Miracles With Car Trouble

Miracles happen still. About two weeks ago I had my 36 week doctor visit. It was a really quick visit everything looked good and I think it was extra fast because the previous week I had just seen the high risk doctors and had gotten a growth check on baby girl, so really all I need was a strep B test, but it was still good to go. She is head down, which is great and according the ultrasound done at the high risk doctor’s office they estimate she would be about 9.5# if she goes all the way until the due date. Anyway, I finished up my appointment and went out to the car. Started it up, called Gaupo to let him know everything checked out good, and then I went over a little bump in the road and my dashboard lit up and the battery light stayed on. I didn’t know what to do. Gaupo said, told me to find a place to pull off to try and turn it off and on again, but I didn’t know where to do that. I had just turned onto an unfamiliar road to head to Costco. Well, he said just keep going then, so I did. I got all the way to Costco turned it off and then turned it back on. It started up fine and so I was like now what.

 Gaupo said, “go ahead and just go shopping. “

Me: “What if it dies while I am in there and it wont start and I frozen stuff?”

Gaupo: “Call me.”

Me: “Ok.”

So, I go in and get the shopping I need to done. I load it in the car and start it up. It starts, so I head home. I was so nervous because I needed to take the interstate home and my car dying going 75miles an hour seemed scary. I took it a little slower. On my way home, Lindsay who had the kids for me called and said to just take the groceries home and then come get the kids. I don’t know why I didn’t tell her about the car trouble,  but I didn’t and instead said okay. Then I hung up and silently pleaded, “Heavenly Father, please just let me get home.” I got home without any problems. I shut off the car unloaded my stuff, grabbed some lunch, quick deboned the rotiseree chickens, and then got back in the car to go grab my kids. The car started again, so I headed out. I got to Jack and Lindsay’s house and rolled up the windows and locked the car and went in. I visited with Jack for a bit and then got the kids. It was now raining outside so I let the kids kind of play in it and then said we should go see if we can go home. Well, I went to the car and it wouldn’t start. Like nothing, super dead. So, Jack pulled his car and cables out and gave me a jump. It started when connected but died and soon as we took it off. Jack worked with it a bit and got it to stay on, but by the time I loaded the kids it was dead again. So, we decided to hangout until Guapo could bring a new battery and be with us. The kids had a great time. The twins and I laid down for a nap and the big kids played. Then we all played and enjoyed until Gaupo got there. He and Jack put the new battery in and it started. The light was still on, but Gaupo figured it just needed to be cinched down and would do it when we got home, so we loaded up and headed out me and the kids in the van and Gaupo in his truck.

 We were headed out and I started smeeling something kind of funny, so I told Gaupo that the car was smelling weird. We pulled over and he smelled it and said it would be okay. So, I drive on and hit a little bump and the dash just lights up all over again. I call Gaupo and tell him I am not going to drive home he can. So, we switch cars and head home. We get about 1.5 miles from our house and Gaupo pulls off. The car was completely dead. I pulled up my State Farm app and ordered a tow truck. It was so slick and fast I could hardly believe it, but so grateful at the same time. Once the tow truck loaded the car and towed it to the dealership for repairs we got in the truck and headed home.

Getting a tow.

It turns out a valve had leaked onto the alternator and ruined the alternator. So, we got that repaired and as of Monday afternoon it seems to be working fine. I sure hope so. I really like my van and am not ready to replace it so hopefully this keeps us in good shape for a bit.

 This experience just reminded me how miracles still happen. I was able to do everything I needed to do that day. We were safe. The car didn’t die on I-25. It didn’t die while I was driving it. We were able to have it safely on the side of the road not in a turn lane or at a light or something like that. We had relatives who we could spend an afternoon at their house and it was more fun than a worry. The tow truck was quick and responsive. There wasn’t more damage than there was. My pleading prayer was answered. I made it home and more so I made it off I-25 home and to my kids which is where I really wanted to be.

