Merry Christmas!

Halloween Cuties

I just love this picture of my little pirate and clown with their cousin the skeleton :-)
Isn't this the cutest little clownie you've ever seen?!
Seen Peter Pan? We were called a "codfish" all night long by my tough little Adam boy LOL

WOOHOO!! Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay!

I am SO SO SO SO excited! I have been working my butt off in school. I got my Associate degree from Utah Valley when I was 18. Then I couldn't figure out where I wanted to go from there. I was frustrated because everything I was interested in seemed like another Associate degree. I didn't want two degreees, I wanted the Bachelors! But to build on the degree I already had, put me in something I didn't want. I decided on Dental Hygiene when I was pregnant with Allivia. I spent my entire pregnancy just getting as many credits as I could hoping that I could finish sometime after she was born and still be a good mom. Well, this year I started back up, getting some last prerequisite classes done and I applied the UCDH, Utah College of Dental Hygiene. They offer a Bachelor's degree that would build off my Associates and put me graduating 20 months after I start! I have been so excited. Well, a couple days ago, I got my letter! I hope I'm not celebrating too soon but I was invited back to interview at the school! I passed the first of the two part admissions process!! I am really excited and hope I do well on the other part!!

I LOVE Allivia!

My little woman turned 4 yesterday! It seems SO weird to me to have a 4 year old. I still feel like I am the same high school kid that I was 8 years ago...maybe something to do with dating Zac so long, I don't know. When I see Allivia, I am reminded of how much time has gone by. I am SO thankful to be Allivia's mom. She made me a mother and it is the greatest experience of my life. I enjoy being a mom and appreciate my kids every single day. I know they won't be little forever and so I try to just memorize their little faces...but they keep changing on me! Maybe that is why I am so into scrapbooking LOL. Livi is such a fun kid. Very smart, laid-back, easy going, independent girl I know. She is smart beyond her years and says stuff that cracks me up all the time. The other day I said, "Allivia, I'm so glad you're my girl." and she said "well I'm so glad I'm on this earth!" And she really is! She wakes up to meet the day EXCITED to be alive and ready for whatever the day will bring. It is so fun to be her mom. I am really proud of the kind of person she is turning into. She is really into what Heavenly Father wants of her, and I love seeing her learn about spiritual things. She teaches me a lot. I love her so much! Happy Birthday baby girl!

Warning: Naked (a little) Me!

Ok so me and my neighbor Angie have been doing this hardcore work out program called P90X. We have 3 "phases" each lasting 30 days. I just started my 3rd and final phase so the first picture on the left is my "before" picture, next to that is me after 30 days, and the last one is after 60 days. I know my results aren't AMAZING yet, but I hope they will be by day 90! I am proud of myself so far and wanted to share! LOL
It has been fun fun FUN if anyone wants a great work out, I would highly recommend P90X!

Got our Coop Built and Chickies Here!

Ok so we did this like 2 months ago, but I've been such a bad blogger! Zac threw the most AWESOME chicken coop together for us. What a guy! I never realized I was a chicken person, but I LOVE them! We have the nicest birds, they are so sweet. The follow me around and eat out of my hand. When I look out my back door, there is usually one waiting for me on the porch just staring in the house hoping for a treat.
We should start getting eggs in a month or two! Fresh eggs anyone? I definitely don't need a dozen a day!!

Reminder!

Coupon class tomorrow (Tuesday) at 7 at my house for everyone that wants to come! It will be so fun, I will teach you how to save mega bucks! Email me if you have any questions!
zr2aroberts@q.com

First Talk and Baby Chicks

Allivia gave her first primary talk a few weeks ago. It was on eternal families and it was SO sweet. She did a great job!

We got our very own chickies! I always pay extra for the fresh eggs anyway, but now we get to have our very own! The kids are SO excited. The chicks are getting so big, I think they are going to be ready to go outside sometime next week. We'll have to get busy building a coop this weekend!

Canning Strawberries Pages

Wowy. It has been a LONG while since I have last posted. I have decided to put the trying for baby on hold and get my school finished so I have been taking summer classes and been BUSY BUSY BUSY!
I have also been a little bummed since my computer crashed a few weeks ago. I lost all my pictures and EVERYTHING. I was so sad and didn't even want to try to start scrapping again. But, Zac knows me well. He bought me an AWESOME new camera so I am super motivated and I'm getting back in the game! I have recovered what I can, I had some of my pics backed up on CD's, but not as much as I should have. Anyway, I got these pictures courtesy of my fabulous friend Angie who got this amazing deal on strawberries and canned with me. These pages were so fun. I am on a roll tonight, so more to come!

