First day of school

You can tell Ty's barely humoring his somewhat camera crazy mom in this picture. :) He's FINALLY in 9th grade, if you ask him. Me, I can't believe I have a high schooler! He started soccer practice the other day in hopes of making the soccer team. Today was his first day of seminary. The busier he is, the better, if you ask me! It gives him less coherent time to make eyes back at all the girls who never seem to leave him alone. ;)

Jo's first day went amazingly well. There were no tears, no drama, no nothing. I was surprised, to say the least. After we moved to this house in March it's taken him a long time to be okay with the change. Even though he stayed at the same school through the end of 1st grade, it affected him a lot. Moving to his new school & making new friends was much smoother than I could've imagined! It helps that some of his favorite classmates from church can be found on the playground. :)

Drama can be found in all things

It was YOYO night (as in, yo-on-yo-own) last night. It just means that I'm either too busy to cook or I'm gone. Dave took over the reigns while Ty & I went to the Seminary Kickoff. He had a fun time with the littler kids, from what I can tell.

Dad: What do you guys want for dinner?

Jordan: I'm not hungry

Logan: A Popsicle

Hayleah: I want soup

Jordan: Okay, I changed my mind. I'd like a tuna sandwich with hot sauce on it. Just a little, though.

Dad: Alright. Logan, would you like some soup as well?

Logan: Just a Popsicle.

Hayleah: I want a Popsicle tooooo! With hot sauce on top. Just a little, though.

Dad: I'm not giving out Popsicles for dinner.

Hayleah: I NEED a Popsicle with hot sauce!! (in her whiniest voice)

She proceeds to drop to the ground & thrash around sounding tortured. Much wailing & gnashing of teeth could be heard in the McKenney household last night....all over a Popsicle with a little hot sauce on top. *sigh*

Shark Boy & Lava Girl

This Disney movie is a current favorite amongst the little people in our house. And when I say little people, I mean Hayleah (& sometimes Logan & Jordan, too). She's obsessed with "Labba Durrrl". She's two. How did this happen!?

If you're brave enough to sit next to her while the movie is on, she will literally do a play-by-play recap for you in her cute little voice with her too big vocabulary.

This movie is almost like nails on a chalk board for me. Lame in a big way. The only good thing that's come of it is Jo has started his own "dream journal". Whatever it takes, man. ;)

The worst part of all of it is that Shark Boy is played by the actor Taylor Laurant. For the Twilight fanatics, like myself, you would know that (((Taylor))) plays the role of (((Jacob))) in the Twilight series. And if you've seen the recent clips for the next movie New Moon, you would understand my dilemma here.

It's hard to look at this:

Without thinking of this:

It makes it seem wrong on a whole 'nother level to love him (the guy in the first picture) when I see him as a child portraying a shark-wannabe practically every day.

Disneyland Photos

We had such a nice time last week. The weather wasn't too bad & the crowds, for the most part, could be dealt with. Tyler, Jordan & I even got to spend the last evening we were there together at the park. It was fun being able to ride the rides with Jordan that he couldn't ride the last time we were there. The faster & more jarring, the better if you asked him.

Here are the pics I've scrapbooked so far. There are at least a few more pages to come. :)

Goodbye First Grade....

...Hello Second Grade!!

Jordan's last day of first grade was this past Friday. It was a bitter-sweet day for him. Mrs. Jonhson took the time to make a slide show of pictures that were taken over the year & gave a copy of it to each of the kids.

She gave it to them a few days prior to the last day of school & Jordan watched it over & over. At one point he asked me to close the door on my way out after I set it up for him to watch once again. I found him watching it a few minutes later with red eyes. What a sentimental little sweetheart. :*)

Here's the video....

We applied for a zone varience back in April but recently found out it was denied. So it looks likeJordan will be going to Frias for second grade. He's anxious about changing schools but luckily most of his church friends also go to his new school.

Jordan loved his classmates, for the most part. He made many friends this year & I know he will miss them when he goes to his new school. He spent most of his free time Friday morning going around collecting all his friends' phone numbers. With his birthday coming up, he wanted to be able to send them all an invitation.

Jordan also had his first taste of girlfriend-love this year. Her name is Janet. When I first met Janet, after hearing how enamored Jordan was with her, I must admit I was a bit surprised. I didn't expect her to be so tall & I really didn't expect her to be black. After getting to know her, I see why the color of her skin never even factored in to how he feels about her. First of all, this has been a great lesson for me on how kids really are color blind until prejudices are introduced to them. Secondly, she is so loving & caring. She's always tying Jo's shoes for him, she plays with his hair for no reason, & she's kind to everyone. All of which are perfect reasons to love all that is Janet. :)

Here they are....