 I know Heavenly Father looks out for us. Things happen. Today I read in The Friend that life is suppose to be an adventure. We are here to have experiences to learn, grow, and do. The Lord is with us through it all, so though things may not go as planned for may not be what we wanted them to be they are here to bless us and if we keep the commandments and stay true to our covenants then we can know for certain that the Lord will use this life to help us become what we need to be.

Getting Restarted

I haven't written in forever. I don't even know where to start. We have done so much, missed so many 'major' events, its really hard to know where to start. In the last 9 months, we went to Idaho for Thanksgiving, Tia turned 8, Abby and Kade turned 3, Tia was baptized, so Grandma and Grandpa spent almost a week here, I am pregnant and due in about a month, I was released as Young Women President, Kylee turned 10, Jason and I both had birthdays, the school year ended, and so many other small things. This blog post would be endlessly long if I tried to back date, so I wont but know this past nine months have been fun, hard, and just such a great part of life.

 Kaitlyn, Kylee, Blaine, TIa, Hyrum, Naomi, Arlen, Kade, Abby, Jarom

Tia

Tia, Allen, Betty, Roxy, Abby, Kylee

Tia 

Tia and Guapo

Kylee and her new bike

Kylee turns 10

Jason Birthday that we spent at the Blaylock Cabin.

Tia and her teacher Mrs. Weglarz

Kylee and her teacher Mr. Wakeman

So, the big event of the week is Kylee participated in her first ever played. Back at the end of April I took Kylee and Tia to a musical at the high school and Kylee loved it. After it she told us 'I think I could do theater and do good. I want to be in one." So, I started looking. Summer programs filled up really fast this year, but I found a local one and it even offered a scholarship. I looked into the program to find out times, dates, if it was running and how to apply. Then I told Kylee about it. I told her I didn't know if the program would run, and I didn't know if she would get the scholarship, but she should apply. I told her if she applied for the scholarship and didn't get it but the program ran we would pay for her to go. She did it. I was pretty proud of her. She had to answer a couple questions about her theater experience and why she wanted do theater camp. She did pretty good writing and took comments to help better really well. Then she had to ask someone to be a reference for her. She wanted to ask me, but I told her I didn't count because I was giving her a scholarship if she didn't get this one. She emailed her teacher, Mr. Wakeman, and he agreed. It was a good experience for all of us just to have her apply. Long story short, she did get the scholarship and they did run the program so she has spent the last 2 weeks preparing to be in the Rainbow Fish Musical. 

Kylee was Silver Scale two and really enjoyed it. She loved going to camp. She practiced most days so she had her lines pretty memorized and her songs too. It was fun to just watch her embrace and try something new. Last night after her last performance she was in heaven and was bummed it was the end. I am so glad she had the chance to do something that was just for her and it was fun to be able to go watch her. We loved it. I loved watching her grow and learn. It was good to watch her practice then learn she needed to do a little more and practice some more. She always kept going and didn't give up.

 

We took everyone for the Saturday show.

Kylee the Silver Scale

One other brief things is summer break. We have officially been on break for 3 weeks. It has been busy as we have played with cousins, gone to Tia's tutoring, had theater camp, start piano for Tia, and then just played on our own. However, summer is such a great time. Its been fun to do these things and not have to worry about what we aren't doing academically. Summer is full of all the things my kids and I do well and we only spend maybe an hour on the things we are trying to get the hang of like piano and reading. I love watching my kids play with each other. I enjoy seeing what my big girls do to pass the nap time that happens in the afternoon. Its great to see our cousins. Its fun to be able to have fun.

Family Temple trip. Tia, Jay, Kylee, Abby, Kade, later joined by Roxy, and Betty

Family Bike Ride

Fall is Here

The kids are in school, the weather is more warm or cool than hot, the evenings are cool, and mornings are cooler. Fall is here. I love the fall colors, but I don't love that it means the end of summer. I actually needed to wear long pants a couple times and though it was fun I felt like I was giving up on my summer clothes. However, I really do not enjoy being cold, so the shorts have to be put away sometimes.

