Pictures from Sierra's Sweet Sixteen

I will post more about it later, but here are some of my favorite pictures. I have many many more. She begged me to bring the kids to her sweet sixteen black and white ball, now what 16 yr old would want a 2 and 4 yr old at their dance. Sierra is the only one I know, wow I can't believe she is 16. I think I cried as much as Sarah did last night.









The kids had a blast and Ruben danced his little butt off. :)
More Pics to come.

Lawn Mowers & Good Neighbors

Life is good around here. We call Mom and DD's part of the house Chippewa Assisted Living, they prefer Chippewa Manor :)
Things are busy busy busy. Roo has started spring soccer and so we will have an even hectic schedule than we do now. My calender is definitely coming in handy.

God definitely put us in this house. We have the best neighbors anyone could ever ask for. We have one sweet lady who brings over fried chicken and for mom's birthday made her a pineapple upside down cake, mom's favorite.

The neighbors right beside them let me use their riding lawn mower yesterday.

I went over and asked him to use it and then preceded to let him know I had only used one once and asked him simple questions such as where is the break, gas, clutch and yet he still let me have his John Deer mower. Now what man would let a woman run off with their John Deer unsupervised.

God given neighbors I tell ya.

Oh and just in case you are wondering, I mowed the front and back lawn without incident.

Have a great Thursday!

Oh How I Love This Little One

Your Gonna Miss This....Moment

Surely by now everyone has heard of this blog carnival but if not click on over to Pam's site and learn what it's all about.

I will miss this moment so very much. Kids grow so fast and at some point they no longer want to climb in bed with their Nana or help take care of her. But for now both my kids love helping to care for my mom. And I love this picture. Marissa always rubs her face and asks her if she is feeling OK and if she can get her anything. Coming from a two year old I think that is remarkable. Or maybe it's just because it's my two year old. :)

Creating New Personal Blog

After posting about our marriage and getting a lot of questions from family that practically had us on the road to seperation. It's amazing how fast something can spread and how much of the truth gets lost, I have decided to create another blog.

It will not be linked here. I have been thinking of doing this for a while, creating a blog where I can tell my story, give my testimony and just be completely open and honest.

I created it tonight but it will be a while before it is up and running. If you would like the address just comment on this post and leave your email address and I will be sure to send you the link or you can email me at Quinonezfamily@charter.net. We have been having some problems with that email though.

Warning though, I'm planning on holding nothing back. Which is not soemthing I have ever done before. I've never been honest with myself about so much that has happened in my life. Of course there will be a few subjects off limits, I won't go into a lot of detail about what goes on in my marriage simply because I think it would unfair to him.

I so admire those who can put themselves out there and be transparent. That's what I hope to do with this new blog, and I believe in doing that I will learn a lot about myself and at 32 I think it's about time.

Great Blog With Great Chances to Win Great Prizes

I have been meaning to post about this blog that is having several giveaways but this week I have had so much on my mind I didn't get around to it. So today when I visited the blog again I saw that Pam was doing her 4th giveaway. She has a great blog and she is an inspiration to me because she is a single mother of six and I struggle being a married mother of two. So check out her blog, it's the same blog that does the

Marriage, It Ain't Always a Fairy Tale

Update:
Right after I wrote this post, I checked the mail and the book had arrived. And then our pastor called to cancel our appointment because some emergency came up. I'm not sure if this is a sign that we should just read the book and not talk with our pastor. I just don't know. But I had taken all day to gear myself up to go talk to someone about my marriage and now it's not happening. I'm a little let down and confused as to what to do now.


I will give you fair warning this will not be a happy post. And I don't think all posts should be that way, you can read more about that here.

Today has been hard. I woke up to a screaming two year old, tried to clean the bathroom as much as I could, threw in a load of laundry, made breakfast for mom and Marissa and then helped the Home Health nurse with Mom's bath, which totally wears me out. I love my mom dearly, there are just some days where taking care of a 4 yr old, 2 year old, hubby, aunt and my, for the most part, bed bound mom just gets to be overwhelming at times.

I think what is at the bottom of all of this is that tonight Jose and I are going to our Pastor for marriage counseling, it may be one session or turn out to be several.

I was hesitant, and still am a little, to post that because his family reads this blog but I think it is important for me not to portray a happy little marriage and happy little life on our blog.

