I Will Follow You

Blogger has this really fun new gadget that you can add to your blog layout. It's called "Blogger Following". The feature lets readers publicly subscribe to your blog (so you know who's reading) and adds a Reading List to your Blogger Dashboard so readers can stay updated with the blogs they follow. To me it seems kind of MySpace-ish and really don't like MySpace but my egotistical side really wants you to show some love and sign-up to follow me!!! (Sounds a little David Koresh-ish too!!!) All you have to do is click on the link that says "FOLLOW THIS BLOG" and it will walk you through it. Welcome to the cool kids' club!!!!

Simple Pleasures

We have lived in New City for 4 weeks now and we frequently drive by something very fascinating to my kiddos. So fascinating, in fact, that they have asked me to go there practically everyday! It's the StarWash!!! I guess they've never seen anything like it living as country bumpkins in Oklahoma! Well, we keep telling them that we will go there one day but it's been raining like crazy with the last couple of storms that have come through so we haven't really had the chance. We finally gave in and told them that we would go to the StarWash for Family Home Evening tonight. I know you are all just dying to check it out so here are a couple of videos of our $8 FHE activity!

Flashback Friday... Is Back

A while back I started this new feature on my blog but moving kind of got in the way of keeping it up. Well, it's back! Here is this week's entry:

I decided that in light of Patriot's Day yesterday that I would post these photos that I dug up!

This was at our house in Michigan. I can't really remember but I hope Geoff was being somewhat silly because he looks a little cheesy! Even cuter is Aspen copying her dad!

Just an interesting note: the mascot for the girls' new school is The Patriots and they have Rise & Shine every Thursday. The kids are encouraged to wear the school colors (red, white, & blue) on these days. I think it's kind of neat how this week's Rise & Shine landed on Patriots Day!

I Remember

New Blog... Under Construction

I'm going to try to start a new blog about the great state of Arkansas. My friend Cindi is constantly posting about these great trips that her family makes to various places in Michigan where they live. So, I thought since we're probably going to be here for a REALLY long time that we should get to know the state! Feel free to give us some ideas for great places/events to visit and I'll try to keep this blog updated with our adventures. Any ideas for a name for our new blog?

Gibson Version of "Moving Target"

Here a while back Amber posted on her blog about a fun family game that they play call "Moving Target" (here's the post if your interested). Well, we've decided to get in on the action! Here we have the Gibson version. This first clip features Daddy as the moving target:

This next clip I had to quickly cut short because Ainsley (our more sensitive child) got pegged in the face one too many times and began to cry. I really didn't want proof of the abuse!

In the end, Aspen was the only one tough enough to take the beating.

Rest assured, I scolded Geoff several times for throwing things at their heads! I noticed in the Dahle version of this fun family game that they always aimed at their feet!!

Take notice that this is a peek at what our 2 bedroom townhouse looks like! I've had people ask me to post pics of the new place. Truth be told, it's a mess! I went into 'no cleaning' mode AS SOON AS we got here! I have been the gestapo of cleanliness for long enough (while trying to sell our house) and now I'm taking a break!

Asher's Birthday

It seems like an eternity ago that we celebrated Asher's 4th birthday!! It was a little over 3 weeks ago. It was so chaotic and stressful during that time!! There were two things that helped me keep my sanity enough to actually make him a cake - 1) Laura Albrecht watched all of my kids that day (thank you, Laura!!) and 2) it required no baking what so ever! It was made out of a pound cake that I purchased at the store then frosted and decorated with some candy and mini doughnuts. Easy-peasy!

If you can't tell from the photos, Asher LOVED it! So did the girls! I had to post both of these next two photos even though they are really similar because I love Asher's facial expressions! He is quite the character.

And then just for your enjoyment here is the video of us singing to him. Once again I LOVE his expressions!

Just a tid bit of information: 4 years ago Asher was born right before the Summer Olympics in Athens started. This turned out to be a fabulous thing for me! I LOVE the Olympics so it was great to get replays, updates and early morning events during those all night feedings! And for two weeks! It made those nights somewhat more bearable. Celebrating Asher's birthday during the Olympics this year just brought back a flood of those memories!

A picture of Asher's birthday PJ's.

Happy Birthday, Son! I love you so much and can hardly believe that you're four years old!

Back In The Saddle Again

Wow. Moving really knocks the wind right out your sails! Gets you all off course. But I think we have pretty much settled in and now have a reasonably stable schedule so maybe it's time to get back in the saddle and post all of the things that have been happening! I'm looking forward to it aren't you?

I Am Officially a Gold Medalist!