Gingie's Sleep-over

Our sweet, playful, sometimes rambunctious, buff & tan cocker spaniel Ginger needs a place to stay while we're at Disneyland. We've boarded her before with a company that doesn't keep the animals in a cage all day, which I really liked. The animal hospital around the corner will board her for considerably less than this "pet resort" but they keep her in a small cage throughout the day & night, only letting her out for a few walks.

If it were for a day or two, I don't think I'd have a problem with boarding her at the vets office. But we're going to be gone 5 days & I don't have the heart to give her to someone who won't play with her or even let her play with other dogs for that long.

The last place I took her to went up in price. I hate it when that happens! It makes me want to take her somewhere else.

We had some good friends that would look after her for us in the past but they moved away. I'm bummed we have to board her at all. She's such a sweet dog & I feel guilty for doing it to her. And what mom doesn't need more guilt, right??

Castings & sharing the Gospel

I've been a life casting artist for the past 3 years now but I have been doing it very sporadically. I'm the type of person that doesn't want to turn a hobby in to a business (though this was never intended to be anything but a business) for fear of it getting old & making me not love it anymore.

It did get old for a while & honestly very overwhelming. I slipped in to a funk with all of it when it seemed all my business came from Candlelighters. I love the ladies over there, but when every child I took a cast of was guaranteed to either be gone within hours or had already passed away, it weighed on me too much.

Dealing with the babies who are soon to leave this world takes a huge emotional toll on me. I'm very much empathic & I haven't learned to protect myself from other people's emotions. A year ago I would have scoffed at someone who said they were empathic. I didn't know what it meant to have this "gift", & didn't believe it really existed until it came to my attention that people actually deal with this on a daily basis.

I've always been a sucker for a happy emotional climate. On the flip side of that, when I'm around negativity I tend to get sucked in to that as well & I begin to feel negative very quickly. The grief exuded from the loved ones of children with cancer, who have just left this world or are about to leave it, is something anyone can see & feel, if you're near enough. I just can't seem to help taking part in feeling it right alongside them, when I'm near enough. Almost every one's empathic to a degree, I think. It's when you can't shake the negative feelings that it becomes a problem.

There have only ever been two times when I have done castings on kids with cancer where the families weren't in extreme emotional turmoil. It happens to be that both of these families were LDS. I really believe losing a child would be one of the most emotionally difficult, heart wrenching experiences a parent could ever go through. From my experience, I've come to the conclusion knowing about & believing in the Plan of Salvation makes all the difference in the world for these families.

Seeing the families that don't have this knowledge makes me want to share it with them SO badly. I just haven't figured out yet how to make that happen. Maybe I need to stock up on the movie Together Forever, collect addresses of the families I've served & send the video to them.

Lately I've had business of the happier kind. I've been casting the hands & feet of very ALIVE babies lately. Babies make me happy. Especially the healthy ones. There's a small sea of tiny hands & feet on my counter right now as well as a gorgeous belly casting that's hanging out in my garage, all waiting to be finished. It's times like this, when I'm able to make a little spending money for my family & get to spend time with new mom's & their sweet little babes, that make my "job" not a job at all. I love what I do! :)

Orange Julius

We recently got a DQ with an OJ inside down the road from us. They STILL don't have the OJ side up & running though. Don't they know!? Strawberry-Banana Julius' make the world go 'round. It's wrong to hold out on me like this & tease me with their sign when I walk through their doors, money in hand, a smile on my face to light up any room, only to burst my happy little bubble & tell me "sorry, not yet".

I've been trying to lose weight to no avail. I've been really good but I think these thoughts are weighing on me. If only I could just have one.......

Warm moistness, here we come!

We're making lists (oh how I love a good list with its own list! ;) ) & getting everything ready for a trip to visit as many Disney characters as we can possibly squeeze in in 3 days!

We're last minute people & didn't begin actually making plans for a trip until a few days ago. We'll be leaving this Saturday for a whopping 5 whole days! :)

Though I long to get away, I don't love to stay away. Any more than 5 days & I'm begging for my own bed. We've even left vacations early, in the past, & drove all night just to get home to that comfy, somewhat lumpy bed.

As a side note, this will be the very first vacation to a theme park when I'm NOT pregnant! WOOT! ;) It opens up so many possibilities. I love a good thrill ride! Now the challenge will be to squeeze my cheeks in to the seat. LOL That oughtta be fun!