Thoughts at 37,000 feet

So, as I sit here an a plane, somewhere over Nebraska, but next to my little and a very nice older man who Snapchatted the boarding process, I am thinking of Christmas with my family. Yeah, it's been a pretty rough, wild, crazy, and eventful 2017. So much has happened, and not all of it pleasant.

I'm reading a book on the plane, one I bought specifically so I could read it on the plane. I love the author, Gregg Luke, and I have become a fan of historical fiction, and a huge fan of LDS historical fiction, like retellings of the Book of Mormon. (Ok, they aren't retellings, they are just the same Book of Mormon stories, just with specific fiction details about the personalities of the characters.) I'm reading "The Hunter's Son" and I love it. A young Nephite is captured and sold into slavery. He keeps his hopes and his faith alive with the help of his friendship with another slave. Once they are separated, he spirals down to defeat and depression. He catches a glimpse of his reflection and doesn't recognize himself. He dives deeper into his life and thoughts and has an amazing discovery :

Just like following evil leaders, I knew that finding solace in sorrow broke the spirit, opening the door to emotional, spiritual, and even physical destruction... It had been a long time since I had opened my soul to God. I still believed in Him; I just didn't trust Him. I knew that God did not delight in the sorrows of men. But sometimes sorrow was the only thing that could bring us back to Him, because sorrow is a precursor to humility.

Wow!

*I knew that God did not delight in the sorrows of men. But sometimes sorrow was the only thing that could bring us back to Him, because sorrow is a precursor to humility.*

This helped me to look inside myself a little bit, and I realized that I am NOT a humble person. Yeah, sometimes I can be, but for the most part, I like people to see all that I am doing, see how hard I'm working. And I can honestly say, that when I'm doing things for ME, for the show of it, I feel awful. But when I'm out doing things for others, I feel great.

So I guess, my word for 2018 is HUMILITY. 

I guess we'll just see how this goes.

Hello goodbye

Hello there. I've had a revelation : if I spent the time writing on my blog instead of on Facebook, I'd have a post a day, Heck, I'd have a post an hour!

The boys have been way cute lately. 

Danger loves digging is his pile of dirt/sand/clay and mom has had to implement a ruling is inside toys and outside toys. 

The Colonel turned 6 months and absolutely loves food. He likes pickles, and I even had the camera ready for the initial "sour pucker" but he didn't even flinch, just dove right in. Momma's boy!

Some days I'm.greeted with this. 

But then it immediately melts into this. :)

We're potty training still, so most days Danger is just rocking the undies. If he wants to go outside he needs shoes (we've lost soo many socks) and he can put his boots on by himself so it's really a win-win. Those are his muscles he's showing you, by the way. 

Shark was in charge while I had an appointment and I walked in the door to find this trapped smiley thing. 

We had our first duo bath. Lots of splashing, smiles, and peeing in the tub. (That is NOT why the water is green!)

Donut day!

So many donuts!

Everytime we drive by the Ogden Temple, Danger says, "look mom, it's my favorite temple!"

So even tho things have been crazy, I've been trying some new things out. Cuz you know, the best time to try something new is when you're life is chaos. The boys and I have been listening to hymns everyday. It's been pretty calm around the house lately, well, compared to normal. 

That being said, Danger had a meltdown today and the only thing that would calm him was me singing "Everything is awesome." Go Lego song. It worked. And to add more smile to my day, I made "Where are my pants?" My notification sound. Cuz me and Danger have the sense of humor of a 3 year old boy. We giggle uncontrollably. Every. Time. 

Smile. Everything is awesome. 

Day of Fulfillment

Alright, so there are days, even weeks where I don't cook dinner.... It's not that we don't have food at our house.... But when I look in the fridge, all I find are ingredients! Ugh! That's the worst!

So I've been searching the Pinterest for CrockPot Freezer Meals... I love my crock pot, I love being able to dump a bunch of stuff in there and have a meal when Shark comes home. And for the most part, the meals are pretty delicious! And way easy. In the summer I lean heavily on the crock pot, I don't want to turn the oven on!

So I found a CrockPot Freezer recipe gold mine! I stumbled upon Baked In the South, and decided to make ALL of her recipes. She's got 5 parts! This link goes to Part 5, because parts 1-4 don't link up part 5. But part 5 links up the other 4. She's got about 5 recipes per post, so that's A LOT of food.

 Please ignore how disgusting my freezer is.... I bought berries from Dollar Tree... once the packaging froze, it cracks and broke open... Lesson learned.

It feels so good to have a freezer full of meals. I made 20! And no repeats either. Although I did have enough of some recipes to make doubles, I figured we'd try them out first, see if they were tasty, then make more.

Also, I ended up not having a few things, I thought I had more than 1 can of cream of mushroom soup, so I put on the bag the things I needed to add when I put it in the crock.

So easy, and I bought all the ingredients (expect for the stew beef!) with my bi-weekly grocery budget! It worked out so good!

mo money...