One of my favorite things about fall is it becomes bike riding weather. After we take the kiddos to school we come home and they almost always want to ride their bike. Usually they just ride in the neighborhood to go see the turtle or go to the park, but lately they have been wanting more. So, this past week I let them ride to the 'Richards park' which is not too far away. It is easy to get there, but a little rougher getting home because you have to go back up the hill. Then yesterday we went on our first family bike ride. It went good for awhile, but then the two big girls said it was hot and wanted to go home. I let them go home and we finished the bike ride the way the twins wanted. I would love for us to have stayed together the whole time, but it just wasn't worth it, and we all ended it having a good time even though we weren't together all the time. 

Another great part of fall, is the school's Fox Trot. I don't like the fundraising part of it, so we don't do that. However, I do love watching my kids run and cheering them on. Tia ran quite a bit of it and ended up with 5 3/4 laps and Kylee walked most of it and ended up with 4 1/2 laps. They both I think enjoyed it and me and the twins had fun cheering and marking laps (me) and playing (twins). 

Because the weather cools it allows for some project like cleaning the garage to get done.  The garage got a major overhaul. We moved everything around and have about double the space. It is so great. I love walking into the garage and knowing I can reach everything I need to and can find what we want. I am not going to run over a scooter or a bike. It so great. It took all day and wasn't smooth sailing the whole time, but we got it and it worked out well. 

Lately I have been super bad about taking pictures and the fox trot and garage cleaning were time I should have pictures but don't. They both really did happen though. 

Another big thing that happened is we had friends over to play games. We haven't done that in forever, mainly because our kids don't go to bed early anymore so we either have to start late or deal with kids during a game. However, we have really wanted to have Gaupo's co-worker and fiance over for games so we just took the plunge and hoped for the best. I was a little nervous about it because well they don't have kids and we have four. My house was kind of messy and I just don't feel like I sell how awesome it is to be a stay at home mom because I don't dress fancy (mainly because I am not fancy. I love a good t-shirt, jeans and ponytail), my house isn't super trendy, and our food isn't fancy. However, I got my house tidied up, made some delicious food (pizza and cookies and cream blondies), and forgot about everything else. It turned out really fun. The twins were with Gaupo and I most of the time, but the big kids did watch the movie. We had fun and they said they had fun, so hopefully we will do it again, because I really enjoyed it.

At this time, probably because I feel like it might end before I am ready, my heart is so full of gratitude to be home all the time. I also love to have my two buddies with me all the time. I love taking them for bike rides, going to the park, playing in the basement, going shopping or whatever else we decide to do. I love right now when we can just play and have a good time. No one tells me they should be doing this or doing that we just do what we want because we can. I love that I can be here when my big girls get home. I can make them breakfast and take them to school I love the conversations our family has at the dinner table. I love that we enjoy being together. I love that my kids love each other and play together. I love that being a mom is fulfilling to me. It is a gift that has been given to me and I love it because I feel like it is a great work. 

One last note, is this--sometimes my kids actually hear what we say. Duh, right, but seriously our family home evening nights and come follow me lessons are a zoo. The kids are up and down, touching each other, playing with toys, and I don't even know what else. It feel like once every other blue moon they will sit for half of what we have to say. We try and try and I don't know why they don't but its like they can't I don't get it. However, this week when Jake (Jason's co-worker) came over he asked about he organization of the church. You know what we talked about in family night this week just that. So, I started to explain, but you know who finished--Kylee. She listened enough to be able to tell Jake about church organization and I got a glimmer of hope that maybe just maybe despite all the chaos my kids are learning, and feeling the gospel in our home. Also, Jake mentioned while he was here "I don't know if I have ever seen a bunch of kids smile as much as you guys." That helped me and Jason see that really our kids are a pretty happy bunch. I mean yeah we have time when things are not happy around here. We have our fair share of tantrums, its-not-fair fights, misunderstandings, and other stuff but most of the time we have pretty happy kids. I am so blessed.

