Day 35

Day 35 - A picture of your favorite place to eat.

Honestly? Any place as long as I don't have to cook or clean up!

However there is one place that immediately came to mind, and that is...

I love me some Wendy's. Especially these two items:

Yup, I'm a dip-my-fries-in-the-frosty kind of gal. YUM!

And as you can see I am clearly NOT a high maintenance girl. I could've chosen any number of restaurants, REAL restaurants where you actually sit down and have a server. But no, the first place I thought of was a fast food joint and my two favorite items come off the dollar menu. Yup, I'm classy.

Day 34

Day 34 - A picture of your currently most played CD.

I don't really listen to CD's very much anymore since getting an MP3 player. I'm not really sure what's my most currently played one. I do know the one I've probably played the most over the years!

I love me some Journey. You just can't go wrong when you slide this into your CD player!

Story Hour

My son brought this home from school and I feel the need to share it with the world. And I'll forgive the spelling errors and missing letters because he's 7.

Day 33

Day 33 - A picture of the house you grew up in.

Dangit, I was over by that neighborhood yesterday and didn't think to drive by and take a pic! Although the people who bought it haven't really kept it up as nicely as my parents did...so maybe that's for the best. I tried to look it up on Google maps but the picture they have is really bad, you can't even really see it.

So I'll leave you with this. Once again, a picture of a picture. This is circa 1995, I'm looking super dorky and so is my brother. Luckily the picture is such bad quality you can't see our dorky faces.

So that was the house I lived in for 9 years, the longest I've ever lived anywhere!

Then the year before I graduated, my parents built a new house and sadly, I only lived in it 1.5 years.

(that's my college roommate out front, she came to visit)

But when I dream about my growing up years, I always dream of that old house. That's where all my memories are.

Day 32

Day 32 - A picture of a crazy night.

Okay I kinda got off track for a few days and rather than do 4 catch up posts, I'm just going to keep going with one post a day.

I had a lot of crazy nights in college, here's one of them. Staying up all night to study for our Physical Science test! Since I went to BYU there was no caffeinated beverages sold on campus so we had to walk from our dorms to the nearest gas station for some decent soda. Pretty wild right?

Day 31

Day 31 - A picture of a tradition you have.

I think we've seen plenty of pictures of our traditions! We like to make the most of every holiday.

But one tradition that I do every day is I sit outside and wait for J.J.'s bus after school. Sometimes I wonder if he would prefer I don't wait for him (and I'm sure when he's older it will come to that) but he actually told me he looks for me to be sitting in front of our house waiting for him to come home. So today I took a picture of what I wait for every day:

Isn't he just the cutest thing? And lately he's been coming home with these for me:

I have a fresh bouquet of them every day!

Trey waits for J.J. too. The two of them have lots of stories to catch up on from their day apart, and lots of arguing to do too.

Day 30

Day 30 - A picture of someone you miss.

I'm not really sure who I miss. Thanks to the Internet, and Facebook in particular, I have pretty much reconnected with every single person I've ever known in my life! Including friends from 1st grade, my 3rd grade teacher, girls I met at EFY, my old piano teacher, high school acquaintances, past boyfriends, college friends, etc.

Who is there left to miss?

So I'm going to get creative here and say I miss these people:

Aw...look at how cute we were. So young (seriously, we look like we're 12 years old), so innocent! We weren't even married yet and had no idea what the future held for us and we didn't seem to care. No kids, no mortgage, nothing! Our biggest problems were deciding where to go eat and what movie to see. Aw...I miss this carefree couple!

Day 29

Day 29 - A picture that can always make you smile.

The first picture I ever took of all 3 of my boys.

Samuel was one week old, Trey 2.5 years old, and J.J. was 4 years old.

Day 28

Day 28 - A picture of something you're afraid of.

I think I've fallen 3 days behind for one simple reason. I am afraid to post the picture of what I'm afraid of. So instead I will take the coward's way out and post a cartoon picture.

Seriously, I'm deathly afraid of all bugs. It's the kind of fear where my heart feels like it's going to beat out of my chest and I can't breathe kind of fear.

Day 27

Day 27 - A picture of yourself and a family member.

Okay, once again we have another poor quality picture of a picture on display. This is me about 12-13 years ago with my Grandma! Let's not talk about how chunky I look, instead let's focus on the fact that my hair is awesome. I miss it! Sadly I do not have the patience to grow it out again.

