Kahlan's Birthday!!

I can't believe my baby is two... I know I know I always say that but really, where did time go?  She of course had no clue it was her birthday just super excited to see so many presents just for her.  I made her a cake and we got her all Minnie Mouse presents since she in love with anything Minnie and she loved it.

Of course we didn't have a big party, it was just us and it was really special but a little rushed. Victor had a Scout thing going on Saturday afternoon (her birthday was Sunday but we celebrated on Saturday) and Tristan had a birthday party so  we decided last minute to celebrate before everyone left and had lunch with her, then opened presents and then had cake.  I wrote something on FB about Kahlan that describes what she is into right now and I am going to re post it here so I can remember later on...

Happy Birthday to my sweet loving baby girl who is no longer a baby but a happy toddler full of energy and smiles. At two years old she is a pro at running and barely falling down while doing so, she can go up and down the stairs all by herself taking one step at a time, eats all by herself and loves to sit at the big table not the highchair (she has officially claimed my seat next to dad), loves to "lolor" on books, walls, clothes and pretty much anything else. She is so proud of herself for finally being able to say "daddy" so clearly and she loves him, she can jump for real and had been trying to master it for a couple of months now, she is a busy little big, big talker and a great sleeper. She gets into everything literally.... she is a Mickey and Minnie mouse lover, great dancer and knows how to move her hips :) We feel so blessed for having her around and can't imagine what things she will come up with tomorrow :)

I just love being her mom and am really grateful to be able to teach her and love her here on earth.  I should add that she is currently enjoying pencils and crayons... basically whatever leaves a mark on her skin or any surfaces she will find and use, I have so many marks on the wall, furniture, my watch, clothes, the carpet did I mention the walls?  Yes she loves doing that I am trying to be super patient and also grateful for the magic eraser :)  One day I am sure I will look at my sparkly clean walls and wish she could still come and draw on them so for now I am just enjoying her as much as I can!!
Happy birthday my sweet angel!!!

 The boys helped me decorate with balloons and I made the table look like a big bow...

 Her hand painted cake which turned out better than expected, I ma not giving up on this technique yet.

She loves having her picture taken and says cheese every time she sees me with the camera.

 She looked so happy with her stuff.

 Yaya got her a purse of her own.

 She got a place mat and a matching cup (which she already broke)

 Kahlan and the cake, she surprised us at how well she blew out the candles all on her own.

 She loved her cake too.

 My pretty little girl and the last pic is of the cake and what happens when you leave it unattended for a while...

Shayna's Birthday!!

Houston we have a teenager... so she is finally 13 and it feels weird, for some reason it feels like this birthday is marking down the begining of a new era.  Shayna is our first baby so everything with her is a first and I am sure that by the time we got the last one we will be used to it.
We wanted Shayna to have a really cool birthday and so we let her choose whatever she wanted to do that day.  She wanted to skating with her best friend so Dan and I took the two of them and they had tons of fun going around and around the skating rink.  They skated until they could no more.  Funny how Shayna is so good at everything that she tries and Dan asked me that day how in the world did Shayna learn how to skate, he didn't teach her, I didn't teach her, we just bought the skates and she put them on, three days later she was skating all over the neighborhood and this is when she was 6 years old.  She is just awesome.
After going skating we told her she could pick whatever restaurant she wanted to go to, we advised her to make a good choice since she could go anywhere, you know what she picked?  Wendy's... later on she was kicking herself because she realized she could have gone to Denny's or somewhere else... oh well, but she did enjoyed her meal, she was with her friend.
We dropped her friend at  her house and then we went back home to pick up my mom so just us girls could go shopping together, since boys get bored shopping.
We went to a show store when they have awesome deals and I offer to buy her a pair of shoes and with her money she got a pair of purple boots.  Then we went to a clothing store but we couldn't find anything she liked so we went to the mall and got lots of jewelry from her favorite store there, then to Forever 21 where she found a blue sweatshirt with the Superman logo.  We were so tired by the en of the day but we had a lot of fun.  I made her a sorry looking cake, I am trying to teach myself a new technique and it didn't quite work out but she was happy with it.
I know we only have our kids for a little while and it makes me sad that Shayna has probably about 8 or 9 years left with us and that is wishful thinking, we are trying our best at being parents and hope that we haven't messed her up too much, she is a great person, kind and loving to others.  I see her at church and she makes me proud of how much she is learning and what a strong testimony she is gaining on her own.  I lover her so much and will treasure every single moment I get to spend with her.
On a side note, she has become a very good babysitter with friends and a couple in our neighborhood.  She has been making lots of money and is constantly asked to babysit Friday nights and Saturdays... so much that she has to pick and choose at times.  I am glad she is finding joy in what she does.