We made it!! We are safely and happily moved in to our new place in New City!

 

This was our 9th move in 11 1/2 years. Here are a few things that I learned from this move:

1. Have a giant garage sale and get rid of everything that you don't absolutely love or need. We did this. We actually had two garage sales. One to empty out the garage so we could actually move around in there and another one to get rid of everything else! We made over $500 dollars plus we sold Geoff's car for $300 (more about this later). So we got a chunk of change that was really needed. Whatever was left I gave to a lady who does resale at a flea market. I would have given it to Good Will but they made me mad when we first moved there and I swore I would never donate to them again. Plus, this lady came and picked up everything that was left. I didn't have to haul it off. She also told us that things had been kind of rough and she had only been bring in around $100 a week lately at the flea market! How can anyone live on $400 a month?! She deserved the charity more than anyone I knew at the time. So... she got it!
2. Make friends with a kid named Vincent in the Wal-Mart meat department. The best boxes are from the liquor store and the Wal-Mart meat department. And you always need way more than you think. I started collecting boxes weeks ago. After Geoff's car died (more about this later) I started taking him to work every morning. On my home I would stop at Wal-Mart and load up on boxes because that is when the stocking crew was finishing their shift. A couple of days before we moved I ran out of boxes and it was in the middle of the day. I looked everywhere for boxes and when I finally got to Wal-Mart the only boxes to be found were from the meat dept. I made friends with Vincent and he put back every box that he emptied... just for little ole' me! They're heavy duty, perfect size and have handles.
3. Don't tick off the people in your ward... because then they won't help you. Honestly, I'm just assuming that I've done something terrible to these people because this is the second time in one year that I have asked the Relief Society President to petition the ladies in the ward for some help. Each time more than 50 ladies were emailed and/or asked personally to do a small act of service and not one person responded. Whatever. I won't beat that old horse.
4. Renting a moving truck is cheaper on Sunday through Thursday. I saved a chunk of change by renting it on Thursday. We had a friend from the neighborhood come and help Geoff load the big stuff and most of the boxes on Thursday night. We 'camped out' with no beds and while Geoff was at work on Friday I kept the kids corralled in the living room with a blow up mattress and a little TV while I emptied and cleaned every other room in the house. This worked out pretty good until about 2 PM when I hit my wall of exhaustion and the kids were feeling some cabin fever because it was raining. This leads me to the last thing that I learned from this move.
5. It is ALMOST impossible to move a big family all by yourself. Because of the afore mentioned issue with the ward Geoff and I had discussed that that we would have to be really organized and we could probably do this move by ourselves. Uh. Wrong. Even after getting rid of a ton of stuff and being severely organized we had so much to do! We had to leave the house spotless and vacant because the realtor still needs to show it. We moved into a two bedroom townhouse so we had to put everything that we weren't taking into the garage and clean everything. The brunt of this load landed on my shoulders because Geoff was still working. With regards to this lesson learned here is a public shout out and thank you to my Olympic team mates: Jen Wagoner, Dawna Bowen, and Terra Rogers! Jen and Dawna spent several hours helping me pack and Terra really went the distance driving 6 hours round-trip for just one day to clean and help me pack an entire house!! And a major acknowledgement to Laura Albrecht for watching my kiddos all day on Monday so that I could get Asher's birthday cake made and some packing done!! The phrase "I couldn't have done it without you" seems so overused but somehow appropriate here. I really had my hands full and each of you made the dream possible!!

We won the gold!!

 

P.S. Subsequent posts will be less wordy and contain more photos!!

Stay tuned...

Shelley here! Yes, I still have Steph's username and password. I'm posting for her as they are currently driving to their "new city" with most of their worldly belongings. She managed to pack up the entire house in record time and off they went! Geoff's last day of work was Friday and they are moving into their temporary townhouse on Saturday. Ta Da! I'm making it all sound so quick, easy, and painless!(???)I know Terra came one day and helped pack much of it and it sounds like without her help they never would have made it so THANK YOU TERRA! They will be without internet until next Tuesday, at least, so stay tuned until then. The kids start school in "new city" on Monday and I think Geoff starts his new job then, too! To be continued... p.s. Steph's username and password are up for auction. Serious bidders only. I accept Paypal.

Man, What a Ride!

Whew!! That was a little bit of a crazy ride!!! I just got back today from an impromptu trip to my sister's home town where I drove an additional 30 minutes after dropping off the kids to the Nearby City that we will be living in. I did this because.... well, let me just start from the beginning.

