Don't you just love Walmart?

I have a love hate relationship with Walmart and it has been going on for years now.  I love their low prices most of time and I love it that we can price match prices there now BUT their poor costumer service really makes me wonder some times if I should just stop going there.  I probably wont because they do carry a lot of items that I like and they are so close to my house I can pick and choose which one to shop at.  I absolutely hate the one in Atasocita (about 7 minutes from the house).  I really try not to go there.  The closest one to me is about 5 minutes away and it is cleaner and some times their cashier are friendlier.  Last night I went to that particular one looking to price match some milk (very cheap at $1.99) and some vegetable afterwards I started to walk around the isles to check for new products and I found what I have been looking for a while now.  I had a steam mop that I bought when we lived in Utah and it worked great until one day it exploded in my face, I did not get hurt but my mop died.  I trust my floors are very clean when I use a steam mop so I was looking everywhere for a cheap one and I found one last night.  It was the Shark Stem Pocket Mop.  They had a display on the store which did not show that particular one and it was in a spot that had the price for $79.99 so I was very excited and double checked for the name on the shelve and the name on the box, there was no other box with that same name and from the bar code I could tell it was that one, it was missing a few numbers but I figure that was the one.  I went to the register and proceded to check out but I told the cashier that I needed two transactions since I had some items that I wanted to price match. I prefer to have one receipt for the big ticket items to make it easier in case I need to return it later on, which happens ALL the time.  Anyways I was about to pay for it when the total was double of what it was supposed to be and I told him the price on the shelve was different and he called a manager who agreed to come with me to go check back on the shelve and display area.  We got there and I pointed out the last box sitting there and the tag was matching the name of the product,   She realized that there was something wrong with the labels and then said I can't give it to you for that price because this is the most expensive one, but I told her that was not my fault and that if they had the label wrong it was their problem not mine, then she said you need to match the price on the labels that are on the display but I told her that it did not make any sense when the item on display was also int he wrong spot (they had the chapest mop on the spot for the most expensive mop), then she said I could take $20.00 off the mop and I told her no way, I was not going to pay over a $100.00 on the mop.  Then she started scaning every single mop and none of them were in the right place, her excuse to me was that they run out of place for their shipments and they have to put them in any space availbable and I told her that was not acceptable to the costumer since it is very confusing and you can barely tell how much those items really are, do we have to carry a scanner ourselves to figure it out?  I am not going to walk back and forth to the price check with a huge box when they should have it all done the right way.  I started to walk away and told her to forget it and I would l just go pay for my food and go home.  She insisted on giving me a discount on the other mop that was actually $79.99 and she offered me the price of the chapest mop instead which I could not refuse since I really wanted my mop.  It is not as nice as the other one but it works just fine.  So I went back to the register and when I got there the guy had already done my transaction including the expensive mop and I lost it.  I told the manager that he could not ring up the transaction without me present specially when I told him I was going to price match, I felt embarrased because all the people were looking at me and there was a huge line behind me.  They moved me to a different register and said that they could fix it there without checking me out all over again.  They did and then when I try to get my food items the guy started to say that I needed to empty the bags again and re do the whole thing.... he was so irritating because he kept contradicting himself the entire time, he was rude and was laghing at me in my face.  I finally told the guy to leave me alone and walk away from me because he was not helping me at all and I did not want to speak to him anymore, since the actual cashier was doing a great job at that point I did not need him around and to just walk away... he would not stop talking and I was getting really annoyed, in the end I just ignored him and talked to the cashier the entire time, he eventually left me alone.  I payed for my thing and walked away and the stupid guy said to me as I was living "Enjoy the rest of your evening".... not thanks to you pal!!

And that was my wonderful trip to the store last night.  I can honestly say that I could just have walked away at the beginning but you know what?  I am not taking people's %$*@ anymore, I am so sorry but nobody is walking all over me anymore. I am polite, I am kind to everyone but if you come to my face and start treating me like I am not your equal then forget it.  I did not yelled at anybody I simply told them what was on my mind.  I guess it doesn't help that I am so sick with a cold and kind of grouchy...

P.S My mop works wonderfully!

