Halloween

We had a great day today. Mario dropped Eric off at the Stake Center at 6:30 this morning for a merit badge camp. He came home with two completed merit badges. While Eric was gone, Mario took the other 3 kids to the Kartchner Caverns while I grocery shopped and cleaned up the house. Then we had a relaxing afternoon waiting for the real fun---trick-or-treating to begin.

Being Consistent

I couldn't get Dave Ramsey's podcast downloaded to my MP3 player today, so I decided to listen to a Conference podcast instead while I ran/walked. I probably need that more than Ramsey anyway. I took comfort in Elder Bednar's talk where he described FHE in his home while his boys were young:

"As our sons were growing up, our family did what you have done and what you now do. We had regular family prayer, scripture study, and family home evening. Now, I am sure what I am about to describe has never occurred in your home, but it did in ours.

Sometimes Sister Bednar and I wondered if our efforts to do these spiritually essential things were worthwhile. Now and then verses of scripture were read amid outbursts such as “He’s touching me!” “Make him stop looking at me!” “Mom, he’s breathing my air!” Sincere prayers occasionally were interrupted with giggling and poking. And with active, rambunctious boys, family home evening lessons did not always produce high levels of edification. At times Sister Bednar and I were exasperated because the righteous habits we worked so hard to foster did not seem to yield immediately the spiritual results we wanted and expected.

Today if you could ask our adult sons what they remember about family prayer, scripture study, and family home evening, I believe I know how they would answer. They likely would not identify a particular prayer or a specific instance of scripture study or an especially meaningful family home evening lesson as the defining moment in their spiritual development. What they would say they remember is that as a family we were consistent."

So, I know I have no control, but I can be consistent. Eric gave his first talk as a Youth speaker yesterday. I got an honorable mention when he talked about reading scriptures. Eric said, "My mom makes it a point to read every night." I looked up his talk to get the exact quote. He wrote the following in his talk, but must have changed his mind about saying it: "Once we were at the table, about to have cake, when my mom pulled out the scriptures and made us all wait to eat until we were finished reading."

I think I am on the right track. Hopefully my kids will look back and say we were consistent (and not just consistently yelling! :)) Honestly, Mario is way more consistent than I am. But I try really hard!

Control Freak

I came to a realization today. It only took me 35 years to figure out I am a control freak. Maybe that's why my twins cause me so much frustration. I cannot, no matter how hard I try, control them. Mario just laughed when I told him this today. Of course, he knew these things all along.

Chocolate Cake

Mario finally got word today that he will officially get IDE credit for his time at Naval Post Graduate School. Don't ask me what that really means, but apparently it is good because he is very excited about it. He says it will make it easier for him to get selected for Lieutenant Colonel. So we are celebrating with his favorite homemade chocolate cake. We had chocolate cake a lot in Monterey (when he finished up his thesis, when he finished all his classes, and when he graduated.)

He claims it is nothing he did to deserve this, just a blessing from Heavenly Father. I know that it was a blessing but I also know Mario worked hard to be worthy of that blessing. We are grateful to Heavenly Father for continually blessing our family.

Love this quote

"Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people." Eleanor Roosevelt

Back to School

The kids are on a year round school schedule so they have been off for the past 3 weeks. I jokingly asked Mario last night if he felt like he needed to give them "back to school blessings" again. Not that blessings are a joke, just the break seemed like as long as a summer vacation. But we had a great 3 weeks and did a lot of fun stuff.

The first week was in San Diego which I already blogged about. We also did the following:

Erin and Zachary each broke their first boards in karate. The karate school was raising money for breast cancer and so they offered 30 minute private lessons. Nathan didn't want to do it and Eric was on a boy scout campout/hike. The instructors let the kids choose what they wanted to learn. Erin chose to learn to break board with a kick and Zachary chose to do it with his elbow. Zachary is so proud of his accomplishment that these are some of the things we here him say..."Whoever broke a board gets to use the bathroom first....I think my karate clothes need washed because when I broke the board, they probably got sweaty." Mario came up with a few of his own that we will probably hear in the near future..."Wow the weather is nice, it reminds me of that day I broke the board...Can we eat the same thing for dinner that we had the day I broke the board?"

