HAPPY NEW YEAR!

HAPPY

NEW

YEAR!

From the Swizz Household

Merry Christmas!

MERRY

CHRISTMAS!

May your day be filled with reminders of

our Savior, who came in the form of a newborn baby.

Thanks be to God for His gracious gift!

JMonster is SO excited for Christmas!

Cleaning out my closet

I'm still here, people!  Sorry for the lack of communication.

No excuses!  Just busy...

The Rev asked me months (okay YEARS) ago to clean out my closet.  I own clothing I've had since I cannot remember.  Maybe middle school? :o)

I've noticed that most of my clothing goes unworn, because I'd rather grab a comfy dress or a pair of comfy lounging pants and a comfy shirt.  

Are you catching on to the trend?

I'm not a slob, but lately (okay, most of my adult life other than when I was working) I've taken to dressing like one.  I tell myself it is out of comfort, but why must I let myself go?

Laziness?  

I'm guessing that is part of it.

Low self esteem?

Why go there?

Mostly it is just easy.

And mindless.

(And oh so comfy!)

And I tell myself I'm trying to not be vain.

But does fixing yourself up to look halfway decent fall into the category of vain?

I'm learning it doesn't.

Why should my husband look at someone who is sloppy?

I don't have to put on make up, but shouldn't I at least do my hair?

And by do, I mean more than pull into a ponytail.

How about you?

Do you dress for the day?

Do your hair?

Maybe put on some makeup?

Or are we most likely to catch you in a pair of yoga pants with a ponytail?

My Infertility Journey...a brief update

Somehow I haven't felt much like writing lately.  I've been busy, it's true, but I also haven't had a lot to say.  Life is moving forward, sometimes quickly and sometimes agonizingly slow...

We're homeschooling.  Barely.  We do our reading lesson and reading every day, but other than that I've been a slacker in that area.  I'm giving myself some grace here...he's 4 1/2 and already reading.  We're still ahead of the curve!

I'm trying to organize the house and get it cleaned.  I mean DEEP cleaned.  And ready for us to move this summer.  Which means I need to slowly start packing.

Did I mention JMonster went through a HUGE growth spurt and has outgrown a lot of his clothes?  So, not only are we doing a seasonal closet change, we have to go through every piece to figure out what still fits.  I despise doing this!

(Of course, I also have bursitis in my shoulder.  VERY painful.  VERY limiting!)

And CHRISTMAS is coming!  

I've been finishing the Shutterfly book I do every year.

I've been shopping.

Did I mention the Shutterfly book?

Which takes HOURS?

And in the midst of all of that, we're discussing whether we should try and get pregnant again.  We have 2 more frozen embryos, remember?  And I'm not getting any younger.  And no one has jumped up and shouted that they would be a surrogate for us (okay, 2 people did but both of them promptly got pregnant!).

So, we're discussing doing a transfer in the next couple of months.

But to do so we'd have to add maternity coverage to our health insurance.

Which would cost BIG bucks.

As would a transfer.

And what if it fails?

What if it SUCCEEDS?

What about my trip to HAWAII?

I need a vaca!

I thought I killed the fish!

Yesterday I decided that it was time to clean the fish bowl.  I mean...REALLY time to clean the fish bowl.  It had white gunk floating on the top.  A sort of crust.  This has never happened in the 3+ years we've had a fish so I'm still not quite sure what went wrong.

I did as I normally do and put Dorothy, the betta, in a separate cup.

I boiled the water.

I scrubbed all of the stones.

I scrubbed the bowl.

I scrubbed the plants.

I then put spring water (yes, I purchase spring water for the darn fish!) in the bowl.

Sparkling clean!

Back in went Dorothy.

(Dorothy is a MALE fish, by the way.  And is Dorothy the 2nd.)

Dorothy I

Dorothy immediately started gasping and went straight to the bottom of the bowl.

Where he stayed for almost an hour.

Gasping.

And causing JMonster to be very concerned that he would die.

We got on the internet and looked up fish illnesses.

By the time we finished that, he was better.

Go figure.

Dorothy lives!

Will watch out for white gunk in the future.

Ick!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm sorry I've been silent for so long...

I've been helping my younger sister, HA out.

This morning, at 3am to be precise, she had her 4th child.

A beautiful, healthy baby girl.

And I was there!

I promise next week I will be better about posting.

In the meantime, enjoy time with your family.

I intend to immerse myself in mine.

Many Blessings,

Swizz

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons!

I haven't talked much about JMonster's learning...

I've mentioned we LOVE homeschooling!

When we started this whole homeschooling thing, JMonster couldn't read.

Not one word.

He knew his letters.

He knew the sounds they make.

(Thank goodness for LeapFrog videos!)

We have been using the MOST fabulous book to learn to read.

After 20 lessons, JMonster could read a short book.

He absolutely LOVES the program by the way.

And BOB books.  We LOVE the BOB books.

We are 30 lessons or so in.  Yesterday I was making my grocery list.

"I'm going to get a piece of paper and make a list, too, Mommy!"

Off he went to get paper.

I figured he'd draw pictures and scribble a little bit.

"I'm going to add tomatoes to our list."

A minute goes by.

"See Mommy?  Tomato!"

"Tomato"

 

 

 

 

The scanner didn't do it justice, but he wrote TMATO the first time, and when I told him he left out the O after the T he wrote it again correctly.  On two lines, but spelled the right way!  Pretty darn good for a kid who has been reading for barely over a month!

WAY TO GO JMONSTER!