Foster Care Licensing Chaos

Omgosh, we're finally done with all our foster care licensing!  We are just waiting for the final approval.  We started back in October and it took all of my free energy and time.  I'd take care of the kids all day and study late into the night.  Add 3 home inspections to that, CPR/First aid training, gaining 2 foster kids and losing 1, renters moving in and out, and just a normal large family chaos..... you get a lot of coffee.  Ha ha.  Ahhhhh, free time.  A little bit.

Large family life has really upped it's game on me.  I can hardly keep up.  I'm finally starting to realize that 10 kids (eight of my own and two foster kids) is about all I can handle.  No joke.  It has always been my dream to have my own kids but take in a couple and I'm living that dream!  I loooooove my life and so grateful for everything.  

Our foster daughter has never been to Disneyland so we are trying hard to make that happen for her. It's just gonna cost a ton to bring a large family there for the two day ticket price.  $1,902 to be exact.  That's JUST the entrance fee.  Wouldn't it just be so amazing to bring in kids and bless them with some adventures, hugs, and fun?  Yay!  A lot of time they go through some pretty rough stuff, traumatizing stuff.  I've known some that were trapped in their home and can't even go outside.  I had one foster son where his dream was to see the ocean.  He was moved to a group home before we could take him. For now, we can't wait to show the beach and Disneyland to our foster daughter.  But, ohhhh, the cost of traveling, hotel, and tickets are a bunch.  We're gonna give it our very best shot and if save like mad.

MY HEART FEELS SO BLESSED!  

Fun at the Beach and Knott's Berry Farm 2015!

What an amazing, fun time we had in California!  We took my family and some of our best friends came along with us in our 15 passenger van.  We stayed in the Knott's Berry Farm hotel with connecting rooms for four days. 

The first day we go there we wanted to check out the Santa Monica Beach.  That is definitely a fun beach if you are okay with the crowds.  It wasn't too bad being it was such a popular beach.  Maybe the summer would be worse?  On the pier there are so many options of fun.  You pick from tons of restaurants, my husband's fave was Bubba Gump Shrimp.  There are rides.  Being that the next day we were gonna hit up Knott's Berry Farm, we decided to just go on the ferris wheel and check out the sun setting on the ocean.  Was gorgeous!!!  That is definitely a very FUN beach!

Kyle and Ryan

 

Kyle (11)

 

Chaz (14)



Caleb (5)

We had saved up and prepaid for almost all our vacation before we got there.  The hotel and the tickets to Knott's Berry Farm included.  Another option we had when purchasing tickets was add meal bands and souvenir cups.  I was a tad worried buying the meal bands in advance.  What if it wasn't worth it?  Meal bands are $34 each and give you access to 6 restaurants in the amusement park.  Each ones has meals you can pick from AND you can eat every hour and a half!  One meal at Knott's Berry Farm can be anywhere from $10-15 so that band is definitely worth it.  In fact, we only got it for the kids that were gonna run around the park riding rides without us.  The ones that were with us, we only got the band for every other kid. The meals were so big it was easy to share.  Best money spent for food ever. The cups were worth it as well as you get free refills allllll day for that one day.  We refilled a lot and they even make it to where you can hang the cups from a stroller.  I didn't need to even use the cup holders.  Being I was 35 weeks pregnant with baby Jaxon, I could ride any of the rides.  The older kids ran everywhere while Charles and I stayed in the Snoopy area with the younger ones.  I had no idea they would make it so fun and have so many options of neat things to ride.  Even our 2 year old Juliet was able to do a lot!  Yep, my suspicions are confirmed.  My wild 2 year old isn't afraid of anything and would ride anything that was allowed for her.  She laughed her head off on every ride. We waited till we could get discounts so it was $305 for my family of 9 for the day.  Way cheaper than our last visit to Disneyland and faster, shorter lines. 

 



 



Our third day we went to Seal Beach.  It was so neat seeing the military ships way off in the distance.  That's partly why I wanted to go.  I think every time we go to a beach, we like to try a different one.  This was new!  The kids were able to see seals, starfish, and other fun sea stuff.  The day was warm and this time we weren't freezing with sweaters!  I was so worried we'd get a foggy or rainy day.  It's hard to plan in advance because you never know how the weather is gonna be.  It was great!  It was an amazing day and we didn't plan anything else as we just wanted it to be all about our time together at the beach.  Sigh.  It was great!!!

Ivy (9)

Ryan (13) holding dead stingray





See full album HERE!!!

Second Day in Vegas

Forgive me for not posting much! My computers stink and I'm having so many problems with them. It gets so irritating that I'm resorting to blogging from my phone again. I don't like it because it pushes all my pictures to the bottom of my posts. Oh well. I'm such a busy mom it's hard to find time to sit at a computer anyway. :P I'm writing at the dentist office while my kids are getting their checkups.