Tristan turns 7

It does not seem like it should be happening already, my baby boy is turning 7!!!  I can still remember those fat and cute cheeks from the day he was born.  He came on his own time unlike any other of my babies and has been a sweet little boy from the moment he was born, sure he has his temper and wants to get away with murder these days bu we still adore him just like we did back then.  Looking through some of the old pictures I found some really cute ones that bring back a lot of memories so I will have to share those in here, from the day of his birth up until now.  I just want to write some things about my little boy so he can read them in future and know all about what he is like right now.
Tristan is a very inquisitive little person, he has always been able to carry on a conversation with an adult just like any other adult, he is like a little sponge that soaks up everything he can and remembers it for ever.  His love for books has grown so much and he was a busy little boy all summer long reading his books all on his own.  He is a great reader and needs no help from me any more.  He loves to write stories and it is amazing to see how long they can get, he has so much details in them and his vocabulary is excellent.  I have been told by his teachers at school that he is so smart and by the end of the year they just did not know what to do with him.  He seems strong but many times his feelings get hurt so easily, at the same time he can be one mean little boy without wanting to be, he is simply just a kid.  He has grown up to be a nice little boy, he looks studly in his church suit and has a killer smile, just to die for.  He recently learned to tie his shoes all on his own, took him two years for some reason but he finally go it and could not believe he had not done it before... he said it was so easy... I know.
He still kisses soft things but his blankets remain in his bed most of the time, he still adores me and hope that it wont change for another couple of years, I truly love this boy with all my heart and we are so proud of him and everything he does, he is so Innocent and we wish he could stay like that forever but we know it can't be, he will only keep growing and becoming more mature.  The one thing we love about Tristan the most is how he is the most outgoing kid in our family, I have said this before but really that is the one thing that we wont have to worry about him, he goes out there in the world and acts like a big boy, has lots of friends and for that I admire him. I love you Titi, don't you ever change.



The day after he was born.

 At a church Halloween party, just 1 month old my sweet pea in a pod.


 2 months old, his cheeks keep getting bigger and bigger.


This is what we call a "grandpa face", he was 3 months old during Christmas time.


One of my favorite pictures of Tristan, the "Gerber Face" at 4 months old.


I wish we could go back in time and kiss him in this picture, he looks so cute.  5 months old.


Around this time he started to get a little more hair,  6 months old.

My babies are always small enough to fit into one of those toy strollers, 7 months old.

8 months old, amazing how much he looks like Kahlan in this picture.

 Can you say happy boy? He was starting to get long hair, this is before it got all crazy... it happened over night. 9 months old.


 This was just before the big move to Utah, he was close to 10 months old.
 


 During our move to Utah we stopped in AZ to visit Russell (Tristan's second name) and family, here he is eating a chocolate cookie.  11 months old.

And finally 1 year old, we gave him a nice hair cut because it was getting wild.

I have to include this picture, it is so cute, look at that face.


2 years old.

3 years old.


He survived IKE and was in love with Thomas.

At 6 years old he loved Shamu.


And last year he was really into Cars

And now at 7 years old he is into Angry Birds, he loves that game!!

Happy Birthday Titi!!!

7 years old!!

I am a busy little bee....

Yes I am, busy busy busy all the time and it might not show at the present moment if you come to my house.  I have been going a little crazy working on my Halloween costumes this week.  We finally made the decision with the kids that they were going to be a happy family of Angry Birds... the famous computer game.  I have to admit it, I am a big fan of it.  I did not stop playing for days until I finished all the levels (back when I was pregnant) and my kids sat around watching me perfect my technique until I beat the stupid game.  Now I am working on getting my 3 stars on all the levels and it is not an easy task.  But lets get back to the costumes, yes we are all going to be wearing cute Angry Bird costumes including Kahlan who will be a cute yellow angry bird.  I came up with the patters myself (they are not really that hard) and so far 3 are done and look great.  My kids are so excited but Dan on the other hand is not so thrilled, if he could get away with wearing something in the "knight" department and have his whole family follow suit he would be very happy.  But I am putting my foot down this year and we are doing what the kids want.  It is popular and hey nobody else will have costumes like they will.  The best part is how cheap this is turning out to be, you can't beat $20.00 for all the costumes.
So I spend my free time designing, cutting, ironing and sewing until Kahlan is done napping, we take brakes when we do school time and then get back to the project.  I want to have them all done before Aaron's Halloween birthday party so they all need their costumes done.
Apart from all of these I swear I do the dishes, sweep, vacuum, clean bathrooms, go shopping for food, take care of the little ones, do tons of laundry and cook most days but for the life of me my house does not look like I am taking care of it.... sigh.  Some day I will have it all together I promise.  At least the husband and kids are not starving and they have clean clothes on their backs.

15 de Septiembre

Es la celebracion de los 190 años de Independencia de Guatemala.  Mi pequeño pais festeja hoy un dia muy importante, extrano poder escuchar las bandas tocando en las calles y escuchar los cuetes celebrando la Independencia.  Se que ya no puedo ir y experimentarlo todo como cuando vivia alli, pero lo puedo recordar y auque lejos pues celebro de mi forma aqui en este pais.  Sigue adelante Guatemala...

¡Ojalá que remonte su vuelo,
más que el cóndor y el águila real,
y en sus alas levante hasta el cielo,
Guatemala, tu nombre inmortal!

My mom is coming!

