Better eat your wheaties...

It's no secret that I'm a picky eater. I know it's where my kids get it from.
I despise wheat tortillas
I shiver at the thought of eating brown rice
I HATE wheat noodles.

BUT, I do eat wheat bread. (and occasionally sneak in a loaf of white bread for me to quietly devour on my own).
And I will bake with wheat flour. I have gradually went from doing just 1/4 of the recipe wheat to doing it all wheat and no one has noticed. (gotta use that food storage)
Yeah me.

Last week I ran out of ground up wheat, (and grinding it by hand is fun for about, oh, 1/4 a cup)so I had to use - gasp - white flour in my muffins. When I pulled them out of the oven and they were fluffy, I think I actually gasped - wondering what I had done wrong. They weren't little sunken muffins. Then I tried one...oh man, it was GOOD. Jer tried one and said, "These are good, what's different?" So I had to tell him my secret. We both oohhed and ahhed about my muffins. So I made cookies. Wow. Oh wow. I love white flour.

Tomorrow I am going to my mom's to get the wheat grinder. :(
I will miss you white flour.

A wise uncle of mine once said, "the whiter the bread, the faster you're dead" Is that sad that it kept going through my head as I enjoyed my white flour?

What I've been up to...

This really should be a post for my Craft blog, but who really checks that one anymore, anyway? I've been busy the past few weeks "crafting." Jeramy is really getting tired of all my "junk" all over the house. I keep telling him to get rid of the treadmill that doesn't work so I can have my own room, but he's just not ready to say goodbye to our old friend yet.
I've discovered FLOWERS! I'm having oodles of fun making these layered flowers, in fact, the first picture I used felt left over from my potato project. I haven't been brave enough to wear the headbands myself, but the girls have worn them and they look pretty cute. Oh wait - I did wear the green one to the Jazz game the other night. I kept waiting for Jeramy to ask why I was wearing one of the girl's headbands, but he never did. :)

And this is the potato that I almost lost all my fingers on. (Apparently, he lost his arms somewhere between me setting him up and me getting the camera). The girls haven't played with it much. :( My mom said that maybe it's because of the traumatic memories tied to it of me jumping around the kitchen in pain. Maybe.

And this project will be the death of me. I want to make washer necklaces for Girl's Camp. I bought my stamping kit and the "R" doesn't work. Can't very well stamp "courage" without an R. So I've been practicing words without "R" in it. I'm getting much better. I only mess up on every other one I try now - not every single one. And the washers I'm using are HUGE. They are all I could find for now that weren't galvanized steel.

And my glitter hearts. I heart my glitter hearts. They look sooo pretty in the light! Thanks to my mom and dad for helping with this one!

And yesterday I made my first table runner. The color is totally off in this picture. Apparently my kitchen is dark in the morning. It's not done yet. I tried to do the binding on my own and well, it needs a lot of TLC, but it was fun to try and I'll be doing a new one each month for the holiday. Thanks to Kerry and Amy for teaching me this fun new craft.

My fingers

Saturday night I was hard at work making this. I was having a great time sewing and hot gluing to my little heart's content - then my glue gun threw up on my fingers and I found myself running around the room screaming in pain. The girls were very concerned and kept saying, "mom, what happened? what's wrong? why are you doing that? mom...mom!" Until I had to yell the "words-we-don't-say-in-our-house"...."SHUT UP! I burned my fingers". It was then that Jeramy suggested cold water, which I did. It hurt worse. I sat there with the cool water running over my fingers and I tried to peel the hardened glue off my fingers -surrounded by 3 curious little girls - and I wanted to cry.
I ended up with 4 pretty good sized blisters on my fingers. It was a painful night and I kept ice on it for 7 hours straight. I worried about playing the piano at church on Sunday. I struggled to wash the dishes with one hand. I couldn't get my pants unbuttoned without some serious pain. It was a hard night.
And then I thought about Nie Nie. She has been such an inspiration in my life for the past few months as I've followed her blog. A little over a year ago, she and her husband survived a plane crash in Arizona. She was burned over 85% of her body. Her blog makes me cry, laugh and be grateful for what I have. My sad little fingers were only what - like .0002% of my body, and I thought I might die. I thought about this post of hers. So, grab a box of tissues, and read the NieNie Dialouges. Right now she is in the hospital again having some serious surgeries done and her husband is writing for her.
My little blisters are getting better. I will probably survive this ordeal - in fact, I've already pulled out the glue gun twice since the "incident." It was just interesting to me how it put things into perspective a little more.

Before Jeramy and I were dating, I was hanging out with all the guys at his apartment. Jeramy's mom came over to get him. He said, "You didn't bring Rosie, did you?" She smiled and laughed and said, "Yeah." Jeramy rolled his eyes and said, "Mom!!!" And I thought to myself, "What a jerk. That's probably his grandma or someone and he's mad that his mom brought her."