My grandma is awesome. She's been on a several missions for our church (I lost count after like 7) and can speak several different languages. She can sew like a pro (hey that rhymed!). She is now in her 80's, has had 2 hip replacements, and still extremely active! I hope I'm that active when I'm her age.

Anyway, I love my grandma and I hope I get to see her soon!

Day 26

Day 26 - A picture of something that means a lot to you.

I love my boys. They mean everything to me and I can't imagine my life without them.

Super Moon!

A fellow blogger mentioned that tonight there would be a "super moon". I wanted to make sure to look at it but then forgot about it throughout the course of the day. We were picking up pizza for dinner and turned a corner and BAM, there it was! It's huge!!

The picture is crappy and it's not like you can tell it's bigger than normal but just trust me, it was pretty cool to see!

Doin' it up right!

Yes, another holiday that we make a big deal of here in the Larsen household!

First we get dressed in all green of course. Wouldn't want to get pinched now would we?

Oops, I think we're missing one!

Ah, there he is! The little lephrechans enjoyed a breakfast of green waffles, and green milk.

Even Mommy had to make sure she showed her true St. Patty's Day spirit. Luckily, I discovered I had green nail polish!

And...green hair spray! I tried to get the boys to do it but they wouldn't! So I told them Mommy was gonna do it and they wouldn't believe me. Well of course, I had to prove how cool their mom was right? I thought if I did it, they would want to join in. NOPE! Instead J.J. asked me if I would put a hat on it when we had to go run some errands. haha! Can you believe I ran all over town like this and NOBODY commented on it all day? Not until J.J.'s baseball practice that evening did another mother tell me she liked it! Makes me want to do more outlandish things with my appearance just to see waht I can get away with.

Unfortunately I forgot to take pictures of my shamrock lights I had up in our family room, the window stickers with clovers, a rainbow, and a pot of gold, and the "Ireland" sign I had hanging up in our kitchen. Oh well, there's always next year! The green food continued at lunch with green applesauce. I was going to make potato soup for dinner and dye it green but...I ran out of green food coloring! I used the rest when I made these babies.

Oh yes, green velvet cupcakes! They were delish.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Day 25

Day 25 - A picture of your day.

Well, I'm playing catch up here so this was supposed to be yesterday's post. Yesterday involved a lot of cleaning, grocery shopping, babysitting my neighbor's kids, and a sisters' night (complete with cookie dough and the movie "Selena"). However, I don't have pictures of any of that! So I'll entertain you with pictures of today instead.

Josh and Trey are visiting family in Cali this weekend so it's just me, my oldest, and youngest boys! Having one child gone sure changes the entire sibling dynamic of a family. The boys woke up missing their Daddy and brother.

J.J. talked with them on the phone:

And Samuel kept looking for them out the front door:

There's a lot of playing with Little People going on:

I have a couple errands to run, maybe some yard work to do.

I also need to fold laundry. This is about half of what I will be folding today:

Then I still need to finish my paying work:

Don't worry, I still have some fun things planned! Like a hot date with this cutie:

We're going to stay up late, watch Star Wars, and eat junk food!

Day 24

Day 24 - A picture of something you wish you could change.

I would like to change from living in this:

To living in something more like this:

Somewhere with four seasons, the color green, majestic mountains, and trees.

Please?

Day 23

Day 23 - A picture of your favorite book.

One of my favorite things to do is read! I'm even named after a book my mom was reading while pregnant with me. I've read it and it's pretty good, if I do say so myself.

Anyway, it's hard to narrow all the books I've read down to a "favorite". But I can say that I don't think I've ever been so engrossed in a story as I was with this series:

I could NOT put these books down once I started reading. I thought about them when I didn't have time to read, I even dreamed about them (some seriously messed up dreams BTW)! I heard they are making a movie based on the series and I'm excited/nervous about this. I actually liked the Twilight books until they made the movies. Now I can't get the horrible acting/ugly actors out of my head. I'm not saying that Twilight was fine literature, because it most definitely was NOT. I enjoyed the story though until they made the movies.

So I'm afraid of what the big screen is going to do to this series. Nothing will ever compare to what I've imagined in my head!

Day 22

Day 22 - A picture of something you wish you were better at.

Oh boy, where do I begin?! With this being Spring Break, and all 3 of my boys home from school, and me still having to work...I would say without hesitation I wish I were better at being PATIENT.

With that, I leave you with this:

I laughed pretty hard at this, and I needed it today!

