Teaching Juan

This is my awesome brother-in-law Juan. His second language is English. He never had the opportunity to learn to read. So I made it my responsibility to teach him. Over the last few months he has come to my house after work and we have done reading lessons. This is an amazing book and he is doing awesome. We will be done with all 1o0 lessons by the end of this week. I'm so proud of you Juan and I hope you still like me after all the torture I have put you through. :)

Sadie Spells her Name

Sadie got so excited when she wrote her name for the first time. She was running around saying "I write my name, Daddy I write my name"

The Story of our First Home

We have lived in our home for almost a year now. I have finally decided to post the story of how we got our home.
Ben had been searching for foreclosures for over a year at this point and we were being really patience in hopes that we could get a good deal on our first home. When Ben found this house we decided to look further into it. To make a long story short the home did go to auction. On July 26, 2010 I went to the court house steps to bid on it. By the time the attorney came out and starting taking bids. It was me and about 12 men that wanted to buy the house as an investment. Nearing the end of the auction it was me and one other man bidding. Loosing hope and tearing up a little. I told him I would pay him some money if he would stop bidding, but he wanted more than my offer. So we negotiated and he stopped bidding and in return I would pay him the portion we agreed upon. After I had won the bid. I broke down in tears and jumped for joy. Explaining to all the man that we had been waiting for along time to have our own home and now we would finally have a home for our family. After signing the papers with the attorney. A guy came up to me and told me I would not have to pay the man the money we had agreed upon. This gentleman had convinced the other man to let me off. To say the least it was an eventful day.
In the end I would say it was well worth it. With the good deal we got on the home and the down payment we had saved up for our first home we now only owe a small fraction of the cost of our home. We are looking forward to having our home paid off within the next 10 years.


The whole back yard was about 2 1/2 feet high of weeds. Last year we just watered it and mowed it and it looks a lot better than it did. This year I have spent much of my time killing weeds in hopes that one day it will look as good as my moms lawn.
The swing set was left here when the people moved out. It's not the best but it serves it's purpose. I think my yard is getting taken over by the rototiller. This is just part of Ben's garden. Not including the flower beds he has turned into garden. The man just keeps taking more and more of the lawn for his garden. It has to stop!

Poor Guy

This is what I woke up to the other day. To say the least it was not a good day. I felt so bad for him. I held him for a good part of the day.
On a side note he had his 18 month appointment and weighed in at a hole whopping 20 lbs. Putting him in the less than 3% for his weight and 29 3/4 inches for height-3%.
I just realized I never have mentioned the name of his condition, because I could never pernounce it. It is called visceral hyperalgesia.
What is painless to most children feels excruciatingly painful to children with Visceral Hyperalgesia.
It is when an individual has increased sensitivity to pain in the visceral system of internal organs like the stomach, intestines, or pancreas. Normally, when one eats or drinks, the stomach and intestines stretch to accommodate the meal with no discomfort whatsoever. But in a child with Visceral Hyperalgesia, the mere act of filling the stomach or intestine with a small amount of fluid or food triggers the nerves in the gut to respond as if a painful stimulus has been introduced.
The good news is that most children grow out of it within 6-18 months. He has been on the medicine Neurontin for 6 months now and we are slowing taking him off of it. In hopes that he has grown out of it.

Easter Pics

This is my attempt to get pictures of the kids on Easter.

The sun was in her eyes, but at least I tried.

Ben's Gardening

Ben is obsessed with gardening and now he finally has his own place to garden. This is him planting broccoli in the front yard by the flowers. He has much more garden space in the backyard.He has planted tons of heirloom seeds. This means he will be able to use the seed from the plants he grows. Resulting in never having to buy seeds again. He started over a month ago planting in our basement. He rigged this light to hang from the ceiling. He has already planted lots of his starts outside. So this is only about half of what he started with. I don't know what he thinks we are going to do with all the vegetables. He thinks I'm going to start canning. We will have to see about that.

2nd Easter Egg Hunt (Jeppsen Family)

After a good long nap. Sawyer was ready for some egg hunting.

All the fun cousins.Sadie has been waiting all winter to ride the airplane. She finally got her chance and she loved being the pilot.

1st Easter Egg Hunt (Dad and Kathy's)

Sawyer was not in the mood for Easter. He cried the whole time at this Easter egg hunt. Ben took him home early for a nap.Sadie out on the hunt.

Dad and Kathy rented a cotton candy machine and Sadie ate it like an ice cream cone. She really enjoyed it as you can see.

Petting Zoo

I took Sadie to the petting zoo with her cousins pre-school. She had so much fun petting all the animals. Brushing the horse.

Sadie and her two cousins Daylon and Brycen hanging out in the pig pen. Look at that attitude from that sweet little girl. A couple weeks ago Sadie told me "Mom, I am attitude". What have a taught this girl?

Sawyer's First Hair Cut

I finally got sick of the mullet Sawyer was sporting. So I talked Ben into cutting his hair. I thought it was going to be a horrible experience. Sawyer hates loud noises and I was sure he would scream the whole time, but to my surprise it tickled him and he laughed the whole time.
Daddy getting serious!

Sawyer laughing

Mullet free and handsome as can be!

Sadie getting her ears pierced

I was so proud of this little one. She did have a look of shock on her face "like what did they just do to me?"
It broke my heart to watch them do it, but she didn't even shed a tear.

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Sadie getting her ears pierced

Mom and Sadie gearing up for the event!

Getting prepped

She did such a great job. She didn't even cry. Her reward was riding on the train with her cousins Kaylee and KaLaya.

Mass Destruction

Sawyer likes to make lots of messes for mom. After he hits all the blocks out he proceeds to go to each block and scatter them more. So most of the day I have blocks scattered all over the floor. I guess kids have to be kids and you have to let them play. So much for a clean living room.

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Big Helper

I asked Sadie yesterday if she wanted to feed Sawyer and of course being the helper she is she wanted to. She did awesome. I can definitely get used to this!

Sadie's Hair Cut

Sadie got her first professional hair cut the other day. I love it! Her hair has been so uneven and just not working for her. So I finally broke down and got the little hair she did have cut off. She did a great job at letting Natalie cut her hair.
Also she went to the dentist for the first time yesterday. She let them do all the x-rays and clean her teeth. The best thing about it was NO CAVITIES! I guess all that brushing pays off.