Fattest baby ever

This pic is a pretty good representation of her fatness/cuteness...it deserved it's own post

A great day at the zoo!

This has been the week of field trips! Monday, I joined Little Joe and his friends to the Science musuem. He is a very popular boy with many little buddies...or amigos I should say. Sara's name is actually "sa-RAA" and Ismarie is actually "is-MA-ree" and Jyro is actually "HI-ro" whatever. Either way I found it so funny that he had so many friends because his teacher always tells me he has a problem cleaning his own toys up. When she asks him to, she turns around to find him delegating his chores to a handful of friends. I guess that will come in handy later in life. I rode down on the bus, but on the way back I was told there were too many people and I needed to ride back with one of the parents. Luckily, one of the dads did drive and had a large car for me and a few other parents to ride back in. Little Joe kept asking what kind of car "Damien's daddy" had. I told him, "A truck." "Was it a monster truck?" asked Little Joe. "No." "Oh. was it a truck like Uncle Steven's?" "No Joe. It was a truck like Stefanie's." Stefanie is my friend with a Ford Explorer. And he said, "Oh. Was it an Expedition?" It was very cute. He's obsessed with cars, and terms like Truck, Car, convertable etc aren't good enough. Ask him what kind of car I have...he'll tell you it's a Dodge Caliber. His favorites are Range Rovers. Go figure. Anyways, we had a lot of fun, but I forgot my camera!!

Yesterday the high was around 80 so I called my boss and said I wanted to go to the zoo, but wasn't sure because I had taken a half day earlier in the week and I had a few things to do. She was mortified I wanted to go to the zoo! I didn't understand until my light bulb went off because it's February, and she's lived in Toronto all her life. when I explained that it was 80 degrees outside, she demanded I stay logged in and take a few hours to head off to the zoo. I wanted to prove I was able to follow directions and did as I was told. I packed up my wagon (thanks mom!) went to Stacy's house to get Jackson, Juliana and Jadah (Jackson's cousin that is two weeks older) and we all went to the zoo. It was great, all the kids were free and I had a coupon so it didn't cost anything! it was their first time there, and they just couldn't get over the fact that there are more animals in life than birds, squirrels and dogs. We all had a ball...despite the retarded elephant we affectionately named Stevie Wonder (watch the video, you'll see why)

Mallory enjoying Steven's birthday donuts.

she was a little concerned about the balloons floating above her but thrilled about the refreshments.

Politically Incorrect

THE LITTLE RED HEN!

Who will help me Plant My Wheat?
'Not I,' said the cow.
'Not I,' said the duck.
'Not I,' said the pig.
'Not I,' said the goose.

'Then I will do it by myself,' said the little red hen, and so she did. The wheat grew very tall and ripened into golden grain. 'Who will help me reap my wheat?' asked the little red hen.
'Not I,' said the duck..
'Out of my classification,' said the pig.
'I'd lose my seniority,' said the cow.
'I'd lose my unemployment compensation,' said the goose.

'Then I will do it by myself,' said the little red hen, and so she did. At last it came time to bake the bread. 'Who will help me bake the bread?' asked the little red hen.
'That would be overtime for me,' said the cow.
'I'd lose my welfare benefits,' said the duck.
'I'm a dropout and never learned how,' said the pig.
'If I'm to be the only helper, that's discrimination,' said the goose.

'Then I will do it by myself,' said the little red hen. She baked five loaves and held them up for all of her neighbors to see. They wanted some and, in fact, demanded a share. But the little red hen said, 'No, I shall eat all five loaves.'
'Excess profits!' cried the cow. (Nancy Pelosi)
'Capitalist leech!' screamed the duck. (Barbara Boxer)
'I demand equal rights!' yelled the goose. (Jesse Jackson )
The pig just grunted in disdain. (Ted Kennedy)

And they all painted 'Unfair!' picket signs and marched around and around the little red hen, shouting obscenities. Then the farmer (Obama) came. He said to the little red hen, 'You must not be so greedy.'

'But I earned the bread,' said the little red hen.