Day 21

Day 21 - A picture of something you wish you could forget.

There are a lot of things I wish I could forget. A lot of past mistakes, past experiences, past memories, past relationships, etc. But I can't put a picture of anything like that on here. Because people in my "real life" might just look at this blog. The internet isn't private. It's not a place to share personal things you would never want other people to know...although maybe people seem to think that's what Facebook is for some odd reason. That's a different post for another day!

So I'm going to put a picture of something that is ALWAYS on my mind, and I wish I could just forget and not worry about it for just one day.

Seriously, it's always on my mind. I think most people would be amazed to find out the amount of money we manage to live on. It requires A LOT of very careful planning and yes, sacrifice. Somehow, we manage to make it work though! Who cares if we only see one or two movies in the movie theater a year? Who cares if we never go out to eat as a family? Who cares if we don't have cable TV? Who cares if Mommy goes an entire year without a haircut! (Just kidding...that has nothing to do with not having enough money and more to do with Mommy being lazy.)

Anyway, my point is, I'd like to just forget about it for one day and not stress about it! Is that too much to ask? Apparently it is.

Day 20

Day 20 - A picture of somewhere you'd love to travel.

This is easy, England, Ireland, and Scotland. I would love to see all the castles, how GREEN it is, learn more about the history, etc.

Day 19

Day 19 - A picture of you when you were little.

I just love this picture because my mom looks so happy! Plus it's just pure 70's awesomeness.

It's another picture of a picture, because I STILL don't know how to use my scanner.

Day 18

Day 18 - A picture of your biggest insecurity.

Again, first obvious choice would be my stomach. Let's just say, it ain't pretty folks.

But I'll go with another one that is harder to conceal. My neck. Or rather, LACK of neck.

Obviously this is not a picture of me. Because if I ever see a picture of myself showing my neck, I immediately delete it. But this is exactly what my neck looks like. It's not a neck. It's a slope. It's gross. I hate it.

Can you spot it?

Sometimes living with boys can just be...well...DIRTY. They forget to flush the toilet, they love to talk about bodily functions, they pick their noses, they leave their clothes all over the house, I could go on and on. On one occasion I even had one child get out of the car in a public parking lot, unzip his pants, and PEE right there. (And there was a bathroom 100 feet away that I had told him to wait for.)

I'm not going to lie, it frustrates me to no end! We're constantly having conversations on such foreign topics as "manners" and "being polite".

Today though, I saw this and all I could do was laugh. And take a picture.

Can you see it?

How about now?

That my friends, is a pair of Spongebob underwear on top of the ceiling fan in my family room. Who knows how long it's been up there? I don't know but I have a feeling if I try to lecture them on the importance of NOT throwing your dirty underwear up the light fixtures in your house, we'll all end up cracking up.

Day 17

Day 17 - A picture of something that has made a huge impact on your life recently.

I can't post about what first came to mind. And I'm having trouble thinking of something else. I'm having a crappy day. It was long and it was tiring and all I can think about are the things that I DIDN'T get done or situations that I could have handled better. I hate days like that.

Okay, back to the subject of this post.

Yes, I have finally joined the 21st Century and gotten my very own cell phone. Back in 2000 I actually did have a cell phone for a short time. When my contract was up, we never got another one. Finances wouldn't allow it and it was kind of weird at first but I got used to it. It's amazing what you can live without. I even kind of enjoyed it. I mean, it's kind of nice to just be "unavailable" sometimes you know?

But I started feeling "out of the loop". All my family members rely heavily on texting. Let's be honest, the entire world relies heavily on texting these days. And especially with my "difficult" children being in school, I felt like maybe I should get a cell so that I could be reached in the event of some sort of problem.

So, I finally caved. I now have a phone and I can text with it. Watch out world!

Day 16

Day 16 - A picture of someone who inspires you.

There are a lot of people who inspire me in different ways. But I have to say that the two people who come to mind first are my Mother-In-Law and my Sister-In-Law! Yes, that's right, I said my Mother-In-Law! I really lucked out in the in-law department. I consider these two ladies to be two of my best friends.

I admire "J1" (MIL) because she is just amazing. She raised 8 kids and still has her sanity intact! Whenever I'm having a bad day with just my 3 boys, I think to myself, "J1 had 8 kids in just 12 years..." And somehow that just makes me feel better. She is funny, wise, compassionate, patient, and fair. I know that last one sounds funny but she really knows how to take a situation that everyone might be caught up in the "emotion" of, and look at it rationally and bring everyone back down to earth. I think she might be a judge with her own TV show in her next life... I really value her opinion and outlook on things. I just love to spend time with her and we always have so much fun together.

