My Grandpa

My Grandpa died yesterday. This is kind of an old 4 generations picture with him, my grandma, my mom and dad, and my girls. Look how happy he looks. That is how I think of him. The picture I think I love best is from when I was young. Tori is riding on his shoulders and I am walking a long side of them. We are camping and wearing our matching Mickey Mouse sweatshirts. He was the biggest guy I knew, as a kid that was a little indimidating, but he was so much fun, especially when we went camping (I loved riding trees) or snowmobiling. Today I am sad. I am grateful for his life. I am grateful to be a part of the legacy he leaves behind. As an adult I started to see his tender heart. He would cry as we left after each visit. He was full of stories, I got good at talking with Grandma while he told a completely different story. His stories have been our Christmas gifts for the last several years, I think I'll spend some time reading them today. I am glad my kids knew him and even more glad that I know him. I will really miss him.

Sarah Wants to Be a Rockstar

Yesterday I hit the jack pot with clearance plus 40% off at Justice. This is one of Sarah's new outifits. She wants to know if she looks like Judy Nails (from Guitar Hero). Ask Sarah what she wants to be when she grows up and her response is "A Rockstar Mom". So, What do you think?

Valentines day and My New Hair Do

I have about 3 blog posts running through my head. The problem is actually sitting down to write, so after getting updated on everyone's blogs I am now inspired to do at least one post.

Here is a picture of my girls in their Valentines Day shirts. Darren and I went out on Friday night, and it was madness! The wait at Texas Roadhouse was at and hour and a half when we got there. So we killed time at the mall and then went to our movie. The theater was packed, I don't think I want to go to Jordan Commons ever again! Then we went to dinner at 9:30, good times. Oh, we saw "He's just not that into you" -Ultra Chick Flick, I felt bad that Darren had to watch it. On Saturday we did a little shopping, I needed to get Darren's present, and then we went swimming, Shelby's friend was there so she had an even better time. We ended the day with a heart shaped pizza and an excellent ice cream cake. I loved that the day was about the family having a good time, being together.

This is my new hair do. I helped in Primary on Sunday and the little girl sitting next to me asked if I spray painted my hair.

Possible posts to be coming soon: We have Snack issues, and Why genius is stupid.

Love Is In The Air

I am a huge Jon and Kate plus 8 fan. In one episode about Valentines Day Kate had these cute bags that she strapped to the kids chairs and filled with goodies for Valentines Day. I thought that was so cute. Well I decided to have the kids decorate these little mailboxes, and then the kids could spend the month of February delivering little things to each other. We decorated the mailboxes on Friday and immediately the kids started delivering notes and treats to each other. They raise the flag to let the person know they have mail. I thought the novelty would wear off by the end of the day, but they are still at it. It has been a lot of fun. We will have special prizes for Valentines Day. We are also our Valentines dinner, since the big day is Saturday, and it will be crazy busy everywhere Darren and I are going out Friday. Saturday we are having heart shaped pizza from Papa Murphys and I have ordered and ice cream cake from Maggie Moos (cinnamoo and dark chocolate ice cream with Heath bar and chocolate cake), I think we still need cookies from the Smart Cookie to finish it off. It is going to take some extreme points managing to pull it off, but I am up for the challenge, I think.

Yesterday we got a delivery from FedEx. I called Darren to tell him a package had arrived, and ask him what it was. I got the typical Shipley response "Its too close to a holiday to be asking those kind of questions". When he got home from work he handed me the box, I opened it and found this!



Isn't it cute? I LOVE red! I did already have an i Pod, its and old (in the i Pod world) 2G, I have to take stuff off anytime I want to put something new on. I like to listen to General Conference on my way home from the gym, now with a whopping 8G, I can have all of Conference on there at once! I am rather pathetic, because I don't know how to use i tunes or rip music. I tell Darren what I want on there and how I want it organized and he does it for me. Lame right? or is it love? I am so excited about my new ipod. In honor of Valentines Day I have decided to wear red shoes everyday this week! Today my red shoes are red slippers, cuz hey I'm not going anywhere until yoga class (tonight is my first class, I'm excited about it too).

Saturday Sentiments

My friend Catey does this "Making a Happy Home" thing every Monday. I have loved the idea and wanted to do it myself.

This past Monday I had a great plan that I would start with my kitchen floor. I HATE my kitchen floor. It is vinyl and has this texture to it that holds the dirt, so unless I scrub on my hands and knees with a scrub brush it has these little flecks of dirt that stay stuck to it. I know there are those of you that regularly scrub your floors on your hands and knees, I am just not motivated enough to do it every week. I like the swiffer and use it pretty much everyday the the hard scrubbing only happens once in a while. So I was going to take a before and an after picture of my floor. Well, I did scrub the floor around the back door, in front of the oven and the fridge and in front of the buffet, the spots that get really bad. I didn't take any pictures.

Then after I was finished I took my wheat, rice, and oatmeal containers downstairs to the storage room to refil them. I couldn't open the containers on my own and enlisted my brother in law, Mike, to help me open buckets. I was in such a cleaning mood that, with Mike's help, I started organizing the storage room, mostly moving buckets around. The spot right inside the storage room door is where the soda goes, and has really been a mess. I have been thinking for months that if I had one more set of shelves that could hold the soda, as well as the cleaning supplies, and paper products it would make a huge difference in that room. I was planning on going into town anyway that day, so we added Costco to our list of stops. Mike had found some shelves there that would be the perfect size and didn't cost a lot. That night Darren and Mike put the shelves together and then we organized even more. I gained so much storage space by adding the shelves the room for my food storage also expanded. I can see what I have so much better now, and will be able to tell when I need to restock much easier.


This is how my storage room lookes now. The black to the left is the new shelves. This is seriously as good as my storage room can look.

Now, after all of that, the reason I chose this as my Saturday Sentiments post is that organization makes me happy. The storage room has been one of those scarry rooms in my house that I leave as quickly as I can (not just because its really cold in there). Now I go in there and just look around. I can with peace of mind say that it is finished. To make it even better Mike vacuumed the carpet remnants that are on the floor. It looks great. I am ready for a case lot sale, and have room to put it all. That is happiness.