Many of you will remember my post: Blog Slacker where I described my stress levels and how we had found the perfect house... yadda, yadda, yadda. Well, that didn't turn out so good. In our offer on that house we had it contingent on the sale of our current house. I guess that means that the sellers have the option of accepting another offer if they want... which is exactly what they did. Gggrrrr. So we had to start over. We found another one and this time found a way to go ahead and buy it even though our current house hadn't sold. It was a foreclosure that had a 10 day bidding period that they would take the best offer within in that period. We decided to offer just above asking so that we could guarantee getting it. Um. No. Someone was actually dumber than us and paid even more. We found out that we didn't get that house on Monday. New kid enrollment for the new city was on Wednesday. My absolutely wonderful realtor frantically tried to get us signed on to a different house so that I could go ahead and enroll the kids but to no avail. So I threw the kids in the car on Tuesday drove straight to my sister's and then went to the Nearby City to find an apartment or rent house that I could get a rental agreement on so that we would have an address for enrollment day! We called about 6 or 7 apartment complexes before I left but nobody had any vacant!! So I got in the car and left. I got to Nearby City at 4:45 - 15 minutes before all offices would be closing!!! I drove straight to a complex that my realtor told me about but couldn't find a phone number for and just crossed my fingers that I would find the right person to help me out. Wouldn't you know it! There were a couple of men in the parking lot next to a truck and I asked them who I would need to talk to about renting a place and one of those gentlemen happened to be the property manager!!! AND he said that he had a place vacant and we could take a look!! It was a two bedroom townhouse that they were cleaning up and working on! It was perfect! Plus, he said that we could go to his office across town and fill out the paper work and get the rental agreement right then. Wow. Was I ever grateful. He even let us sign a 6 month lease instead of a year because of our situation. Two bedrooms for a family of 6 is going to be tight but we'll manage. This will give us time to sell our current home and find the perfect home in Nearby City. {sigh of relief} The kids are enrolled and I even signed up for their public library cards. Kind of exciting. We're moving in 9 days. Just in time for school to start and for Geoff to start work.

Man, what a ride.

Just Pretend...

...that you're listening to elevator music right now. I will be with you momentarily.

The End of an Era

In January of 1994 I purchased a 1992 Saturn SL1 for $9000. I had been almost 6 months without a car while attending LDS Business College in Salt Lake City, UT. Granted, I didn't really need a car. I lived less than a block from school and only 3 blocks from Deseret Book where I worked. But I thought that I needed a car so with the financial help of my dad and the emotional help of my friend Warren, I bought this car: Over 400,000 miles and 14 1/2 years later... Buella died. That's right folks, as of yesterday the transmission went out. The cost of repairing it would be more than the car is worth. We were REALLY hoping that she would last long enough for us to sell our house and move. We hope to make enough on the house to buy something else for him. As it is, we are officially a one car family now. It's not the end of the world. But, it is the end of an era!

"You're an animal lover or you wouldn't be here."

I don't consider myself a HUGE animal lover. But I don't think I'm an animal hater either. I used to have a greater fondness for animals. I think a couple of things have made me shy away from them in recent years. 1) I have kids. Most kids love animals of all sorts and I think that's great. But very early on I realized that having pets meant TONS more work and stress for ME (not to mention the money). With 4 kids it is really difficult to cheerfully take on that added work and stress. 2) A couple of years ago I went to a garage sale and they had their dog loose. I didn't think any thing of it because I was not afraid of dogs and obviously the owner would have him pinned up if he was going to be a problem. Wrong. The dog attacked me. He full on jumped on my back. I have been afraid of dogs ever since. Not deathly afraid, but definitely overly cautious. Having said all of this I must relate to you what has happened at our house within the last 3 days.

My really good friend Lolly packed a moving truck and moved to Utah on Friday. She had a mamma cat and two baby kittens that she had tried hard to find new homes for but was unsuccessful. In our town we do not have an adoptive pound. We only have Animal Control and they euthenize strays. If you call them and ask them to come and get them and you own them they charge you a fee. So, Lolly didn't know what else to do. She couldn't take them with her and she didn't have any money. So she suggested that I call Animal Control after she left to let them know that they had been left so they would come pick them up. Of course, at first this seemed the most practical thing to do but I started feeling my heart strings being tugged. The two babies had eye infections and the mamma had a sore on her neck that needed some attention. I couldn't just leave them. Geoff and I talked and agreed that we would bring them home and nurse them to healthy cats and then find good homes for them. We brought them home Friday night. The kids were in heaven! We explained to them that we were not keeping them, only helping them and finding them good homes.

