl here with us. I still do not understand completely why she was not able to live here on this earth but one day I will. One of the hardest parts of everything that has happened is wanting so desperately for Jacob to have a sibling to play with and to watch them interact. While Serene and Brandon were here visiting Jacob loved playing with their 15 month old Sydney. He was so good with her and loved to make her laugh. I pray that someday we will be able to have more children. It is still hard for me when almost everyone around me is able to get pregnant and have children whenever they feel like it. I have to tell myself that Heavenly Father has a plan for our family and although I don't know what that plan is I must do my part to stay faithful and follow His way. I am thankful that this year in primary the theme is "My Eternal Family," how thankful I am that we are an eternal family. Although Breanna is not here with us now we will all be together again someday and that brings me peace and joy.

Mavs and Mario

Tuesday night Brandon, Serene, Kevin and I went to a Mavs game. We had a lot of fun, thanks BJ for the tickets!

Kevin, Me, Serene, and Brandon

The Mavs beat the Clippers!

I got an email today from Birthday Express advertising Super Mario Bros. birthday decorations....whatever!!! Jacob had a Mario birthday last year and at that time there was NO decoration of any kind made by any company. I had to make all of my own stuff and be really creative instead of just buying it from someone...o'well. Just a little frustrating.

Maybe we will have another Mario birthday this year.

How can it be 2009 already? December was definitely a busy month but it was filled with so much fun! Jacob had a Christmas program at school and we loved watching him sing with all the 2nd graders. We made smores in the fire place and we also made a gingerbread house.

Eating yummy, messy smores.

Our beautiful gingerbread house creation.

This is Jacob during his performance all of the pictures turned out really dark he's in the front row in the middle.

We had Christmas Eve with my family at our house.

Nice smiles BJ (my brother) and Brandon(my brother in law).

My nieces Abbie with Melissa (BJ's wife) and Sydney opening gifts.

Jacob with the remote control cars he got from Grandma and Grandpa Quinn. Jacob with Grandma, she is opening the ring Jacob got her at the school Christmas store.

Christmas Morning

Santa brought Jacob a race track where the cars are Mario and Wario, he was so excited. Jacob with dad, Kevin is holding the eagle bank Jacob bought him at the school store. I've decided that the school Christmas store is a complete rip off. Basically kids pick out things that they could have gotten at the dollar store and pay way too much for them. Of course I give Jacob money every year to shop there because he loves picking out the gifts all on his own. I got a giant "diamond" that says mom on it, Jacob was so excited to give us the gifts that he picked out for us he was sure that we would love them and we did.

Me with my new slippers in all my no make up glory. Our living room after opening all the gifts. Jacob was shocked to say the least when he opened his Wii. We had pretty much convinced him that there would be no Wii. Grandma and Grandpa Frainee bought us Rock Band and Grandma Peterson and Jarrett bought Mario Kart. Needless to say there has been many hours spent in the last week playing the Wii. We have so much fun as a family playing it. Kevin and I were so excited for him to open it, when he did we both got a little teary eyed. It is so much fun watching his reaction. One of the best parts of Chrismtas was watching him open all of his gifts.

(There is supposed to be a video of Jacob here opening his Wii but it will not load! Maybe later.)


Many of you know that every year Grandpa Quinn hides somewhere in the house and the kids can't open the gifts until they find him. If he isn't found by 9 am he wins. I think he has only won one time. This year Olya and Toli found him at 8:15 am. He was in the roof! Crazy man! This picture is of Brandon, Grandpa, Toli, and BJ after they pulled Grandpa out of the space he was in. Once again the kids won!!!

New Years

Jacob and Daisy. Serene, Jacob, and Brandon playing Rock Band on New Year's Eve.

I guess that is it for now, another long post from me. I am going to try to update more often so that when I do my posts won't be so long. We'll see if that happens or not.
Happy New Year!!!

I think it has been a couple of weeks since the last time I posted so here goes...
We had a great Thanksgiving. Kevin's brother Ken and his family came down from Tennessee. Jacob was so excited to see his cousins! We met them Tuesday for dinner at Kevin's store and then we drove out to McKinney to visit with everyone on Wednesday and Thursday. Wednesday was a lot of fun we went to the park and fed the ducks and then played kickball on the softball field. It was a lot of fun and Jacob enjoyed getting dirty.

Jacob, Kelcie, Kendyl, Kaitlyn, Addyson, Kensey, and Ethan

Ken being gross after a bird pooped on him. Feeding the birds and the ducks.

Thursday morning we went to the Turkey Bowl and I am happy to report no broken ribs for Kevin this year. He played QB most of the time so he didn't have as great of a chance of getting hurt. I was the ONLY wife who showed up, what's up with that? I love playing football and I had so much fun.

After that we went to Kevin's work for a couple of hours. Some of his employees met there and had a Mexican style Thanksgiving dinner, it was really good. After that we went to Kevin's moms and hung out their and ate and ate and ate. We played bingo and just hung out, the kids had so much fun playing together.

Friday and Saturday we decorated the house for Christmas. I was telling my neighbor that I would like to buy a fake Christmas tree (which I never thought I would say) and she asked me what kind I wanted. I told her like a 6 or 7 ft noble fir. She said that her brother had given her a tree and that they already had one so she gave it to us!!! I was so excited. It was a 7 1/2 ft tall noble fir, it had pine cones on it that I was not too fond of so I clipped them all off and now we have a beautiful FREE Christmas tree. I was so thankful to her!

This week is the big nativity display that our Stake does. For the last 3 years I have done the bulletins boards. I was up at the church for about 10 hours on Wednesday and was completely exhausted when I got home but I finished and here they are:

Last night a whole bunch of us met up there to walk through together. We had the cutest picture of all of our kiddos taken.

Beckam, Brinley, Jacob, Jordyn, Cara, Ashlyn, Camden, Kade, Mason, and Landon
I love this picture!!!
After that Brittany, Courtney, Hilary, Britt's mom, and I all went out for dessert at Red Robin, it was way yummy. We had so much fun like always and I think even a little extra fun because Britt's mom is so funny she makes me almost pee my pants. When we were dropping off Courtney I drove by a house that had this in the yard:

Along with all the other Christmas decorations at this house was a large cut out of the lamp from the movie "A Christmas Story," we love that movie.

Well I guess that is enough writing and picture posting for now. I will end with a video I took this morning that is so funny. Jacob thinks it is so funny to throw water on his daddy and Kevin hates cold water especially in the shower. So while Kevin was in the shower this morning Jacob and I got a big glass of cold water from the fridge and this is what we did (ignore the gigantic pile of clean laundry on the floor):