Eric finished up his hiking merit badge with 2 -10 mile hikes (70 miles total for the merit badge). He had to forfeit his private karate lesson on Saturday to go on his campout and hike. We are so pleased that he made the right choice. I also talked Eric out of accepting his dad's $20-$25 for each completed merit badge. He should do it because he wants to and not for money. I convinced Mario he was only paying him because of his own fear that Eric wouldn't do otherwise. Give Eric a chance, he almost always makes the right choice.

Erin cut several inches off her hair and it looks adorable. Plus it is much easier to maintain. An added bonus is that she seems to be in a much better mood since cutting it. Mario and I both noticed that.

Nathan overcame his fears and went boogie boarding in San Diego. That was a huge accomplishment for him. He has been our only child with a fear of the water.

We saw two movies at the theater...Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and Where the Wild Things Are.

Eric decided he no longer wants to be a doctor after I rented the movie "Gifted Hands." It was about a neurosurgeon who separates conjoined twins and saves both of them (He was the first to discover a way to do it.) It was a very graphic movie showing a lot of blood. Eric couldn't watch the surgery parts and decided maybe Law school would be a better option. Whatever he does, I am sure he will be successful.

I reread Dave Ramsey's book and decided to put ourselves on a tighter budget and start saving 15% towards retirement. We had only been saving 5-10% before. With Mario's pension and our retirement savings, hopefully we will be able to serve lots of missions. Plus I have been saving for a home when we retire. With all this saving, I capped our Christmas budget at $600 this year. I thought the kids might complain when I suggested we split up the $600 and give each person (including Mario and I) $20 to spend on each member of the family (Mario and I don't want anything, but the kids like to buy for us too, maybe I can decrease the amount that they spend on us.) At first there were some groans, but now instead of everyone trying to figure out what they are getting for Christmas, they are making lists of what to get everyone else. None of the kids believe in Santa anymore, so we don't have to worry about getting lots of Santa gifts. But Mario may end up spending slightly over our $600 budget to fund some stocking gifts. I think it would be kind of fun to see if we could really stick to our budget. With all the money we spend on karate and orthodontists, we need not overspend on Christmas. Our kids are definitely not lacking for anything.

Eric chastised me for wanting to watch the movie "The Proposal" with him when our Clear Play wouldn't edit it. It was PG-13 and so I thought I could use TV Guardian to edit out the language and it would be fine. He looked up the reviews and he saw all the sexual content in it and decided to watch a Little House instead. He constantly keeps our family on the right track. In fact, Mario and I were joking that his kids are going to come complain to us that their father won't let them do anything. Our only response would be, yep, he wouldn't let us either.

It was a fantastic 3 weeks, but I am excited to get some time to myself again. Eric and Erin occasionally ask to be homeschooled, but I keep telling them no. I am not dedicated enough, plus they both know more than me. I could never teach them. I guess I should start looking into online homeschools, but I am hoping they can hold off.

First Kiss

The neighbor came over to tell me that Zachary kissed her little sister, Anna, today. Fortunately it was just on her cheek. Zach denies everything. Eric told Zach no kissing a girl until he's 21. Zach asked why not because he could get married at 20. Eric and I explained to Zach that he doesn't get home from his mission until he's 21. That brought a lot of confusion to Zachary because he knew that he would leave on a mission at 19. He had no idea a mission was 2 years. I am not sure he is excited about the 2 years. He looked devastated.

Nathan's Advice

While Mario was up decorating the boys' room today he decided to fix their closet door. Zachary was doing a lot of talking while Mario and Nathan were working. Mario looked at Zachary to give him a "dirty" look and Nathan told Zach, "Less noise, more work."

Nathan was adapting a common phrase of Mario's that he says often at dinner, "Less talking, more eating."

Boarding School

Does anyone know of a good boarding school for two almost 6-year-old boys? Do they have a twin discount? I can tolerate my boys separated in public places, but not together. I took them to the local bank the other day to open an account. I don't know if they have ever been in a bank before since I do almost all online banking with banks in Texas and Utah. Apparently, they confused the bank with a park. Then I took them to the grocery store yesterday where they climbed under the display tables. Again, they must have confused the store with a zoo. Then today I took them to a baptism (which they are fully aware of how to behave in church.) They must think that because it is not Sunday, they don't have to behave in the chapel. After the baptism we went to the library. That was a mistake.