Our second day in Vegas we were feeling like we didn't get to see enough and had a family discussion about staying longer. So when my sister Jodee asked if we wanted to come visit their church. I was like yeah! Jodee and Dan have always amazed me because ever since they got married, even before, they just had a vision to reach souls for Christ. They haven't looked back since. They even built a church in South Africa for several years and did a really good work there. So we were excited to see them while visiting in the area. The kids got to see their cousins. That's all the pictures you're seeing on here. ;)

After church we went to the Bellagio and watched the fountains. It was around 11pm but we didn't care. Vegas is fabulous at night! The fountains were so beautiful and are synchronized with music.

It is super fun to shop in Vegas. I've always loved bling on everything and that's where I can find it real easy and not overly expensive. Charles is stinking awesome because he kept making me go into stores to buy all my favorite stuff. Even if I was holding back he would tell me to find stuff because it's harder to get where we live. :D Yay for guys that love to give to their wife!

Bringing Our Large Family to Las Vegas

True to our former ways, Charles and I took our family off on an adventure.  We are known for not really planning.  Just deciding one day to up and take off for another fun trip.  5 years ago we were eating breakfast and decided to take our kids to Disneyland.  We picked up the kids from school and took off for 7 days.  The kids still talk about that trip!  Ashley was a baby and I had just found out I was pregnant with our sixth child.  It was an amazing trip.

Sometimes planning is good but sometimes it takes the fun out of it for me.  We knew we might do something but we literally didn't know what we were gonna do for sure until the day of our trip.  All we knew was we wanted a Christmas get away!  I'm not usually the traditional type where I have to keep up with different traditions for the holidays.  If it gets to where it's the same year after year, we have to shake it up a bit.

 We decided to take our kids to Knott's Berry Farm in California for Christmas and then to the beach.  The night before our trip my husband said he's always wanted to take the kids to see the Vegas lights in Nevada.  I'm like, "Okay, we'll pop in there for a couple of days and then head off to California."  We made sure not to arrive into Las Vegas till night because we wanted the kids to see all the lights from very far away.  Well, that's not hard when driving far and with a large family.  We had to make tons of potty stops.

  The kids loved all the lights in Vegas!  They oohed and awed.  It was getting late so we headed quickly to our hotel.  Because we knew Las Vegas could be iffy for families, actually for Christians in general, we tried to figure out a casino hotel to stay in that was safe.  You know, simple things like not wanting strippers on a pole while trying to check in our hotel.  Someone suggested we try Circus Circus because it's so family friendly.  TRUE it is very family friendly.  We weren't very pleased with our room and it was pretty outdated.  The service was very slow and the lobby for horrendously crowded with families.  Normally that is a good thing but it really did feel like a circus. LOL.  

Regardless of our hotel we had soooo much fun looking at everything that the kids voted to make the entire trip about Vegas and not leave so soon.  Fine with us! Less driving and more sightseeing! Even though we got checked into our hotel late we HAD to walk around the casino and look for a yummy buffet.  They had a decent one except for how expensive it was.  Basically $16 per person. Normally not a big deal with one other person but there were nine of us. Well, I had to show the kids how awesome Las Vegas buffets are!  It was huge and the kids were having to go into different rooms to find all the different types of food. It was goooood.

As much as I wanted to live it up, we passed out early because of all the traveling.  Oh well, the next day we would live it up!

Celebrating 13 Years Married and Adventures!

That doesn't feel like a long time to some but in this world, it actually is!  Thank GOD I married my best friend.  Makes the ups and downs a bit easier to handle.  :D

We had so many fun adventures in our first year of marriage.  I can't  believe how much we did before we had kids.  I got pregnant our 11th month of marriage.  Just 3 months before I became pregnant with our first, we made a trip to the Grand Canyon and hiked down it 6 hours.  Our feet were completely blistered by the time we reached the bottom and made camp. We got to swim next to the Havasupai Falls and race down the river.  It was gorgeous.  No, I don't wear bikini's anymore. Since that picture is sooooo tiny of me, I'm not embarrassed to post it. :)

Eating at the Indian village waiting
for helicopter

The next day there was a warning of a flash flood coming from the ranger.  Even though the skies were clear like you see in the picture, there was definitely one coming and we weren't taking chances.  We threw back on our 80lb packs and raced uphill 2 miles to a nearby indian village.  Even while we were quickly racing to get to safety, muddy water was rushing closer and closer next to our feet.  Once we reached the village we were safe for a bit and away from water but we had to get out of there.

Once we reached the village we took a helicopter out to safety.  The year before people had died from a flash flood so we weren't taking any chances.  Two years after this picture was taken, this helicopter crashed and killed everyone inside.  Crazy, huh?