'Exactly,' said Barack the farmer. 'That is what makes our free enterprise system so wonderful. Anyone in the barnyard can earn as much as he wants. But under our modern government regulations, the productive workers must divide the fruits of their labor with those who are lazy and idle.' And they all lived happily ever after, including the little red hen, who smiled and clucked, 'I am grateful, for now I truly understand. 'But her neighbors became quite disappointed in her. She never again baked bread because she joined the 'party' and got her bread free. And all the Democrats smiled. 'Fairness' had been established. Individual initiative had died, but nobody noticed; perhaps no one cared...so long as there was free bread that 'the rich' were paying for.

EPILOGUE:
Bill Clinton is getting $12 million for his memoirs.
Hillary got $8 million for hers.
That's $20 million for the memories from two people, who for eight years, repeatedly testified, under oath, that they couldn't remember anything.

IS THIS A GREAT BARNYARD OR WHAT ?

Checkin In

Sorry, I forgot I'm the glue that holds this blog together.  You might call me the glog.

Anyway, I guess I do have some cool stuff to write about.  For President's Day weekend, Miranda and I decided to head up to the Salt Lake area and hang out for a few days.  Matthew and Sarah spent some time at Mom and Dad's and that was nice to see the kids and play the Wii.  I kicked Miranda's butt at MarioKart.

So here's a play-by-play:

Friday night we went to the Kings Singers at Abravanel Hall.  One of Miranda's former roommates works for the Utah Symphony, so we got $58 tickets for $9.  That was awesome, and we had great seats.  Afterwards, we got to meet all of them, and I got autographs from each.  We also met David Cho, who is the director of the symphony.  So that was an awesome evening.

Saturday we went to breakfast with mom and dad at Golden Corral, which was delicious.  Later we went to a friends wedding, then up to Salt Lake for dinner with Matthew and Sarah at the Cheesecake Factory and a play at the Desert Star.  The play was great, and Matthew and Sarah hooked us up with great seats.

Sunday was church.  And food.

Monday we decided to go to Park City to stroll about and enjoy the scene.  By the time we got there, it was cold and snowing, so we decided to just go get pizza.  But then we decided to go to Red Robin, which is in Murray.  So we went to lunch in Murray, via Heber and Park City.

Tuesday morning we went to the Draper Temple open house, which was really nice.  The Temple was of course beautiful.  The baptistry was huge, and the bride's changing room was ugly.  Which is okay, because I'll never see it again.  Then Miranda had to teach a workshop in the evening, so I kinda hung out around Salt Lake for a while till she was done so we could head home.  Because she ended up teaching the workshop, her company paid for the whole trip.  She's a catch.

In fact, we're planning on going to southern California (where she is from) in a couple weeks for Spring Break.

It's getting warmer here in Cedar City, so warm in fact that we decided to play a little sand volleyball last Saturday.  We had a boombox blaring 90's pop and we were all in shorts, trying to force summer.  The beauty of it was that there was still snow on the side of the court.

So that's my life.  This should cover me for a week or two.

When you're this cool...

...the sun shines on you 24-hours a day.

Nicole and Tierney went out to do some shopping over the weekend. Carter's had a sale on sunglasses!

Where's Bubba?

Haven't heard from Bubba "We Should Start A Family Blog" Jackson lately. What are you doing, Bubba?

i can't comment!

Seriously, why can't i leave comments on people's posts?? I have so many funny jokes I'm having to keep bottled up inside! I mean, the coin challenge? C'mon...I would say we should have a Clinton coin, but I'd just blow it. or the Abraham Lincoln coin? Nah, it would get mixed up with the pennies and dimes when we all know they need to be kept seperate...
totally kidding.
but really, why can't i post comments??

Are you happy with your cell plan?

We're thinking about getting Tierney a cell phone, but I'm not sure I want to stick with the all new AT&T. What provider are you with, and are you happy with your plan? Anyone have a phone that can be entirely voice activated? Tierney's fingers are too little and uncoordinated to work the buttons.