I am so happy that we got good news from my mom on Friday, she says the test came back normal so she is good to go and now she is coming to visit us next week.  The kids are really looking forward to spend time with her and to be able to celebrate our big events, she comes right around Tristan's birthday, then Aaron's then our anniversary, Dan's birthday, my birthday, Halloween, Christmas, Shayna's birthday and then Kahlan's first birthday... can you tell I am excited??? 

Waiting...

I am probably about a couple of hours to hear from my mom about her colonoscopy she had about a month ago. She has this procedures done about every 6 months or so but that last time was about a year ago, the doctor felt confident that she would be OK for a whole year.  For some reason I feel very nervous and can't wait for the time go by really quickly so that I can call her and find out what happened.
She had cancer about 7 years ago and after getting a blessing the cancer went away, she never had chemotherapy treatments or anything at all.  I truly believe it was a miracle.  But for the last 7 years it has been hovering over our lives that she might get it back and get sick and someday she will be gone.  I was talking to Dan today about it and I feel like if she dies... that's it, there is no one else for me.  I know it sounds horrible but that is how I feel.  What I mean by that is that since I lost my dad she was the only person I could fully trust and knew that she would be there for me no matter what, sure my brothers will still be here but one being so far away and we don't have the best relationship and the other one has his own family to worry about.  Phone calls are always the best thing but it is not the same, the relationship with a mother can not be compared to anything else.  She is so important to me, it does not matter that we don't see eye to eye on everything, it does not matter that she might not approve how I do things around here or that I had too many kids, none of that matters in the end because I love her so much, she was my rock for so many years.  I always thought she was wonder woman, she did everything for us, sacrificed herself, her entire life for her three kids and I always wanted to be like her.  She is a strong woman but after getting sick and dealing with her parent's death she became fragile, she hasn't been the same since then and she is a different person now, more vulnerable.
She still tries to look strong, but she is not, she needs us just as much as we need her. She listens to me when I have problems, she tells me what I want to her most of the time, she knows when I need her because she always calls me at the right time.  I love it when she comes mostly because she gets to spend time with my kids and has been able to see them grow and every time she comes back they get along just fine.
So I have been praying this last month for her, praying that the cancer can stay away, praying that the next time we see her wont be the last time, praying that she knows how much we love her and appreciate her in our lives.

Pictures for Grandma

While Dan's mom was here visiting last time she asked us to send her some pictures of the kids for a new picture display of the grand kids that she got specially made.  It was something that I thought we could do right away but then I wanted to send her some nice pictures of the kids taken by me of course since I absolutely HATE over paying for studio pictures.  So a few weeks went by and I knew it was only a matter of time before the subject was going to be brought up again... it did.  So I was faced with getting it done before I wanted to and with not much preparation but my lovely husband agreed to take us out to my most favorite place for pictures around here (The Botanical Gardens in Spring).  Ever since I found that place close to 3 years ago it became the perfect place for pictures, they have lots of pretty flowers, trees, a couple of bridges and more flowers, Dan's favorite thing is to walk all the way down to the Japanese Tea Garden and that is where we usually take our pictures.  It had been so hot for so long that we could not had done it earlier anyways but on Saturday morning it was really nice and we did not melt as much.  So the kids did their best and we took just over 100 pictures so we could have plenty to choose from. Kahlan was the hardest, being the baby we need to wait for her to be in the right mood for pictures, we only had two windows of opportunity to get hers done and that was it.  We had some fake smiles but for the most part they did great.
After taking the pics I sat in front of the computer editing my pictures to make them look the way I wanted and sent them to get printed at Walmart... as much as I hate to admit it, Walmart really is a pain the rear end.  They completely messed up my order by not even printing it, it was supposed to be a quick one hour thing but when I got there they didn't even had people there.  I had to hunt somebody down and then he had no clue where they were until he realized the pictures were not printed.  He finally went to look for the person in charge but she never came out to talk to me and simply said that they were going to close soon and to come back the next day (Sunday).  I went back Monday morning and the very "nice" lady at the counter found my pictures except for my 8x10 collage I had ordered... I was already prepared to fight them for the pics not being ready on Saturday so when she rang me up I told her there was no way I was paying $25.00 for that order, specially since it was missing part of it.  She was rude and not very nice but in the end she realized that it was their fault and she brought it back down to what a three day service is.  But of course in my life things never go the right way and the pictures did not work at all.  So today I sent another order to a different Walmart thinking that it would be fine.  When I got there the pictures were not ready... seriously???  
So I waited for over an hour to get my two prints that I needed, I was joined by 5 other people with the same problem and we all were not very happy at all.  Finally some guy who knew what to do finally showed up and pressed the right button and out came the other half of my order.  Anyways we finally have what we needed and now I can cut them to size and send them to my MIL so she can put them on display.
On a side note the lady from Monday told me that I needed to show her the copy right to my pictures and said she was not going to give them to me because they were taken by a professional photographer.  I was so mad at that time but Dan told me that I should take that as a compliment instead... I guess he is right.
So here are the cute pictures of my kids that we will be sending to grandma and also Dan will have a collage to take to work so he can show off his beautiful kids.

