January

I don't know if I have pictures. I haven't bothered to check my camera. Its been a crazy month. I was sick again. I was basically sick all of December and half of January. It started as a sinus infection then moved to a chest cold. Went away so I could enjoy Christmas but came back with an awful vengeance two days later. It was horrible! It started in my chest this time but it was bad. I was trying every home remedy out there (maybe this is where I wanted to start with essential oils?). I was making thyme tea because thyme is an expectorant. I tried cold wet socks with dry socks over it to help loosen it at night. Surprisingly helped a bit. I didn't get the humidifier because Charlotte started to pick up what I had so she got the humidifier and I suffered. It was really rough. I would be so exhausted each day when Scott got home. I would lay in bed a bunch with my chest hurting from coughing and just feeling awful. There were days I just felt miserable and could not figure out why I was not getting better. Those were a rough 4-6 weeks. I hadn't been sick for that long in years.

So with my lovely illness I could not exercise. Any time I even worked up a bit of breathing going to the basement I would end up coughing and hacking and sometimes almost throwing up from the coughing. It was miserable. So I really started to feel pretty down. It was a glorious thing when I could breathe normal again. But that meant having to work back towards everything I had gained. I was running 4-5 miles without getting horribly winded! It was a miracle! But that is all gone now. I haven't run since. I really haven't had time and its been so icy and I can only run in the dark when Scott gets home. But I did manage to maintain my same weight even while not exercising. I have decided though to change up my routine. I was sick of waiting until Jackson's naps to exercise and try to cram in my scripture reading and any other thing I needed to do while he napped. So I made a goal that I've been about 80-90% successful with so far. I now wake up at 5:50 am. I get up, get changed, say my morning prayer (which have been rather long which is why its now earlier than 6 that I get up), then I exercise and shower all before the kids get up. My kids have been on a pretty predictable schedule. Usually up between 7 and 7:30. So this way I get some things done in peace and quiet and without any other distractions. It has been amazing. I just have to be sure to go to bed at a decent time the night before. But I really feel so much better showering and getting ready first thing instead of hanging out in exercise clothes until Jackson naps and I can exercise and shower. I just feel like its more time for me and it gives me a good start to my day with an open mind. So me and Jillian Michaels have been rockin' it out each morning. I love my dvds but I really need an exercise step. I've been using Charlotte's little stool and I'm surprise I haven't broken my ankle yet. Hopefully by the end of Feb I can acquire one. I really love the dvds and they kill me but I've already lost a little over 3 inches off my body in the last two weeks. Could be better but money was tight this paycheck so I couldn't get as many healthy options in as I would have liked. But I'm still going at it.

Along with all that I'm trying to squeeze in more time indexing and finding family names. We have a goal set for our ward for the year to index 300,000 names and the youth have a challenge until the end of Feb to index as many as we can. Our ward also has a goal to find 5 family names to take to the temple and the stake has issued a challenge of 5 names also for the YW for girls camp. I have been able to find a ton! I now have 41 names I have found. Amazing right. Thanks to lots of prayer and some access to newer records I've been able to fix some of the lines that weren't right and find families missing siblings and what not. So we have plenty to keep us busy all year. I am just amazed at what I've been able to find and I love the feeling I get when I find these people who have been missing or just not linked together. Can't wait to do this work for them! I am still addicted to indexing. It is just really interesting and so awesome to know that what I am doing will help people like me. It is bringing to light new information and records that weren't previously available. Such a great experience to take part in. Love to index!

Then to add to my list there is personal progress which I'm always trying to work on and then mine and Scott's favorite time of year... basketball season! Each Monday from 4-5 I have practice with my girls. Tuesday night are the boys games. Wednesday I have mutual. Thursday are the girls games and sometimes the men's bball. Friday are the boys again and sometimes Sat morning Scott has a men's game. Yeah... Feb is going to be busy busy busy. I just hope we can squeeze in a temple trip at some point so I can get all these cards printed.

So that is basically what has been consuming our lives. We haven't really gone anywhere or done anything with the kids. We stay in mostly except when I visit teach. The new aquarium should be opening in Feb or March so that will give us an option and will only cost us gas since my mom got us an annual pass for Christmas. So that will be nice. It's hard being inside all the time and this winter has been a lot colder consistently. Oh, Jackson gets his stent out next Wed. Yay! I just hope it stays open like it should. I have also been working on our taxes and am super relieved that we will not have any additional tax from draining Scott's 401k to pay for some of my hospital bills. Such a relief. Our return still won't be as great as I had hoped but still enough to put a dent in our debt. I think we had over $11k in medical and dental that we could deduct. Some bills will be paid off soon so there is a bit of relief but I still keep praying for a miracle that Scott will get a raise. I'm not getting any younger and if we're going to have more kids I only have 5 yrs before I'm considered high risk but we can't do anything until the debt is gone and we can get a bigger vehicle. But for now it feels good to be where we're at. I've grown more spiritually and I feel like we're doing a lot better as a family making sure we do fhe and read our scriptures each night and have family prayer. As long as we can keep it up I think we'll be just fine. All in due time I guess. I just need to keep working on my patience! :)