Let's Hear Your Dreams (Nightmares)

So, does anyone have any unusual dreams you would like to share? I could post one almost very day. For example, last night was just a typical dream. I actually was worth $800 million (my check from Obama must have come in), but I took a job with someone named Billy-Roy. I am not sure what my job was and what my pay was, but took the job anyway. We were at dinner with about 8 other employees (some of who I recognized, others not) at a Chinese place. I got up to check to the place out and found in one section of the restaurant, there were booths in a sunken area that was filled with water, about seat deep in which gold-fish were swimming around.

Later, I decided I would go in to town to buy some clothes. You could actually swim there as there was an Olympic sized pool that started at a point where I was staying, took a left turn, then a right. The closer I got to town, the width of the pool got smaller until it was just a little creek at the end. Also, it had turtles and seals in it that swam along beside you. But the closer to town, the seals and turtles were more like slimy eels.

Can you top that? Pops.

Martin who?

Paul- who the hell is Martin Van Buren? I would like to see myself on the dollar coin. I was the best president our laurel's class had ever seen! (btw- Tierney is SO cute!!!)

And Mom, here's a talk I heard recently. You know how when you go to Seagull book they have talks going on over the speakers? Well, this lady was talking about how her ear was hurting so bad. She just kept itching it, couldn't sleep, and was in constant pain. She went to the doctor numerous times and after a few treatments that didn't work, they did surgery or something to see what was going on in there. Apparently she had itched her ear too much because in her ear canal was the top part of her FAKE fingernail. True story. I couldn't hear the rest of her talk over the sound of my vomit, so I'm not sure what her point was? Itch your ear too much and you'll get your fingernail in your ear canal, I suppose. So disgusting.


Also, we can list the calendar of birthdays on the side. If you go to "customize" it'll pull up what the outline of the blog is. Click "add a gadget" and pick where you think it would be the best. I suggest "Add a list." Then, just enter the info, click save and tah-duh! All done!

-Sarah

today we had a stake relief society thing and a woman told the following story. She was very ill, had been in the icu 17 times in one year and finally decided it might be time to prepare her children that she might die. she called them into her room, six children, ages 13 -6 and had them sit on the bed. Then she said, you know i've been very sick and i think we need to face the possibility that I might die. If that happened i would want your dad to get married again. i know he loves me and i love him but i wouldn't want him to spend his life alone. (children protest, cry) so if your dad remarried and you had a step mother i would want you to be nice to her and learn to love her. just think, i hate to camp and she'd probably love camping so you'd have lots of fun. i can't sew but i bet she could and you'd have cute clothes or at least clothes with buttons and no holes in them. and i hate to cook but i bet she'll be a great cook and you'll have the best meals ever. There was silence and then the six year old smiled at her and said, just when do you think you'll die?

the other classes were great also. i normally avoid such things but the stake rs pres. did me a huge favor a few years ago and i went to support her.

i am going to post in a few days a calendar w/all the birthdays on it. sarah, is there some way it could be permanent? mom

p.s. your dad cheats! anonymous

i am pretty sure that Martin Van Buren was the first sec'y of the treasury. and am also desperate for a dollar! who knew? Let me think, I'd kind of like to see a truman dollar, you know the buck stops here. mom

Teeth!

Not only has Tierney been sick (she's finally much better, thanks!) she's been teething. We managed to get a good photo of her little tooths after dinner tonight! Check out other new pics, including shots of T-bro with her new shades, at our Jackson-Antoine blog/Picasa gallery.

First Ever JFB Gold Coin Giveaway!

I was at the bank today cashing a check (a rare occurrence...who uses cash anymore?) when a glint of gold caught my eye. I didn't realize the US Mint is releasing a line of Presidential Gold Coins, featuring four releases a year. I picked up several mint condition Martin Van Buren's today just because I thought they were cool.

So here's the giveaway part: Simply post a reply to this message offering your opinion as to why Martin Van Buren is coin-worthy, and I'll send you one of these legal tender one dollar coins!

Include in your reply the name of the president you would most like to see on a gold coin and why, and I'll include a BONUS coin! That's two coins just for participating on the family blog!

I think I'd like to see the George W Bush one dollar coin, although they're already devalued to fifty cents. The Barack Obama gold coin is already valued at $1.50 however based on speculation that they'll almost immediately jump in value. But with the Obama coin, no one is going to the banks to get them...everyone is waiting for the government to just send them out. (See how much fun this contest could be? There are TONS of jokes out there just with the mental image of keeping the Clinton coin in your pocket!)