 This was one of the first pictures I took, both my girls smiled great for me.

 Then Kahlan got in a funky mood.  No wait, this is what she usually looks like at home.

 My boys were more into it at first.

 This is the official Victor pic.  He always knows how to smile for me.

 This is the official Kahlan pic.

 This one is here just because even though she is not smiling, still is able to look cute and you can see her big eyes.

 This is Shayna's official picture, she was not in the mood for posing or smiling for me, this is the best we could do.

 The official picture for Tristan... so handsome.

 This is my absolutely most favorite picture of the day and this is the official pic for grandma.

 But just for fun again, here is another tough contender.  He is a handsome white boy.

 And all the kids trying to smile but not very happy.

 My cute girly, she was all smiles in the end but I was not able to find the right setting for my camera, it still turned out cute.

 And when we were done the kids requested to go walking in the bamboo jungle, Aaron cracks me up!

 I named this picture "Sister Love", but seriously there were a serious of pictures that show you what Kahlan was really after, Shayna's headband. 

 More love.

 And on the way back Shayna managed to push Victor down to the ground and get him hurt, so we made them kiss and hug each other a bunch of times, I promised her I would post this picture here.

I like this picture because she was actually smiling for real, the wind came and made her hair all messy but I love her face, she is still my princesita!
Since this is my blog I am allowed to brag here, do I have cute kids or what?

Back to school!!

We are already finishing the second week of school and I forgot all about posting the first day of school pics.  My kids are for sure getting bigger, they were absolutely excited about coming back, nervous but excited and so here they are.


Victor 4th grade.  So far he has been getting homework every day, he still has his best friend at school and comes back home with a wicked attitude.  He has two teachers this year, his home teacher is Miss Lee again, she was really nice and loves Victor, his math teacher I am not so sure about.

Tristan 1st. grade.  He has a fun classroom and he told me yesterday he is the smartest kid in the classroom, could he be a little bit more humble?  The librarian at school wont let him check out chapter books for some dumb reason so we are a little frustrated about it and hopefully we can fix that because the books he has been getting are way too easy for him.  I think the teacher will realize at what level he is already reading soon enough.

Shayna 6th grade

This cute girl has been getting used to a new way of life at her middle school.  It was pretty scary at first but now she is more comfortable and already made new friends.  She likes her teachers and she is trying really hard to stay on the good side with her PE teacher, who knew she would be so concern about that class, but she has told me several times that she has to do great with that teacher because she is the meanest teacher in the school.  She will be playing the french horn in band and we are really looking forward to some concerts :)

PK with Aaron Brown

I have a cute little boy that is LOVING his PK lessons at home.  I can remember being so excited about teaching my first born (cute Shayna) her first letters, numbers, shapes and colors.  She learned everything in Spanish first and then in English.  She was so easy to teach and very eager to learn... now boys are a different story in this household.  They take their time and do not want to sit down for a long time (10 minutes is considered a long time).  Victor was the first one to show no signs of wanting to color the right way, practice writing his letters, etc. etc.  Then Tristan did the same thing and I thought Aaron would be different but no, he is just like the the other two boys.  He is excited about learning but he thinks he makes the rules and he controls the schedule.
I am trying to keep a schedule so we don't just sit there in a not so organized way.  Most days int he summer were like that.  I want  him to be able to follow the schedule and know what comes next just like they do in school.  He had such a great teacher last year and I know I have some big shoes to fill in.
These are his magnetic pom poms, he loves them.

I think I am doing OK finding all kinds of activities, fun learning games, lots of easy exercises and thanks to many friends in the ward I have sites to go to so I can print special packets.  My biggest thing right now is the way he hold his pencil. His teacher told me last year that he was having a hard time, so we worked with him at home until he got it right.  But then summer came along and we got a little lazy.  I usually make them do school time during the summer days so they don't forget what they learned during the school year, but having my new baby made it impossible to sit down with all of them do  that.  Now I am paying for it because he forgot a few things.  He is still doing great with other things like counting, he knows all his shapes and color, the alphabet could be better but we will fix it.
The other thing that is driving me a little crazy is how he wont stop talking, now that everybody is gone during he day I am his only other person to talk to and there is no brake in between sentences.  He has become a chatter box to no end.  By the time Dan gets home I just take a brake because lets face it, we all need a brake every once in a while.


 And here he is holding his crayon the right way.