Mindset Change

 I am the Young Women President in our ward and one of the thing I do is try to mentor the oldest class of girls. Girls ages 15-18. I was really struggling with this calling and feeling like I was connecting with the girls, and really just struggling. There was a day when there was an activity that night and my co-leader said she couldn't come and so I sought out some mom's for help and learned that 6 out of 10 were not even coming to the activity. When I arrived and was about to start one more didn't come and so we had 3 our of 10 young women there. I also miraculously found another leader for that night. It really was a miracle. I said a prayer right before I called this mom and it went something like this,"Heavenly Father, I know she has never answered her phone the first time I have called ever, but I am out of time and pretty out of options. I need her to answer now. Please let her answer." I then called her and she answered and was able to help. Now, that should have showed me that those 3 girls were important to the Lord and, so even just three should be enough for me, but instead I just became more convinced that my young women weren't coming because they didn't like me. Well, the activity was fun good and the girls that came did have a good time, so win. 

However, I was still believing my young women didn't like me. That why had I been called when all I was going to do was make people mad and not want to come. Well, on Saturday I was cleaning my house and had a quiet moment and decided to listen to a podcast that a friend sent me. I rarely have time to listen to podcasts but I didn't listen to it. Honestly, I didn't love it but at the same time it taught me exactly what I needed. One of the things the author said was that Satan tells us lies and they are in second person. They will eventually change to first person when we begin to believe them, so we need to cast them out. Well, I realize that I was believing one of Satan's lies. No one had told me that they didn't like me, no parents had said my daughter refuses to come because you expect to much. Nope, no one. I knew none of that for certain yet I was letting myself believe I did. So, right then I said a little prayer to have help to cast this lie away. I no longer wanted to believe it instead I was going to believe that unless I heard otherwise no one didn't like me. 

Since then my calling and my ability to serve has increase. I am blessed it was that easy. The darkness that surrounded this calling for me dispersed and I could do it. It wasn't a burden. I could learn about those that come. Worry about those that don't. Love for real, and not out of obligation. Now, its only been two weeks, and I am sure their will be more things that come up, but for right now its great. This last activity I stayed late one because I felt I should make sure everyone got picked up even though I didn't have to and also because I wanted to hear what they had to say and they didn't ask me to leave. They didn't say this is personal please leave, so I didn't and I now know them more. Staying didn't feel as obligatory as it has in the past. Instead, I chose to stay because I wanted to be there. It was great. Then today I actually called my class president checked in on her and asked her, her opinion about a challenge to have more meetings and how she thought we should do it. I texted another girl just seeing how she was because I haven't seen her recently. It sounds so simple, but I couldn't do that before because I was thinking way to much about what they would think or if I was intruding or whatever. For me in this moment, I can move forward. 

Its different. I can't explain it very well, because so much of it was in my head, and then had an effect on everything I did. I still wonder about the bounds on caring verse nosy and if I am asking and expecting too much, but if I do its now more genuine that obligation and I am so grateful because I want to love these young women and this calling. The youth really are amazing despite their faults. I want to see what the Lord sees in them and I want to love them. It is so much easier to love when you don't fear. I am so glad the Lord helped me see.

Nothing Grand Here-- Just Us Doing Our Thing

 Today was a fifth Sunday. That means no meetings. It was so great. I took my time waking up. We took our time in the morning getting ready and went to church together. It was so nice. Gaupo probably didn't love it quite as much because I got the Lego's out which in our house just means the kids need a lot of help. Some families love Lego's and their kids just build and build and play, but not here. It takes some work and it doesn't last, but I still love to get them out because my kids do some good thinking and it brings back good memories for me. Anyway, having a meeting less Sunday made it feel like this is what I could do right now. There are honestly quite a few things that I could do instead like make an agenda for my presidency meeting, make some phone calls and texts about ideas I have, or make some food, but really I just want to revel in the quiet moment.