 They planned on wearing their TS shirts.

 Our little princess, maybe not so little anymore.

 Her shopping bags!!!

 All around the cake I put the things that she likes, her bear Unga, magazines, books and the latest THE TABLET.

 WE LOVE YOU BOO!!!!

Happy New Year!!

Wow so time goes by when you are busy with life right?  I am not going to post everything that we did at the end of the year on one sitting so the posts will come as I get the inspiration to write them...
Today the inspiration is as follows:

A new year and a new begging, for years I have set up my goals at the begging of the year, wow how original but then I realized that I was setting myself for failure because no matter how hard I tried or how many goals I decided I was gonna work on in the end the last day of the year came and my list looked pretty sad :(
It used to bring me down and not look forward to the new year.  So I changed my way of thinking and this is all personal stuff by the way, I am not telling anyone what to do or how to go about it.... this is what works for me.
I don't set my goals at the begging of the year instead, I start whenever I feel like I am falling behind on something and they are more like a 4 month long thing, that way if my progress is not that great I can change things around or start all over again but there is not really a set day to finish them. It has worked so far.  Now I have been doing this for personal goals, behaviors or things that I want to teach myself or things that you can't really see unless you are me,  I am going to start applying that to my physical goals, more like things that need more action and things that my family can see around here.  I am starting next week, not today or tomorrow but next week and why you ask?  Because next week my mom is leaving us and going to Utah to spend some time with my brother and my family. So why am I waiting for her to leave?  Because there is something about my mother that I can't explain but whenever she is around I feel like I am being judge in every single aspect of my life, I know she is not doing it all the time and I am not saying that I don't like hanging out with her but I feel like I am a completely different person around her and that what ever I do will never be enough for her and then I feel like it transfers into my kids, that what ever they do will never be good enough for her either.  I am sure that's is not what is going on but that is how I feel when she is around so I don't work out as much, my efforts to eat healthy are not as great, keeping my house clean is not a big deal because it will never look as clean as she would love it to be, which is funny because she is always so willing to help but I don't let her and I know it would make a big difference but I have to prove that I CAN DO IT ON MY OWN!!!
It is funny how some things don't change from when we are kids and how some of the old feeling come back to you even when you are a grown person, I can't help feeling this way and I hope that next time she comes to visit I will conquer my demons and she will see that I can do it all on my own.

I have been struggling with my weight issues for years and it has been a big battle for me... health issues kept me from trying my hardest to stay strong and keep going, sometimes I have the support I seek and sometimes I don't... it happens.  Last year was great after my surgery because I had the strong will to get back into shape and I did it, I did really good and started to see some change in me.  I think my health issues were a big thing that were keeping me from getting to my goal, now I am so close and at the same time I am so scared to get there but I am still trying.  I was able to get back to the weight I was before the surgery and keep that weight off, I haven't been as active in the last 4 months but like I said previously it will change next week.  I am on the right track and can see that eating right in the last 4-6 years has been helping a lot.  I think also my body is crazy and my metabolism keep changing on me, around Christmas time I thought I was going to gain all the weight back but I ate a lot of stuff and the weight still came off... I guess making the right choices does help...

The one big thing we will be doing for our kids years and the main reason why my mom has to leave... is that we are making big changes in their sleeping arrangements.  It has always been my dream that when Shayna got a little sister they would share a room together and that time has finally come and she is willing to share her space with Kahlan.  I have so many ideas and can't wait to get that ball rolling.  The girls will change into the boys room and the youngest two boys will go into Shayna's room, the space will be perfect for those two crazy active boys and I will be making murals for them with the super hero theme.  I have the room all planned in my head.  Shayna is designing her own mural with some help from pinterest and she really needs to compromise on the color scheme since Kahlan will own two of the walls in that room. Now Victor will be the lucky person this time around and will have a room all to himself.  "The guest room" will finally be used as a real room and not only for guests, it wont be used only 4 months out of the year but will be all for him.  He is so excited also coming up with his own idea for the mural that I will make for him, he is thinking about shelves on the wall and displaying all his Lego creations up there, all his Scout stuff and of course to finally keep his thing out of reach of the younger ones.  Poor guys he has been sharing the space with 2 kids who have to idea what keeping a clean room means and have not respect for his property.  He has a good collection of books to keep his own bookshelf and all in all he is way excited about it.  If for any reason we do have a visitor he will sacrifice the space of course and let the guest stay there but for the most part ti will be his kingdom :)
We will get them all new furniture and we will spend some money on paint and other things, it will be the biggest project we will have so far in this house but I am looking forward to it and can't wait to see the end result.

So far that's it....