There was a little boy kitty and a little girl kitty. The little boy kitty was really bad off. Both of his eyes were closed shut and starting to bulge. The little girl kitty had one eye that was starting to secrete yellow gunk but the eye was still open. We cleaned the eyes the best that we could and waited to hear from my pediatrician friend on some antibiotic eye drops that she might have. Well, that was Saturday. The little boy kitty just got worse Saturday and Sunday. Geoff believed that he was probably already blind in both eyes and if we could just get him healthy that we would probably have to keep him and make him an indoor cat so that he would not be eaten by other creatures.

So today Ainsley and I took the kitties to the vet. I explained to Ainsley that the vet may say that we will have to put Mooshoo (the little boy kitty) to sleep and that meant that they would give him a shot that would make him go to sleep but he wouldn't ever wake up. I knew in my heart that there was a great possibility of this but I, like my children, had grown pretty fond of this little critter and was thinking I might be stupid enough to actually pay an enormous vet bill if they could save him. As we sat there waiting our turn I knew that I would be VERY willing to do what it took. My heart was swelling.

They called our name. We stepped into the room and the vet took one look at Mooshoo and said, "I cannot save that one." I broke down. I told the vet that I'm not really a huge animal lover but these cats were left and no one to take care of them. He looked at me and said, "You're an animal lover or you wouldn't be here right now." I tearfully asked the vet, "There is NOTHING you can do to save him?" He politely said no. Ainsley was standing next to me and listening but not saying a word. They worked on Oreo (the little girl kitty) and told me that if I kept her eyes clean and gave her the medicine she would be fine. As they were working on her I leaned over and whispered to Ainsley that Mooshoo would not be coming home with us that the vet couldn't help him. They took him and we took Oreo, paid our bill and left. I was choking up but managed to keep it together. As we drove home I called Geoff to tell him and when I was done I looked back at Ainsley and she had huge alligator tears streaming down her face. She said, "I'm gonna miss him." I replied, "Me, too."

It didn't seem to really phase Asher. Aspen, on the other hand, cried for a long time. She was really sad. Dang! My heart hurts.

Take a Chance on Me

Today Geoff and I celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary. Under normal circumstances we probably would have gone to Hawaii, Australia or some other exotic place because that's what we normally do {hint of sarcasm}, but this year money is kind of tight and time is limited {due to moving} so we just copped out and went to a movie and a restaurant. Here's the thing, we never go to the theater to watch movies. I (and my husband) really would much rather save the money and watch it in the comforts of my own home with ClearPlay to catch the nasties that they don't really warn you about! The only exceptions would be Harry Potter or some other truly amazing blockbuster type film that we just love! But because we are no longer courting and using some major creativity to win one another's affection, it was dinner and a movie.

We Took a Chance on "Mamma Mia"! Oh lands!! I loved it!!! I'm an absolute sucker for musicals! I don't know why, but they really make me happy inside!!! I love ABBA, too! There were some parts that were super cheesy and I'm still not sure how I feel about Pierce Brosnan singing S.O.S but overall - a total hoot!! I laughed so hard I cried! Something else that was super fun was the fact that I think Geoff and I were the youngest people there and out of 150-200 people I would say less than 10% were male! It was really fun to watch the old ladies sitting in front of me bobbing their heads to the music and putting their hands to their mouths when it showed Stellan Skarsgård's butt! Dang good show, people! As the movie was getting started, as always, they showed a few trailers for new movies coming out. As I sat there watching them I was thinking to my self - movie trailers are always SOOO good. They really know how to make you want to see a movie! Here is a list of trailers that we saw:

The Express

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2

HSM3

Henry Poole is Here

Burn After Reading

I could totally see ALL of these movies!! {on ClearPlay and in the comforts of my own living room of course}

We shared a really yummy meal at Red Lobster and had a really great waiter, stopped at Braum's for a really yummy Brownie Fudge Sundae with German Chocolate Ice Cream, and then headed home. After we put the kids to bed and cleaned the house up some we sat down and toasted some sparkling wild berry juice and ate some left over garlic biscuits from Red Lobster. I said "Here's to 11 years!" and Geoff said "Here's to 11 more. After that we'll reassess!"

Maybe not the most glamorous celebration but fun times were had AND neither of us can stop singing ABBA songs!

Happy Anniversary, Geoff. I love you.

Fascinating! {an update}

For all of you brave souls who let me in on your lurking - "Thank you!" For the rest of you chickens out there "Fine. I see how you are." Now for the random name drawing..... I pick Laura Neal! {ok, not so random} Mainly because you were the only one who DIDN'T say that you didn't want any scrapbooking supplies!! {my sister doesn't count} Just email me your home address (gibsoncasa(at)gmail.com) and I'll send ya some real good stuff!