Quiet is not something our house is good at. I thought that once the big girls went back to school that I would have so much more quiet time, but I don't. At least not as much as I would like. I only love quiet because so much of my life is noisy. We always have chatter, laughter, yelling, screaming, music, talking, and what not going on it seems like, but I love it because I want a home where people live and do. Anyway, I don't have as much quiet time as was originally planned because the last week of summer Tia and Kylee taught Abby how to get out of the baby bed where she was taking naps (in order to keep her away from Kade) AND how to open the baby gate which kept Kade where he could sleep. So, now I get to do my scripture study at the top of the stairs until Kade is asleep. Gratefully Abby leaves him alone once he is asleep and then she usually falls asleep too, but when they party they party and they will not sleep if they can help it. The other reason 'my' time is shorter is because I have a bad habit of playing to long and letting lunch last a little long. So, the twins are down for a nap late. However, I love this time of year when it is warm, but not hot and playing at the park and riding bikes is fun. We take forever to get home from taking the kids to school because we play along the way and I usually talk to someone. I love it. I really do. I love seeing people. I love that my kids can run, jump, climb, and bike. I love that the twins are 2. For me it is a magic year, because nobody expects anything of two year olds. They don't expect them to know numbers or letters. They don't expect them to sit still. They just expect them to be kids and it is so freeing because I love letting kids be kids. I love just going with the flow and playing. Being with the twins is really fun. I am glad we get the chance to be together even if it maybe for only a short time.

The girls are in school, and there school days sound like they are going well. For the first time ever, I hear a ton from Kylee about school and not so much from Tia. I wish I got to hear lots from both, but hey at least I get some. Kylee has her first boy teacher and is loving it. I don't know about his teaching, but he sounds like a pretty funny teacher. Tia's teacher is a really good teacher, but not so openly funny and silly, so that is probably why I don't hear as much. After school, is still a little bit hard. Tia pretty much just has reading for 20min. I think she will get homework later, but hasn't gotten much yet which is totally fine with me. However, Kylee has reading, homework, and piano practicing, so she feels pretty jipped in the amount of time she has to play. It makes for some hairy days after school, but she has made a goal to not go to summer school, so she has work to do this year. With the start of school we also started gymnastics. I found an affordable play to do it and so they are both loving that. Kylee really wanted to do it and for the first time in a long time I limited Tia's choices and did what Kylee wanted. They both really like it though and even though we have to rush right from school to there we are done by 5 so it is totally worth it. I love that Kylee is getting to do something she has heard about and wants to do and I love that Tia is using her strength in a focused way. 

Guapo is working at the library. They were going to open up to full hours but with the new strains of Corona developing they might not open to full hours just yet. Its great because he wont work any nights or weekends, but its a big thing for the library to be open so people can use it. I know we have loved be able to go in again and pick our books, watch the train, and see our dad at work. He is busy at work though and still seems to really like it.

Me, I keep our show rolling. Sometimes maybe not as a well as others, but that's okay, I think. My house isn't very tidy most days because for the first time in 4 kids I have kids that play with toys and so they are always out and I don't always get around to getting them picked up. Sometimes it isn't very clean because when I clean I want to be left alone and that doesn't happen very much, so I just play with them instead. Its okay. One day I will probably have more time than I want for that kind of stuff. But when I am not being a mom and often times while I am being a mom I do young women's stuff. Its been kind of hard lately and I think its because I was believing that the young women did't like me. Now I don't know if its true or not because they haven't told me and neither have their parents, so I need to stop thinking that way. They don't have a reason not to like me and if they think they do its because they don't know me. I care a lot about them and that just might be the problem. I discovered this 'problem' of mine yesterday as I was listening to a podcast a friend referred me to and so I don't know if it will make this week better, but I have decided to give it a shot. Try to let of the lie that the young women don't like me, and instead try to get to know them and not be afraid of them. I am not afraid of them per say just more afraid of making things awkward and uncomfortable, but I got to get over that too. I am sure they will let me know on that account. Anyway, yw is teaching me a lot. I hope the yw learn about their Savior as much as I am.

I know the Lord love my family and these young women. He continually works in small and simple ways to bless their lives. He gives me patience when I feel I have no more. He answers hurriedly offred pleading prayers. He provides me with strength and love and testimony as I read the scriptures. He gives me courage and hope when I just want to give up and not do hard things. I am blessed and watched over, and I can do hard things as I continually lean on the Lord and those He gave me to lift and help me.