Like I said in the post I linked to above, I think it's dangerous to give people the impression that you have a perfect life and/or perfect marriage. It makes them feel even worse if they are going through trials in their own marriage or in their lives.

They need to know they are normal and every marriage no matter how it may look from the outside, has it's problems and challenges. We have a good marriage and have built our marriage on a solid foundation but if you don't spend time working on your marriage on a regular basis it can fall apart before you even realize it.

Because even when you are totally in love with each other, go to counseling before getting married, try to fight fair, try to put God at the center of your marriage, even with all of those things marriage is HARD.
Then you throw in kids and in laws living with you, stress at work or whatever situations you may face in your own marriage and it becomes all the more challenging to put the time and effort into your relationship. It can all build up and if the communication is not there the results can be bad and really damage your marriage.

There hasn't been any major damage to our marriage yet but we decided, well I think it was my idea, to go and talk to our Pastor. I want to deal with problems as they come up and not let them fester and cause damage in our relationship.

The thing is, I thought our marriage was going great, I guess I had my head in the clouds and wasn't paying attention to him, I don't feel like I have had a lot of time lately to pay attention to anything, and it doesn't help that it's not easy for him to show or talk about his feelings.

He is a great husband and father but there are things in our lives we all struggle with. I'm struggling with things right now, fighting personal demons and he has been too.

It's just been a really stressful time in our lives and I was too distracted and not focusing on my marriage and what the stress in our lives was doing to it.

We ordered the book Sacred Marriage which I learned about from MckMama.
It has not come in yet but I can't wait to get started reading it together.

I'm not looking forward to talking to our Pastor tonight about our marriage, and if I'm totally honest I have came up with three excuses why tonight is not a good night to go.

But I know that I am doing a disservice to my kids, my husband and myself not to mention not following what God put in my heart to do, if we don't go.

So we will go and I know we will work this out, because there is no other option and really in the bigger scheme of things it's not that big of a problem because hopefully we have caught it in time. Just pray that our meeting tonight goes well and we are able to get the guidance we need to get our marriage back on track.

Will I Ever Learn to Leave My Red Hair Alone???

I have never used the particular color or brand I used yesterday but I have colored my hair twice, ok we're not counting the time I dyed it purple during my punk phase, both times came out ok and I got the results I wanted. One time it was lighter strawberry blond and the other time was after that when I wanted more of my natural bright red back.

This is the box I bought, it had the color and separate highlights. Basically my naturally color just a bit brighter and with highlights.

This is before.

This is the result I got, well not exactly I didn't take pictures of the result I got from this color because I was too traumatized. It was dark really really dark. So this morning I went and bought a strawberry blond dye and put it on my hair. And this is my results.










It's still way too dark and I'm not happy at all. Just ask the people I live with. I have not been easy to deal with today. I know, I know it's just hair color and I will get over it. It's not even really about the hair color, I'm just frustrated because of the reason I started this whole process, the cut and color in the first place. That's a whole 'nother post for a later time.

I will probably go get a blond and put on it in a couple of days. But for now, this is me and it's just hair.

A Breath of Fresh Air

We got mom into her wheel chair and outside. This is the first time she has been outside for a walk in her wheel chair in over a year. I basically had to tell her I was getting her up into the recliner, then when I had her in the lift I told her that actually we were going outside. She didn't get too mad at me.

She needed the fresh air and just to get out of the house. I was so happy and emotional I didn't know if I wanted to cry or do a jig. So I did both. :)

God is amazing. I found a cab/van service which is run by an awesome lady and who after hearing mom's story said she would come on the weekends when they are closed so that mom can go to church or to walmart, out to eat or wherever she wants to go.

Mom's birthday is Tuesday and I told the lady she had not been out to a restaurant in almost 2 years, so this coming Sat the woman is sending her driver to come pick us up and take us wherever mom wants to go. I'm crying as I'm typing this because I am so very happy for her and the Lord never ceases to amaze me. He never fails me even when I fail Him what seems like lately everyday.

Mom had accepted that she would always live like this, in bed, only getting out to go to the doctor.

I have never accepted that and I remind her daily of what the doctors told me when I had my car accident. They said I would never walk again and if I had accepted that then I would never have walked again.

But I believed then as I do now that God can do all things, and that I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. So I'm having her recite that verse everyday.