A few months later, I learned that Rosie was not his grandma. It was their new puppy. I did not grow up around dogs, so going to Malad and being around a rowdy puppy was new to me, and I'll admit - I was nervous about the dog. (don't even get me started about their baby calf...I still have nightmares about being chased by it).

Soon Rosie became a mom. Jeramy's mom sold all the puppies, then (correct me if I'm wrong Mary) her heart softened and she went and bought back the runt of the litter.

And so began the years of 2 dogs at the Wakley home. The puppy (On the right) was originally called Jewel, then Daisy, then many more names. Nothing "fit" her. She remained Puppy.
Rosie and Puppy did NOT like Maddie when she was born. They were not used to someone small chasing them around, and they both would hide out when she came around.

As the years have passed, I've gotten used to the dogs - and I even look forward to one of them jumping up on the couch and cuddling up next to me. The dogs have definitely gotten used to having oodles of kids around. Over Christmas break, I watched as Kaden shot his nerf gun - point blank- at Rosie's behind. She didn't even budge. She just turned her head to see what was going on, then went back to sleep.

My kids (except for Lindsay who is terrified of dogs) love playing with them. Feeding them, chasing them, talking to them and petting them.

We got the sad news last week that Rosie died. I've never been attached to a pet before, so this was all new to me. The girls were pretty bummed, but they reassured me that "all dogs go to heaven" and they are dealing with it fine.

We will miss you, Rosie!

A fortunate group

Friday night we couldn't decide where to go for dinner. We all argued for about 45 minutes and we could not all decide where to go. Jeramy and Maddie finally won and we went and tried a Chinese place that Jer eats at with the guys from work. I'm not a huge fan of Chinese, but I will admit, it was pretty good. We ordered a "Family Feast" which wasn't really a "feast," but enough to feed my little family of picky eaters (including me). They gave us 3 fortune cookies and we gave them to the girls. This is what our girls' fortunes were:

Maddie "A new relationship is about to blossom. You will be blessed."
Macie "New financial resources will soon become available to you."
Lindsay "You have a strong instinct to take care of people you love."
Well, at least Lindsay's was right.

Maddie was pretty bummed that Jer and I didn't get one. Today when she got home from school, she was pretty excited and said, "You won't believe what I have for you in my pocket." She then pulled out a fortune cookie. "Mom, they had orange chicken today for lunch with a fortune cookie, so I brought mine home for you." Awwww. How sweet is that?
So, just so you know, I will be finding happiness in mind and heart. (Too bad it doesn't say when I will be finding this treasure).

Girls Just Wanna have fun

I live in a home with 3 other girls. (Poor Jeramy). Us girls stick together. Lindsay is my shopping buddy. Yesterday we went to the mall and I tried on some pants. Once she got done giggling and saying very loudly, "Mom, I see your underwear!" She quickly said, "Ew. Those pants are not cute, don't get those." And there you have it. I didn't get them. She is also the one who went with me to pick out my glasses, and I got the ones that she picked out. And she is the only child in my home that throws a fit about what she is to wear for the day.
Maddie got an alarm clock with a radio for Christmas. You can now find her jamming out in her room everyday after school. Not sure I was ready for that one, at least we listen to the same kind of music - for now. And the tears...she can turn them on about anything (like potatoes and basketball and pants that are too long).
And Macie. Oh boy. She just ran over to me and said, "Mom, these boobs?" I was confused and asked her what she said. "These boobs?" And she showed me a Polly Pocket Saddle. I said, "What do you mean?" And she brought me a Polly Pocket and said, "Put it on." And then I got it. She thought the saddle was a bra. A very large bra for a very small girl. She worked for quite a while to get that saddle/bra on, and it would just slide right off. A good mom probably would have gone and found the horse and shown her how it worked - but where's the fun in that? She probably would have just thought it was a bra for the horse.
I can only imagine this house in 10 years...wow.

A little Idaho Fun...

You know those people who find the face of Christ on their toast, tree, iron, house, etc? Well...

This morning before church I was peeling potatoes. I reached in the bag and pulled out the most amazing thing I have ever seen...it was the largest potato in the world! We all looked at it in awe. And then we realized who it looked like. It resembled...

Mr. Potato Head. Who'd ya think I was going to say?? The girls had a blast dressing up our potato. Maddie even made home videos of the potato. Then I said, "K, I need to peel him and cut him up for the potatoes tonight." Tears followed. "Can't we just keep it?" I had to be the mean mom and take away their fun toy, shave it's skin off, then chop it into bits, throw it into boiling water and then smash him up with the mixer.

Lindsay and Macie quickly forgot Mr. Potato Head as they ate their potato beaters, but I bet if you ask Maddie, she's still holding a grudge.

And that big potato pretty much fed our family of 5.