I did it, I jumped on the coupon wagon!

Ok so I went to a free coupon class about a month ago and started getting the Daily Herald. I was just collecting coupons for the past few weeks and last night I attempted my first coupon shopping trip! It was so exciting. I know that sounds funny but it really did give me a little high bargain shopping and saving so much money! Anyway, I wanted to share pictures of my loot!
So this is what I got from Albertson's. My total was 90 bucks, I spent $39.00!! Savings of $51.00!! Wowy. That felt so awesome to leave with all that stuff for so cheap. I never and I mean NEVER get out of Walmart spending under 50.00. Even if I just go in for milk. Sad!





I decided to try Smiths to so I could get a feel for which store I liked better. Both stores had some pretty great deals and my kids were awesome so I was able to try both. Here's my results with Smiths: Total cost was $126.00 I paid: $46.00!!! I had a savings of $70.00, equaling 61%.
I got so many killer deals like deoderant for .44 cents, snacks for FREE (they were on sale for a dollar and I had a bunch of dollar off coupons), and all cereal for .64 cents a box. So I stocked up! This is SO fun and way too easy to not do. This is the only way I am going to do my shopping from now on! Woohoo!

Gardening Weather!!!

Woohoo! We were so excited the weather had been nice for a few days! We planned out our garden one family night which was so fun because we let the kids give their imput and tell us what they wanted to plant. They were so cute and knew exactly what they wanted. So then we went to the nursery and got all of our seeds and we even bought our tomato plants because we have these "water walls" that get really hot inside and makes it so we can start our tomatoes this early. Anyway, the VERY NEXT DAY it snowed like CRAZY! I was still glad we got the walls set up, but hopefully we'll be able to get more done soon! I've got spring fever

Lauren's Birthday Party Pages!

For Lauren's 23rd birthday, I threw a party at my house. We had been wanting to try one of these dinner/murder parties for awhile and so we did an old west themed one called "The Good, the Bad, and the Guilty." It was so fun! We didn't realize until after we bought it the funny play-on-word that each name had:
Zac-P'ELVIS SWAGARIN (the boy born Peter Elvis Swagarin)
Don-CHIEF BREAKING WIND (okay that one was obvious)
Mom-HELENA HANDCART
Lauren-ELVIRA-LYNN FEKSHIN (the hooker. LOL say it fast)
Steve-WYATT HERTZ (the injured sherriff)
Angie-DEE ADELA MUERTE (the widow. We found out her name means "day of the dead" in Spanish
Bridget-BUTCH CHASTITY
Joe-ELIAS TRUIST-HEATH (this one was hard....hint: he's a liar)
It was a huge hit, everyone had a great time.
I served "cowboy caviar" from Alicia's blog for the appetizer (which was DELICIOUS I got a ton of compliments thank you Alicia!!) and we had roasted chicken, potoatoes, salad, and rolls.

Fun Fun Fun! Homeade Toy!

So I saw this idea in a magazine artice and knew my kids would love it! I took body shots of family and neighbors, cut them out in photoshop and placed everyone on a white background, then stuck the paper to a magnet adhesive sheet and cut them out. I also put contact paper over the front to make them a little more durable.
Adam and Livi LOVE them! I am so happy! First thing they did was to start sorting them in ALL different ways. I was surprised because I thought they would like play "house" or something with them. But no, their favorite thing to do is sort them into boys and girls, or families, or adults and kids, things like that. So much fun!

Panty Heads

I think the pictures explain it all....Man I love these goofballs!

First Time at the Dentist....

Today we took Adam to the dentist for the very first time! We have been talking about it for the past few days and both of the kids were SO excited! Allivia has been before and so she was saying "You wanna get your teeth tickled Adam?" and "Adam you get to pick what kind of toothpaste you want! The dentist doesn't pick it, YOU get to pick it! Do you want bubblegum?" It was so cute to see them together, Allivia the "experienced visitor" and Adam the "newbie." I love my kids!

What's New

So...it's been awhile. We have had SO much going on I have been reading everyone's blogs, but haven't felt like posting anything. Anyway, here is something I have been working on. Zac and I have been doing Family Night with the kids and I really wanted a board for them to have different jobs. We went to buy a board and everything I saw I couldn't help but think I could make it cuter! They were all so plain. So I did! I did this like a long, skinny scrapbook page and then decoupaged it onto a board. I am really happy with it. The kids love it and I love that it is customized to our family!