Summer Nutshell

 We have exactly two weeks of summer left and I am so glad to have 2 weeks. Every time I have finished up one thing, I have felt like school would be starting, but nope we still have summer. I am loving it. We kicked off our summer in Swanlake. We spent almost 10 days there. It started off with a huge Merrill Family Reunion. All of Grandpa's brother's and sisters and their kids came. We played on the pond, ate food, and visited. It was so fun, but also kind of exhausting. We were glad to have the farm to ourselves once everyone left. We enjoyed the pond, four-wheeler rides, cousins, and Grandma and Grandpa. It was really fun. 

After our visit to Idaho we came home to take on Summer School. I swore a couple of years ago I would never do it again, but it was the right thing to do this year, so we did it and the kids loved it. Kylee came home happy almost every day. There was no homework, so we just did reading and then played. Plus, it is summer so we stayed up a little later. My favorite part was them riding the bus with kid from our neighborhood. We don't get to do that since we don't go to our home school, but it was a great opportunity. I asked Kylee what the difference between school and summer school was and she said it is that the kids ask her to play with them. I think school is a little less intense too, but what she mentioned is friends. She has mentioned trying to be a little more outgoing this school year so we will see if she does.

During the last week of summer school I had girls camp. It was a day camp in Lyons. I just went one day, so we wouldn't have too many leaders involved. It was good to be with all my Young Women to see them interact and play. I learned a few things about myself and the girls. I was grateful Gaupo could stay home so that I could go.

On the last day of summer school, we took off for Idaho again. We went to the Brady family reunion. It was regular style this year so 2 days 1 night. My big job was the float. It was a big job, but I think people had fun helping and the teens had fun riding on it. I had fun riding on it and I learned what family means for me. My cousin Colten summed it up when he said, "I can be silly here, because these guys know and will love me anyway." Family is somewhere you don't have to pretend you can just be what you are. Sometimes you have it together and sometimes you don't and family loves you anyway. Reunion is always tiring, yet too short. However, it was very fun and I think everyone had a good time. 

After reunion we went directly to Arizona. Gaupo drove my parents car to Colorado and my parents and I drove our van to AZ. We broke it into two days, but it was still a long drive. However, the kids were troopers and did really pretty well. My Arizona vacation was probably one of the most relaxing it has been in a couple of years. The twins loved kicking around the pool in their puddle jumpers, so I wasn't constantly hanging onto two babies. The girls had fun play sharks and minnows, doing handstands, jumping in and Kylee learned how to do underwater flips from Betty. We swam at least once a day for and hour and a half. We saw all of our Arizona cousins. We got some time with just Oma and Papa. The kids adjusted pretty well to the time diffidence. We just lived there and had a great time. They also had a pretty good monsoon season and so that was fun to see all the rain. One time, Uncle Seth helped us catch tadpoles in various stages and we watched them grow over the following week. We had Betty stay a week with us by herself. We watched TV and had some special treats. It was a great 3 weeks.

Now we are home. I just finished a 3 day 2 night youth conference. I almost cried when it was over just from relief it was over. It had a huge service project that I helped the youth put together. It involved boys and girls camping out, a trip to Waterworld and lots of Nine Square. It was fun, but it would have been way more fun to not be a leader, but I was and the youth were pretty good, so I call it a win. There was a huge rainstorm on one night and so almost everyone ended up in the house. We had a group of girls in a camper and another group of girls that wanted to sleep in their tent despite it being wet. They were so funny the next morning when they insisted it was great. I think they loved it but it must have been a cold night. It is kind of stressful being in charge, but it was good to watch the youth be together and get to know a lot of them.

This week we don't have anything and its been great to just be home, have some friends over, clean the house, and just be. Its been a summer worth living so glad I have had the chance. We have one more adventure left--family camping trip for 3 days 2 nights. We will see how it goes. I am excited but it could be a little crazy. Oh well, that seems to be the name of the game lately.