From there we headed to Vegas. For us, it wasn't to gamble.  We just basically went site seeing and visiting the yummy buffets. My husband forgot to inform me about this part of the trip so I did not pack anything fancy at all.  So here were were walking around in hiking clothes and boots. For some reason I have no pictures of us here.  A funny memory was getting locked out of our hotel in our pajamas.  We were with family and didn't know where they were so we just had to sit by our room on the floor till they came hours later with the key.  People in evening gowns kept passing us from the elevator looking at us strangely.  

Then we headed to Utah and got to experience being at a cowboy camp.  It was such a neat place where you stay in cabins and do lots of fun activities. We went shooting, zip lining, cliff repelling, rock climbing, riding ATV's, horseback riding, sitting around a campfire at night.  It was awesome!

3 months later I found out I was pregnant with our first.  We weren't trying, but hey, it got the ball rolling and I've had 6 other fantastic, life changing surprises after that.  Ever since then we have experienced so many adventures since having kids and I wouldn't trade any of it for anything in this world.  Having a family is so awesome.

Those Crazy Wonderful Summers

Caleb has it soooo easy around here

Today we went to a birthday party for a friend's kid and when dropping them off, we saw how cool of a place it was and didn't want to leave.  When we were there a friend asked us if we were so happy to have our kids going back to school now that summer break is over.

No way.

I enjoyed every bit of this summer and my only regret is not getting out more.  We just had a tough summer and couldn't do a whole lot.  We had plans for different adventures around town but mostly stayed in and just hung out together. I CAN'T believe they are going back to school in just a few days.  Sigh.  I don't know.  It just is so hard to think that they are gone ALLLLLLL day like that and don't get home till around 4pm. That's hardly any time I get with them.

Sigh.....again.

The girls put him in a padded basket w/ his
favorite cereal and carried him around.

Yet when I think about homeschooling, I fall short.  I have no problem homeschooling the younger grades but when they start getting up there, I worry that I could keep up with their training.  I'm 32 years old and I have an extremely short attention span already.  You should've seen me in school.  Teachers dreaded me because of my short attention span and extreme hyperness.  Getting me to sit down for hours to this day is impossible.  I-M-P-O-S-S-I-B-L-E. Ask Michele.  <--- Ha. I always tell you to ask her because she knows me more than anyone.

My days have NEVER EVER been busier than these last few weeks and I don't know why.  More than just my kids being here.  I think it's been more about decluttering and other odds and ends that are not part of a normal day.  Another thing is I've been really focusing on really listening to the kids when they talk to me. Even if it's something I think is silly.  I'll take the time to discuss it with them.  (Even if I'm holding back a smile because their issue is so small to me but SOOO HUGE to them.)  I guess it's harder being a parent that really builds a relationship rather than one who throws them on the back burner to watch the boob tube or do my own thing all day.  I really treasure our time together.  Sigh.  I just don't want to to go away for sooo many hours a day.  Wouldn't part time school be awesome?  Can't they cut down the hours some?  Often I lose track of what I was doing because I LET the kids interrupt my activity so they can show me something.  

It really has been a peaceful summer because no one broke a bone or got airlifted to the hospital for any reason.  I mean, Kyle did bash his face on a friend's door frame at her house.  He now has a permanent face dimple (right on his cheek).  Not sure what to do about that.  The doctor said you can only fix it by surgery.

I really like these pictures because it shows the activity in our living room.  Calie (my friend's kid staying over) playing a game, my son Kyle being himself by falling over, and his friend sitting on the couch.  The other 5 kids were running around outside the view of the camera.

Pulling a Thelma and Louise?

I can't tell you what a blessing it's been for my family being able to do reviews for companies.  I know it might seem as if I'm advertising but think about it.  I'm looking for items that I can actually use or give as gifts.  In turn, this is a huge money saver for my family.  Not only that, sometimes I'm allowed to give one away and bless another family.  Just want to put that out as a side note for my readers.  ;) I promise if something stinks I'll tell you the truth.  Or I'll tell the positives and negatives on it.  If you hate seeing the reviews, hopefully you can look past them and just read my regular posts like these ones in between.

Guess what?  My friend and I with 4 of our kids will be traveling somewhere tomorrow for a couple of days. Her daughter will be in a wedding so we'll be getting a hotel overnight.  HOPEFULLY we can party hardy (in a Christian fashion) and stay up late.  Who knows. These days I've been kind of a wimp and hittin' the hay early.  So going to bed after 10pm might be my body's idea of being extreme.  Heh heh.  I've even signed up with AAA to make sure if us girls get stranded, we'll have someone to come rescue us.  Ta ta house cleaning and responsibilities!  I'll see you when I get back!  Don't worry, we won't pull a Thelma and Louise on anyone.  No robbing banks either.  I'm assuming that since no one else knows how to cook here they'll be eating lots of Ramen and cereal.  We just want us girls to get away for a couple of days and take a mini break and since we have our husband's blessings we're gonna have fun.  It's funny because between the both of us we'll still have 4 kids but that's still less than the usual 9 so it's a break.