So this whole "NO SPEND MONTH" thing was another epic fail....

Yeah - we had to pay for tuition and new tires....

and you know, those 4 seasons of Survivor....

Yeah.....

Although, we did get the warranties taken off the Durango... Like the warranties that aren't doing a darn thing for us.

Like the Interior/Exterior warranty : if the Interior gets dirty, they will clean it and if they can't clean it, they'll replace the upholstery. They will repair any exterior damage that doesn't need paint, but not tail lights or panels.... Screw that!

And the Gap Coverage : If we were to get in a crash they would pay the difference from the insurance company.

So that was like $1300 back onto the loan! Woo-hoo!

And today I called my internet company, who I have been a customer with for over 5 years, and asked about a customer loyalty promotion. I got a 50% discount on my internet for the next 12 months!!

I'm so happy and excited I could freaking cry!

These are FINALLY steps in the right direction. I'm so happy.

Yeah so we failed this month. But we're working thru it, and taking steps to becoming debt free.

I've started babysitting again, so that income is coming back in. We've got some plans, and now it's just a matter of setting them in motion.

We did just get a new credit card tho. We tried to refinance to see if we could get a lower rate, and we couldn't. My credit is too low and terrible. For a while, about 6 years ago, I didn't give a crap about what money I was spending, or when they wanted it back... So I have some delinquencies on my credit, but I also do not have enough revolving credit.

So we got another credit card to put gas on. It'll help maintain our budget: I already have the gas budgeted out, but we don't spend that much on gas, ever, so we end up using the "extra" money on other things - like take out or Slurpees.

So the credit card will help me gain responsible revolving credit, while helping us get our budget ironed out (find out exactly how MUCH we're spending on gas).

So here goes! We've got some good plans. :)

menu and week plan

**UPDATE : I forgot a day in my menu plan.... So I added my meal and added the day... **

Ok, so I get it, it's Wednesday.

You're probably asking yourself, "What's this chick doing planning meals and making a week plan on Hump Day?!"

Well, Shark's schedule is backwards of most normal people's. He works nights. His work week starts on Wednesday nights. SO, me being his loving amazing wonderful awesome wife, I have changed my schedule around to fit his.

Also, Thursday is my day off from babysitting and it is also the day we get paid!

Do you know how much easier/faster it is to go shopping on a Thursday than a Saturday?!?

MENU :
2-7 : Frozen Pizza
2-8 : Crock Pot Dump Meal (One day I got ambitious and made these crock pot freezer meals.)
2-9 : Crock Pot Chicken with rolls and corn
2-10 :  Stuffed French Toast with fruit
2-11 : Bacon & Pea Mac & Cheese
2-12 :  - Our Valentine's Day -
2-13 : Soy Sauce & Brown Sugar Salmon with Garlic Asparagus
2-14: Chicken Taco Chili with chips and rolls
2-15 : Bacon Ranch Slowcooker Chicken over potatoes
2-16 : Spaghetti with garlic bread
2-17 : leftovers and veggie night
2-18 : Slowcooker Buffalo Chicken Sandwich with celery
2-19 : Philly Cheesesteak Stuffed Peppers
2-20 : Chicken strips with corn
2-21 : Crock pot Honey Seasame Chicken with eggrolls

So there you have my meals planned out for the next 2 weeks.

I'm planning on taking Danger shopping with me on Friday this week. I have an appointment (more headache stuff....) on Friday and I need him to be awake long enough to fall asleep right before my appointment. That way Shark can watch him while he gets ready for work....

Yeah... So for these 6 weeks I'm seriously planning on making dinner every night. It needs to happen. I have been far too lazy lately.

So Danger has been watching his dad too much! He just dropped some food and smashed it deeper into the sofa... JUST like his dad!

My weekly plan is to go shopping on Friday, then my appointment. Saturday we're just chilling. It's a long week for Shark so it's me and little man. Sunday we chill. Monday we've got nothing planned. Shark is done with his class this semester! Tuesday is our Valentine's Day cuz Shark works on Thursday. So we have coupons to a BBQ place. (I have told him there is NOTHING wrong with using coupons on dates, if we can get something free, I'm all for it!) After that, we're pretty open. We haven't really had anything planned.

Maybe I'll continue taking Danger to the library on Mondays. They have a free kids discovery zone thing. They read, the kids sing and dance and shake maracas....

Also, I'm hoping to make and Ikea run...

We've got plans to go to the children's museum.

My SIL wants to get together more and craft some.

We went to IHOP's Free Pancake night.

We'll see what we can get done in these 6 weeks. Yeah.... Little man has been pretty darn cute. We might go for a walk today. He's just rolling around on the floor. He handed me his boots and his shoes. And when I balanced them on his head instead of putting them on his feet, he decided he'd try to put them on himself.

My handsome do-it-yourselfer! I sure do love that guy!