And of course, her daughter "J2" has a lot of these same traits her mom has! J2 has 3 boys just like I do, but is infinitely more patient than I am! She is a great cook, spends quality time with her boys, is talented and '"crafty". She goes out of her way to help people and tries to see the positive in difficult situations. I admire and trust her so much, I've even asked her to take my own 3 boys in the event I kick the bucket before they're grown! I can't think of a better mother for them if I can't be around to raise them. Hopefully someday we can live closer to each other!

All right, our family isn't the sappy sentimental type so I'll end this post with a picture that cracks me up every time I see it. Hopefully they don't kill me for this!

Oh they're so "essy"!

Whine whine whine

Warning: This post contains a lot of migraine talk. May be boring. Proceed with caution.

For the past 2 weeks straight, I have either wokne up with a headache, or developed one throughout the day. These headaches range from being mild (tolerable with Excedrin Migraine) or pretty severe to the point where I end up taking my prescription migraine medication.

I AM SICK OF IT.

And I'm just using the last two weeks as an example of how bad it's been. I've been getting headaches like crazy for 2 months! Now granted, I have always gotten quite a few headaches. I would say it's normal for me to get 2-4 migraines a month, and about 10 less severe headaches a month.

I think it's time I go back to the neurologist. I just REALLY don't want to. I was on a migraine medication study for 6 months so I couldn't go in earlier because I couldn't be on any other medications while taking the "study drug". I'm 99.9% I had the placebo because I had zero side effects, and it didn't help or hurt me at all.

Now I'm off the study medication so I'm free to do what I want. I've been on a number of preventative medications in the past. Topamax (tried this one twice), Elavil, propranalol, Pamelor...a couple didn't work at all, a couple worked the first few months then stopped working. The side effects can be pretty weird. For example, Topamax makes all soda taste flat to me. Which is not too much of a bad thing since really, NOT drinking soda is healthier. But then there's the dizziness, tiredness, weird tremors, etc. Some cause weight loss which could be nice, but they could also cause hair loss...which is NOT very nice.

I'm trying to go natural right now by taking the supplement Butterbur. I've read a lot of positive things about it. Only problem is, it can take up to 2 months before I'll even notice any difference. I want results now dangit!

AND...I haven't even worked out for the last 6 weeks because my head hurts so badly, or I'm afraid that if I exercise too hard it will bring a migraine on. So what do I do? I'm so upset and frustrated with my stupid head that I'm eating like crap. Which makes me feel even worse, which makes me eat more. Ah...the cycle of emotional eating...

And let's not even talk about how frustrated I am at not feeling like I can be a good mother when my head hurts all the time. Let's not talk about how I can't keep as clean a house as I'd like to because my head hurts too much to clean or smell the cleaning chemicals. And let's not talk about how much it sucks to work while my head is killing me (listening to interviews through headphones, typing the interviews, staring at a computer for 4-5 hours a day).

Well, I guess that's enough negativity for the day. I vented, I feel better. Now back to work!

Day 15

Day 15 - A picture of something you want to do before you die.

Someday, I want to run a half-marathon! I don't care what my time is, I just want to finish.

Day 14

Day 14 - A picture of someone you could never imagine your life without.

Oh yes, that man sitting there eating ice cream for breakfast is definitely the person I couldn't imagine my life without!

Day 13

Day 13 - A picture of your favorite band or artist.

I really do not know how to answer this. I like a pretty broad range of music in almost every genre. I go through phases. In high school, I LOVED the band 311. Now, not so much. I mean I still enjoy them from time to time but definitely not a fave.

I also used to LOVE Journey. Journey is timeless and I will always love it but I can't really say it's my favorite.

I own almost every Metallica album and have seen them in concert twice, but can I really say they are my favorite? I just don't know.

The list could go on and on. Anyone from Credence Clearwater Revival, to Lady Gaga, to The Cranberries, to AFI. My husband even got me listening to a bit of techno (back in the day) and these days, Dubstep! Seriously, my music taste has Multiple Personality Disorder.

But you know what? That's okay! I refuse to be tied down by any one type of music. For now I'll just put a pic up of who I've been listening to a lot lately.

But tomorrow, who knows who it will be!