Offer is open to immediate Jackson family members, their current spouses (Ava is excluded...she has enough of my dollars already) and their children.

Paul

Fun with the Babies

Monday was a paid holiday, but Joe still had Preschool so it was just me and the babies. I've heard Mike say several times how easy it is minus ONE kid. It doesn't matter which one, but if you take one away for some reason things are ten times easier. I've found that true at my house too. We missed big brother Joe, but really enjoyed baby time yesterday. When Juliana was taking her nap I went to the bathroom and came out to find Jackson watching his new favorite movie..."The Wedding Singer" with Adam Sandler. He's a huge Adam Sandler fan. While I was cooking dinner, the boys were in charge of picking up all the toys. While singing the "Clean Up" song Jacks went to the hall closet, pulled out the vacuum, plugged it in and went to work. Awesome. Totally awesome.

Time Flies

Ahhh, they grow up so fast. One day they are laying on the floor cooing and the next they are standing on their own. There have been several days where I have thought "If I can just make it through the next couple of hours, I'll be fine." and then all of a sudden, my barely 6 month old baby has teeth and stands on her own. She got so big SO fast. Btw, would it be totally inappropriate to wax my babys eyebrows? Just in the middle...

Sick Little Baby

This is how we've been spending our days lately. Tierney has been one sick little girl! It started with a cold about three weeks ago and a residual cough. The cough got worse until we took her to the ER last Sunday and she was diagnosed with bronchiolitis and Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV). She's been getting regular albuterol treatments with a home nebulizer and has been on steroids for the past few days. Not sure if she's breathing better, but she's really bulked up nicely.

It's been pretty serious at times this week, and very stressful for everyone. It has really made me far more empathetic and sensitive to parents who have children who really are sick. Not that Tierney isn't very sick, but there are kids that are a lot worse off.

We're going back to the Dr tomorrow in hopes of avoiding another day in the ER over the weekend. Prayers on our behalf are always appreciated!

For all you out of state suckers!

So, the other day I called Mom and I was telling her how I wanted to get out of the house, but not sure what to do. She told me to come down there and we'd go to Chuck E Cheeses. Seriously......how friggin' awesome is that? (To top it off she offered to take the kids back to her house after for a little while so I could get an errand done....seriously awesome....) So the kids spent their day with their Mom and Grandma living it up at Chuck's. We had a great time, and we are so, so, so lucky to have her close. She really is the best Grandma ever guys. So, although I love you all tons....stay away. She's mine!

Mason stayed on this trolley forever. He would just sit on it and kids would come and sit on the other side and put in their coin, so he'd get a free ride. He must have sat on that ride for at least 20 min. Genius.
Mallory spent 95% of the time sitting by Mom playing with the tokens. She would just take them from one cup and put it in the other over and over again. She loved it! It was the funniest thing. Here she was surrounded by all these cool games and all she wanted to do was sit and sort out the coins. She's so awesome.

After the coins, she figured out what Chucks is all about. She spent the rest of the time climbing on the skee ball with her brother and pulling the tickets out of the machines. Whether our family member was using that machine or not. Hey, you snooze you lose.

Mom, here's a picture of Mallory in the coat you gave her. I finally got you a picture! Isn't she so adorable? I seriously love that coat. And I put this little ballerina outfit under it. She loved it because it was all poofy! It was really cute. Tanner kept calling her "Princess." I told him that I was the princess around here. Just kidding. I'm way out of my league with Mallie. There's no contest.

Now if only we could do something with her hair......

Just a Few Thoughts

It's been a few days since anyone put anything up here, so I thought I'd chip in my two cents. Which is good, because a few things are on my mind right now. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. Remember that girl that I said I was thinking about dating? I'm not thinking about it anymore, I actually am.
2. People in southern Utah, particularly in my town of Cedar City, somehow think it's okay to start a conversation with "What are you doing?" This annoys me to no end. The people I work with say it all the time, and I find it ridiculous. It's obvious what I'm doing, I'm talking to you, stupid. Furthermore, what business is it of yours? If you would have started with "Hi, how are you?" I would be fine with telling you what I'm doing. But don't just go starting out with that! I love this town, but this one thing is in and of itself reason enough for me to leave. My frustration is compounded by the fact that I know I can't get mad at them, that's just how they were raised. Getting mad at them would make me no better than Al Qaeda.
3. I also hate the term "hubby."
4. I saw Indiana Jones (the first one) for the first time in my life last night. Underwhelming. But I'm glad it's out of the way so I don't ever have to see it again.

