ColoradoBennett

Brooke, I'm so sorry to hear about your sickness. I really think there are few things worse than indiscriminate vomiters (I don't know how to spell either of those words). Geof. and Darla, congrats on the boy. I'm so sorry for this awful rollercoaster of a time you've been having the last three months or so. We certainly are praying that it all works out and ends soon. Chelsea, thanks for posting. It's great to have an update on your family. So as of late, the only time I can blog is if Kaia and Tristan are sleeping and Sierra is watching tv. And since I really try to limit tv time during this time, blogging time is scarce. Sierra got this game for Christmas and I was hoping to set her up with it and sneek off to blog, but it didn't work out that way. The cover of this game reads: "Super Mind. Makes kids very smart and keeps them busy for hours! Builds the skills every child needs." It cracks me up. What parent wouldn't rush out the door to buy that one. But alas, it doen't work like the tube, I can't put her in front of it and rush off to fold laundry, put dinner in the crock pot, make two loaves of whole wheat bread for book club tonight, vac/mop/dust, etc. I'm sure you'all are rolling your eyes about the whole wheat bread. Truth be known, I never make bread anymore. But our book club is reading "Tip-A-Day Guide for Healthy Living: 365 Simple Ways to Improve Your Health One Day At A Time" and tip #11 is "Baking for Busy Moms: Wholesome Whole-Wheat Bread". And my tip to you is: Don't Try It. You'll probably get a tummy ache from the whole wheat and you'll waste three hours of your day when you could just buy the stupid bread. Just buy a nice loaf of multi-grain and save yourself a few stress wrinkles.
Speaking of stress wrinkles, I think we are gong to not put Sierra in preschool (because of the cost) and keep doing the home school thing for another year. The afternoons are tough because Kaia usually sleeps for 3 hours and Sierra and I have totally different ideas about how to spend that time. There is a new charter school opening up this fall that I was looking into. They are only accepting kindergardeners and 1st graders. Sierra misses the cut off in all the school districts by 12 days and so she'll be the oldest in her class. But this charter school said they could work around that and start her in K this fall. This school has an intense Spanish program (in fact most of the kids will be Spanish speakers). They'll teach tennis and chess. This kicker is that the school day goes from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Can you believe that? They also have a longer school year. I can only imagine the kind of teachers they have in this place. Probably much worse than poor Jackson's schoolmarm. In fact, Adam was so outraged by Meagan's blog about the teacher giving her trouble about Jack missing school. He said something to the effect of, "If any teacher ever talks to me like that they'll be walking away with their head between their @#$#%$^". Or something like that. So no charter school for us. Although I do think it would be sad if our kids left this area without having picked up Spanish. Denver has schools that teach half the day in Spanish and the other English. Critics say kids leave these schools being underlearned in both languages. Anyway, that's my story. Brooke, you mentioned kid #4 for us and I must tell another story. We've been going through a lot of trouble trying to find insurance that works for us. Currently we have good insurance, but they've dropped maternity coverage. I was looking into a health share account (advertized in LDSLiving Magazine) but they only cover maternity upto $4000. Which is ok unless you end up like my friend whose baby came six weeks early, spent two weeks in the NIC unit, and the bill came to $140,000. They fortunetly had good coverage. Our current insurance charges $150 for a vastectomy and my grandpa said (only half jokingly) that he'd pay for that. Tempting sometimes, like now when Sierra is pulling my hands off the keyboard and telling me to stop blogging and Kaia is crying from pure insanity. But I know in my heart that we have at least one more little bundle of joy waiting for us. Speaking of LBOJ, Tristan is wet and hungry and being carried by Sierra in a dangerous situation. gotta go,.....