Anyway this post turned out a lot longer than planned. I was just going to post the pictures from yesterday.

Don't ask what Roo was wearing it was his own creation :)






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Your Gonna Miss This.....Moment

This is my second time participating in the blog carnival Your Gonna Miss This. I loved this idea and this blog when I came across it a few weeks ago.

I am constantly thinking about the moments I will miss when my kids are grown or if our life were to change suddenly as I know that it can in a matter of seconds. I know first hand how just a few seconds can change your life forever and I try to live in the moment and enjoy every moment I have with my family and friends.

I am going to miss my kids wanting to have their friends over to do fun art projects with mom that just consist of finger paint and poster board.



I'm going to miss them sitting at their little table with the tiny little chairs calling me over to tell them that I have never seen a painting more beautiful, and I mean that with all my heart. There little innocent paintings are the most beautiful things I have ever seen. I want to save everyone but know that is impossible.

Fill In Fridays

I thought I would use that title for Fridays because it doesn't seem like I will be able to blog everyday, so I will make sure to catch you all up on Fridays. So this post will contain and little of this and a little of that.

First off, what does a woman do when she feels like she has no control over ANYTHING?

Cut and/or dye her hair of course. And redecorate the house. At least that is what I do!

So I found a card in my wallet from a woman I met at the pumpkin patch in Oct. and decided why not. It's really hard for me to find someone to cut my hair because it's so curly and the only one I trust is my friend Sarah who lives and works 45 min away and this was a spare of the moment kind of thing. I would have changed my mind in the time it took me to drive there.

Anyway on to the big reveal.

But let's review the before first. Focus on the hair, not the smile :)

After

Side

Back

One minute I love it and the next not so much. But it's so much easier to take care of and I needed a change.

My friend and I are going to do a dye job on me on Sunday, so check back for pictures. I'm not sure what color, probably some type of streaks/highlights.

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Things are going ok around here. We are having to teach the grandmothers how to discipline because since they are living here they can no longer let the kids get away with everything and feed them candy all day long.

It's going to take lot's of patience on my part and redirecting, and I'm not referring to the kids on the redirecting. We will get there, or so I keep telling myself that.

I ordered a calender that came in the mail today to help keep me organized. I have 5 people's schedules to now keep up with. So I thought a calender where each family member had their on line would come in handy. I thought I was ordering the one that has 7 lines(mom's plan it plus) but this one only has 5. That will take care of the kids, Jose, mom and DD. Me, the cat and Toby will have to do without.

It has a pocket to put things in and a magnetic hanger and over 400 stickers. So if this can't keep me organized I might as well give up already.

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I had so much more to Fill you in on today but Marissa believes I have had quite enough computer time because she is standing here with a thousand things that I just have to look at.

Hopefully I will get a chance to post this weekend and I have lots of pictures to share.

Hope everyone has a great weekend.

Checking In

I just realized it had been a week since i had posted anything.

We FINALLY have everything out of mom and D's house and have turned the keys over.

That was such a weight lifted, it only took 11 trips to Good will with the car packed full, the largest U haul they have packed full, many trips here with the car packed full and three truck loads of stuff we gave to a guy kind enough to finish cleaning the house out for us.

But we are DONE! Thank you God, because I was beginning to believe we would be cleaning that house out forever and beginning to question whether or not someone was coming and dropping truck loads of stuff off after we left.

Now comes the job of getting our house together, so that 6 people can live comfortable in it without getting on each others nerves.

We have given mom and D our big family room and we are now using our small entry way/living room as our family room. I went into decorating mode and had to get everything done in our new family room yesterday.

I just needed pictures and curtains to be hung so that i could feel comfortable in here. We had not yet made it to this room as far as decorating goes. We moved into this house in August of last year and the only rooms that have been fully decorated was the kitchen and Marissa's room.

I bought a gazillion baskets, because clutter is bad for my mental health, so shoving it all into pretty little baskets that have lids makes me better and able to deal with it all.

I got mom into the recliner on Sat all by myself using the lift. It was the first time she has been in a recliner in over a year.
The weather is nice today so I'm am going to try and talk her into letting me wheel her outside for a walk.

This post may make no sense because I have been so very exhausted but I know that after we get everything situated and get on a schedule that life will be more enjoyable and less exhausting.