Sickness, Sleeplessness, and ADHD Our Personal Whirlwind

Its been a bit crazy here. We had Spring Break about a month ago and it was pretty fun. I really didn't do anything super cool for Spring Break but it was fun to have a break from school. We had friends over to play a couple of day. We bought an unlimited wash pass for the van and rode through it about 3x one day. We went to Cabels and shot arrows, played on the ATV's, and checked out the taxidermy animals, and the fish. Our "Big" things was suppose to be riding the train from Westminster to Kitt's house, but Abby came down with a fever. I was so sad it didn't get better. We actually ended up wanting to take her to the doctor and we had a doc come to our house which was super cool especially since it didn't cost any more than urgent care. Anyway, it really did kind of bum out the end of Spring Break, but we were like that's okay we will see them next weekend for Kitt birthday and conference. Well, Kade started throwing up on Wednesday and into Thursday a little. I got worried with him to because he threw up so much it started having blood in it. So, we took him to the doctor and it looks like it was just a stomach bug. However, we did get a little bit of anti-nausa medicine there and that helped him a ton on Thursday so that was great. Still I didn't want to pass anything onto Kitt and Matthew so we told them it was probably best to stay home. That was probably even more of a bummer for me because I was so excited to do a birthday celebration, conference, and Easter with family. AHHHH! However, it didn't happen and its probably for the best because these sicknesses were no fun at all.

Being sick is bad, canceled plans is bad but there was more. Kylee has been having troubles sleeping through the night. She is nine, this should not be an issue, but it is. It was kind of bad before, but about this time it was starting to get worse. The worst part of it was she would wake-up, and then if we asked her to go try to go back to sleep she would start throwing a verbal tantrum and get herself all riled up and we of course at 2AM aren't so great either so we would get mad and then no one could get much sleep for a couple of hours. It was so bad. We went to the doctor for it. She hooked us up with some ideas and a therapist to talk to. However, when the therapist tried to call me I was taking a nap because I was tired. Anyway, I did later talk to her and honest I am like meh she has been okay but not great at least not what I was thinking. Anyway, she did help us get a really useful app that has sleepcasts on it and those helped quite a bit. We also have had some really emotionally charged moments here at home one because of the lack of sleep and two we have had 2 weeks of quarantine--one before spring break then another 2 weeks later. During that time I reached out to the school counselor and she has met with Kylee a couple of times and it has seemed to help. She actually has only woken up 2 times in the last 4 nights which is amazing because we were easy doing 3x a night. I am hoping we are on the up swing of this sleep thing. I would love it. 

Among all of this, Tia was diagnosed with ADHD and we have been trying to figure out which medication is right for her and how to work it. We like the first medication we tried (Conserta) but it caused insomnia. So, yes at one point in all this we had a kid staying up until 10-11 at night, another waking up in the middle of the night, and then two more waking up super early in the morning. It was not fun. Anyway, we tried another medication (Aderyal) and it didn't cause sleep problems but it took all of her sweetness away. She was so bossy and edgy. I hated it. It only last two days and I was like nope and actually returned it. Then we tried a third one that was supposed to be a little short acting but of the same family as the first family. It did last less, so we didn't have sleep problems, but it almost didn't last long enough. It never really seemed to be in her system after school and definitely not at dinner, so that was a bummer. We tried doubling the dose to see if it would help her focus a little more and last a little longer and it just made her cry about everything. So, that wasn't it. Between the first two, I did a little bit of experimenting. My mom suggested waking her up and giving it to her and then having her go back to sleep. We found if we give the Conserta at 6:00 AM it works and she can sleep. So, that is what we are going with because seriously it helps her so much at school. She is so much more confident. She can string all of her amazing thoughts together and for the most part communicate them to those around her. She does better on her school work. Its great. For our at-home-learning Fridays it has been amazing. She can sit down and work on work without me. She can decide what she wants to do and get it done. She can get her homework done without constant badgering from me. The only real downside is I have to make sure I am up by six or suffer the consequences. Most times not a bad trade-off. It actually helps me get moving in the morning. 

So, yeah its been crazy here or at least it is for us. Things have been improving and I am so glad. Like I was tell Grandma today "I feel like I say "I never thought..." a lot more often than I use to. She said "just wait." I am sure that is probably the case but still I never thought this would be some of the struggles I would encounter with my kids, but it is and we are all learning and growing because of it.