What a worthless post.


Bubba

On a lighter note..

Last night Jackson did NOT want to go to sleep. I had to go in several times and keep putting him back in his bed. It was weird becuase it was the first time I've had that problem...now thinking about it- It may have had something to do with the fact I gave him kool aid before his bed time...hmmm...
Anyways, I kept hearing a dull thud and when I went in there Little Joe told me that Jackson was throwing shoes. I popped him and put him back in his bed. This scenario happened a couple more times. Finally, I hear Little Joe crying his head off. I went in there, Jackson was laying in the bed with his eyes closed, and Little Joe said "Jackson threw this at me!" and it was a big wooden puzzle board. Jackson popped up and said "Whoa! What's that? What happened?" He thinks he is so slick. He got his first real spanking last night. For those of you that know me, I don't play when it comes to bedtime...and now Jackson knows it too. Cute little guy

More Divorce Details...

In response to the several questions commented on my last post:
1. Expensive is $3,000. which, is a deal from the regular $5500 since this lawyer is the father in law of my boss. He's super qualified, and very successful. If I could poop money, I'd sit at home eating prunes until I had $3,000
2. I would like to think that this divorce will be uncontested. I'm agreeing to some visitation (no custody) I get the house and my car, in exchange for his crap truck. Child support will be handled through another outlet since that process have already started (see #3) I agree to visitation since he won't come anyway. I will also have a clause that states I'm not confined to anywhere, and can move where i want when the divorce is final. I will have full custody, and he gets no say in anything I do with them. hes agreed to these terms, however before the child support hearing he said he'd give me whatever I wanted and then threw such a fit, we are getting sent to court. That's why I'm nervous about filing anything myself without proper representation.
3. Child Support - We went to a meeting and fought over the monthly amount. he wanted it based off his current wage (part time at $9/hr) and I wanted it based off his salary history of full time at $15/hr. She agreed to make an amount between the two, but he refused to provide any old salary info. I got $350/month. For those of you without kids, that covers formula and half a month supply of diapers for one baby. nevermind the other ones diapers, food or child care costs. anyway, I wouldn't sign because it said I had to stay in Denton County for the rest of my life we could have altered the papers to say otherwise, but he wouldn't let me. So, now they have to send us to court. I'm still waiting on the paperwork for that with the date.

It's a mess. For a guy that hardly comes around and is totally unsupportive, he sure has a sense of entitlement. I heard through a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend that he's coming back home, but he's just not ready yet. But, when he is ready I'll let him come back and everything will be good again. he also told me that he was victimized by me because I was so degrading to him. I'm not going to pretend to be perfect, and I absolutely have been that way towards him in the past few months. I've been mean as a snake. However, that didn't start until a few months ago. He's so out of touch with reality. For those of you curious, I will not be getting back together with him. Ever. It's sad. My family is in shambles, but there is no possibilty of reconsiliation at this point.

Advice!!

Does anyone have any thoughts on which would be better: Getting an expensive lawyer that I can't afford, or filing for divorce myself using an online service lik https://www.legalzoom.com/

Cowboy Showtime

So we went to Showtime Utah in swingin' downtown PG (https://www.showtimeutah.com/) last night. Mom won discounted tickets off of a local auction and we had to use them by last night. We wanted to go when "The Mamma's Boys" were featured (a cowboy band made up of the Shumway family (neighbor and 1c Stake Presy) and his boys. They were not playing but we were significantly entertained by the Dryer Highway - 3 very talented youngsters. Great night of food and entertainment. Unfortunately their can-can dancers didn't show up for work last night so they had to recruit from the audience. Kinda hard to see, but that is Matt on the left end of the bad picture.