Next news is we are officially selling our house! We've had a sign in our yard for about 2 weeks now. It is so weird. I thought we would be here in Santaquin forever! But, life is pointing us in a different direction. Lots of things contributed to this decision. Zac's school: he will most likely need to go out of state in a couple years and we really want to save for that. Second: we have no way to save lately with Zac's hours being so cut! We can make it (kinda!) but there is no extra! We had a big talk and Zac volunteered to get a different job, but we are really enjoying each other on these cut hours and we want it to stay that way! I love having him home and we really want to move somewhere smaller, cheaper, where we can just be students and save! It's so crazy but it really feels right. So...if you know anyone that wants to buy an awesome house, send them our way!

I am going to miss it here! I love my yard, my flowers, my garden, my bedroom, my kids playroom...I could go on and on. We have lived here for 5 years and put SO much work in here. It will be hard to leave.

VOLLEYBALL WINNERS!

Here is page number 2! For this challenge, "Lucky Me," I am supposed to scrap something that I considered a lucky event for me! Here it is! Yay team!

New Page

Ok this is my first scrapbook page for the "Lucky in Love" contest on my most favorite scrappin' site in the world! (www.digitalscrapbookmemories.com) This challenge I was supposed to scrap someone I love :-) I love you Lauren!

Baby Number 3, Coming Soon I Hope!

OK so on Tuesday I went to the doctor and got my IUD removed!! I am so excited. My first two kids were so fast, and Adam wasn't even planned (He-He) so this will be really fun to have a bigger space and a planned baby. I can't wait! The doctor said that the hormones will be in my system for about 3 months...so I might have to wait a year which is so hard when I feel ready now!
I will keep everyone posted!

DSM!

My favorite scrapbook site is having an awesome contest! Check it out to play with us!

Click HERE to be directed...then click the "forum" on the top right corner

Date with My Girl

New Pages!

My Man (sigh)

Zac is my hero! My car died when we were trying to take the kids swimming for FHE. The activity ended up OK (we got a ride and we still went, heck we were all ready why not?!) but my car was not so lucky. My alternator is dead. Anyway, my non-mechanic husband looked on the internet and figured out how to get my dead alternator out! I was so proud because we called around and this entire job cost $200.00, NOT including the price part, just the labor! Also, this is a 3-hour job for a mechanic, and Zac did it in a little longer I think, but close.
So anyway, he is going to put the new one in today which I am sure he'll do just as awesome! I just love that he can figure out how to do something that he has never done before, and gets it done right! What a guy!
By the way, I hate spending money on fixing cars. What a poopy thing to have to pay for :-(

Sledding!

After many days of having LOTS of snow we FINALLY took our kids sledding! I am so glad we did. I love sledding myself but our kids are usually too cold to fast to even go. But this year was so fun! We found the most perfect baby hill and the kids would even go by themselves. It was so cute. They giggled all the way down and they went over and over. This was an awesome day!

Nursery Stuff!

Ok so I have been working like CRAZY this week on stuff for nursery! One of my church goals this year was to redo my nursery stuff and make nursery better. So I am getting on it!

The ribbon wands are just to play with and also for music time. The kids hold on to the little ring and they whip their ribbons to the beat, like imagine "Follow the Prophet," "whip, whip; whip, whip, whip!" Might be a little advance for them but they will love it all the same (I hope)!

The stars I painted, added little faces, and put them on sticks. My kids in there LOVE "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" and so now I have plenty of stars for them to hold. I also want to tach them "I Am Like a Star" since another part of my goal was to get their music more church related.

The rice shakers are mini M&M containers with rice inside and the lid glued on. This is also for music time so that they can shake to the beat. They will totally think this is the bomb.

And THEN...Zac help me make spiders! They are giant pom-poms with pipe cleaner legs and googly eyes. Zac found these metal "loop" things for me that he poked inside and wrapped around the pom-pom so that the little "eye" part is sticking out. So OK that was confusing. It just looks like the spider has a metal loop sticking out of it's back. Then, we threaded the "loop" and made a little leash so they can walk the spiders, dangle them, whatever they want to do. I am sure we will sing "Itsy-Bitsy Spider" a few times with these!

And I made a "check-in" apple tree. This is a big (20x30) poster and I took pictures of the kids that were at church last week and put their face on apples. When they get to nursery, they will check in by finding their apple and sticking it on the tree.

This will be so awesome. I am going to try it out tomorrow. I made a poster of all of them last year and they LOVE to see themselves so I think that this will be an even bigger hit.

What do you guys think? Are your kids going to LOVE me or what??!! I SO love them :-)