Grease Monkey

Three nights ago I drove my friend Laura to the Stake Center in McKinney so that she could get a temple recommend. I offered because her vehicle is not very reliable right now and I also thought that it would be a nice break from house and kids seeing as it's an hour away! Well, unfortunately, I forgot that my sweet hubby had gotten some incredible tickets to see the new Batman movie at a special premiere thing in Dallas and so I had to take all 4 kiddos! I thought "How bad could this be? I'll just pop in a couple of movies and they'll be fine." Well, they did pretty well as we sat out in the parking lot waiting for her to get finished but about half way home we heard this ominous thumping from the front of the car. Sure enough! We had a stinkin' flat tire - front driver side! Me, Lolly, 4 tired kids and a stupid flat tire! It had to happen on a super busy highway with a bunch of trucker jerks who don't have the common courtesy to pull over to the passing lane much less get out and actually help us!!! Now, I've changed a tire before - couple of times matter o' fact - but DANG IT! it was almost 10 o'clock at night and the kids had already watched Barbie Fairytopia about 3 times and were getting a little fidgety! Poor Andyn was out of control crying - the kind where absolutely NOTHING you do will help her because it is 3 hours past her bedtime!! I just had to let her scream which in turn made the other 3 kids more anxious and the excitement of it all just about drove me to hitchhike! It took us a good 20 minutes to get the stupid spare out from UNDER the van and then we took turns working on jacking the van up and taking off the lug nuts. About the time we were putting the spare on a nice lady pulled up. She said that she passed us once and came back because she thought it was so dangerous that we didn't have any light. So she offered her headlights.... and then proceeded to put on the lug nuts... and tighten them.... and lower the van... all with these beautiful one inch French manicured acrylic nails. I'm glad she wasn't prissy! She followed us for a few miles to a friends' house so he could check it over to make sure we wouldn't have trouble the rest of the way home. Pretty sweet if you ask me.

Fascinating!

Amber informed me of her slight obsession with her Feedjit roll on the sidebar of her blog and though I have Google Analytics set up on my blog I hadn't checked it out in a while. I've checked it out for my FSBO blog only because I have wanted to see if anybody is actually interested in the house! But it's been a long time since I checked out the results for my own blog. So this morning I checked it out and look at this:

You see all the green areas? People from all of those states have visited my blog!! Crazy! In the last month I've had 713 visits! Incredible! I'm no Pioneer Woman but somebody out there really likes me! I mean, I know who's visited my blog 66 times from New Jersey and 36 times from Michigan but who the heck has visited my blog 6 times from National City, CA or Show Low, AZ? Who are these people?!! Who has visited my blog from Beverly Hills, CA and why haven't you offered me some kind of reality TV show?! Who has visited my blog from Eugene, OR and why don't you show yourself? I agree, Amber, it's truly obsessive!!! I want to know who you are! If I were as swanky as Pioneer Woman I would offer some kind of give away if you would post a comment telling me where you're from and how you found my blog! Ooooh, I've got an idea... leave a comment telling me where you are from and how you found my blog and I will send you a box of scrapbooking supplies! I'll make it good too!! I've got some good stuff! I'm serious as a heart attack! This obsession is not healthy!! Help me out here!

And whoever you are in Rosamond, CA... buy my house!! I know you're checking it out!

Scrapbooking Supplies

I'm getting rid of all of mine. We're being ruthless at getting rid of stuff before we move so I've decided that I haven't used this stuff in 10 years so I'm probably not going to start anytime soon. If any of you are interested let me know. I have a butt-load of stuff that I stocked up on thinking I would get around to using... uh, wrong. I'm selling them in our next garage sale in a couple of weeks.

The Fourth

We celebrated The Fourth at our friends' Nancy and Jerry Williams. A good time was had by all but not until there was a thunderstorm come through and all 4 kids had some kind of meltdown. I spent almost an hour myself in the van with Andyn strapped in her carseat because she was out of control! After about 45 min of Ice Age The Meltdown she was good to go and we were able to return to the throngs and enjoy some of this: Aren't those crazy cool!! I love that my camera has a setting for fireworks!

We got to celebrate with our awesome friend Lolly:

And here are a couple of photos of the fam having a good time:

I also took a couple of fun videos. This first one is of Asher running through the smoke of a stink bomb holding his breath! He's UBER cute!!

In this next one Geoff starts belting The Star Spangled Banner and Lolly chimes in!

Hope you all had a great holiday!!