I have concluded that I have not done a good job with teaching these boys how to behave in public places. But to my defense, they are perfect children when they are separated. I don't know what happens to them when they are together. They forget how to act civilized. Erin is at the point that she doesn't even want twins anymore.

Is spanking legal? They both need a good swat!

Deployment Part 2

Well after much prayer, Mario has decided not to pursue the deployment to Ecuador in March. He kept telling me that he didn't feel it was the right time to go and that after praying the answer he got was that we need to trust in the Lord. As much as I wanted him to volunteer for a Latin America deployment, I also knew this morning that it wasn't the right time. I always worry that he will have to go to the desert, and who knows, maybe he will someday. But Mario's right, we just need to have faith and put our trust in the Lord and everything will work out. So looks like for now Mario will be sticking around. I am not ready to be a single parent anyway. Problem is, I am not sure I will ever be ready...but I also know that Heavenly Father will help make me strong when the time comes.

San Diego

Our family just returned from our vacation to San Diego late last night. We stayed in a cabin on the beach at Camp Pendleton for 4 nights. There are some great benefits to being military... like all the discounted military cabins we have stayed at in the past (Honolulu, Kauai, Big Island, and Lake of the Ozarks.) We invited some friends, the Trawick family, from Monterey to meet us there. We also invited my mom meet us in San Diego. We had adjoining cabins which was really convenient.

I had begun to dread this vacation because in the past our kids have complained about some of our vacations not being as fun as they had hoped. So I had planned to cancel all future vacations if they complained even once about this vacation. But they all had a great time. I think I had the most fun being back on the beach and boogie boarding. I can't believe that I lived in Hawaii 3 years and didn't try boogie boarding until right before we left. I don't think there are many activities that I enjoy more than boogie boarding. I tried surfing, but that was way too much work.

We left about 6:30 Monday morning. We stopped at least 4 times on the way to San Diego, the last stop was to an outlet mall on an Indian Reservation just outside of San Diego. We had a couple hours until my mom's flight arrived. Once we picked up my mom, we headed to our cabin. After checking in, I went to the commissary while Grandma, Mario, and the kids played at the beach. When I went to pay, I realized I had forgotten my wallet. I had to leave my cart and drive all the way back to the cabin to get my wallet. Fortunately they didn't put back all my groceries. I had just listened to a conference talk on Attitude, so although I was completely frustrated with the situation, I tried to have a good attitude. Then on Tuesday, Lisa and I drove all over the large Marine Base looking for wax for the surfboard that the kids never really used (again I had to remember the talk on attitude). After getting the wax, it was time to relax and boogie board.

On Wednesday, Eric was able to go to the San Diego Temple and do baptisms for a Samoan family and 6 of Mario's family members. It was a wonderful experience to be at the Temple with Eric for his first time. It made me anxious for the time he goes for his own endowments. But then of course that makes me sad because he will be leaving for his mission. After the Temple, we returned to the beach to do more boogie boarding. Thursday, Mario and I got up early to go to the Temple and to breakfast. Then we spent the day boogie boarding. My mom finally got up the courage to get into that approx. 65 degree water and try boogie boarding. I think she actually really enjoyed it. She was disappointed she had waited so long to try it. Now she is hoping that they will have some storms on the Gulf Coast of Florida so she can try it there where the water is much warmer (Florida's Gulf is very flat normally).

Friday was time to pack up and leave, but not without a little more boogie boarding. I was out at 8 am. Then Mario dropped my mom and I off at the Temple to do a session and some Sealings. He took the kids to the San Diego zoo because he and the three younger kids were free. After the zoo, Mario picked us up and we went to Old Town for some Mexican food and then had to take my mom to the airport and we had to drive all the way home. We wanted to stay until Saturday, but decided to go home late Friday night so we would be home in time for General Conference.

It was a great trip. We are again grateful for my mom coming out and helping with the kids while we went to the Temple and for cooking and cleaning and for taking the kids for long walks on the beach. She and Zachary went for several long walks, their longest was over 3 hours. Zachary really enjoyed his time with Grandma. If I had my way, we would be going back to San Diego several times a year. It was almost like being back in Hawaii. But Mario insists there are other things to see. I am not so sure.

I will have to post pictures when I get some from Lisa and my mom. I didn't bring my camera.