Carson and Lexi

Carson has always had a special place in his heart for Lexi. Today he said "Mom, we are going to have to have 5 bikes when Lexi comes home. When is her brain going to be finished?" I told him that her brain would be sick for the rest of her life. He said "But she is our child. We love her." I really hope that someday we will be able to go to China and visit Lexi and that the kids get a chance to meet their special sister.

Help her come home!!!

Isn't she adorable?? No, she's not mine! My friend Marianne in Idaho is bringing her home to their family soon. The orphanage donation has increased from $3000 to $5000. Marianne is a dietician and has a 4 week eating plan that she will base around your height and weight for just $25!! Go to her blog at http://www.jonahsfamily.blogspot.com/ to sign up. You can pay her through PayPal. Scroll down to her August 26 blog entry to get the link to the PayPal link. It's a great deal for a great cause!!

Here is all the information from her blog:

I have been racking my brain for ways to further reach our goal to raise the orphanage donation for our daughter's orphanage in China. We have been so blessed to know she will be home soon . I feel honored to be her Mama. I know it will all work out in the end, and that the donation we are required to take will help feed and house the many many friends of our daughter's who will remain in China. I want to offer my services as a nutritionist in a way that is easy and effective no matter where you live to help raise the last chunk of money we need before we travel. SO............drumroll please:) ...... haha I've always wanted to say that:)...I am going to offer a 4 week plan for ANYONE who wants to loose weight, make their metabolism fire up, and feel so good you can't imagine!!. I usually give this infornmation out ovver a span of 4-6 weeks for a client to help with their weight loss goals.I work with heart patients, diabetics, fibromyalgia and overweight clients on a regular basis. THIS WORKS FOR ALL OF THEM!!!!! I use a very flexible, very "real life" plan for my clients. You eat real food, you will just be paying more mind to WHEN, HOW OFTEN, AND HOW TO "FOOD COMBINE" to get your body to burn fat around the clock!!!......THIS METHOD GIVES YOUR BODY NO OTHER CHOICE but to burn FAT! Your body composition will change . Let me repeat.......your body composition will change!! I have a friend who did this, and I saw her go from 28 % body fat to 16% in a matter of a couple months! I tried this and within 4 weeks I had dropped the weight I gained this summer worrying about my baby:) It is fool proof and EASY! Exercise 3 days a week is suggested . Anyway, I can't say enouph about this method I use. I have watched it work over and over and over again! You have the power to train your body to burn fat all night long!!! EVERY NIGHT!!!! So, the details. I have put together a "packet" if you will with ALLL the instructions, the food amounts and recipes from my own kitchen that I have developed to fit this plan. I have spent almost 2 years putting all this together. I have done the thinking for you! NOW all you have to do is plug it in and EAT!!!! ( you will eat alot trust me! 5 times a day:)!! It is very flexible and YOU decide what you want to eat......just order it and you will see for yourself! So the plan is.....when you order, just go to the paypal widget here on my blog. The price is only 25.00!!! The average client doing this is about 225.00!! So DO IT NOW FOR 25 bucks!!! SEND ME A NOTE THRU PAYPAL( you go to the "Orphanage Donation " widget below -just keep scrolling down) WHEN YOU DONATE WITH YOUR ADDRESS, HEIGHT AND WEIGHT,. This will give me the information I need to get you started. I also will be available ANY TIME for questions and tips........via my cell phone or email. Picture yourself lighter, happier and healthier for a GREAT cause!!

Healthy Choice

Every time my husband went out of town I would stock up on frozen meals for me and feed the kids mac and cheese, hot dogs, and other junky food like that. It was a vacation from cooking for me. Every time I heated up a frozen meal, it was awful!! Yuck!! Last week I bought a couple of Healthy Choice frozen meals. Have you guys tried these?? Seriously, they are good!! I mean, fresh meals are definitely better, but this the closest to the real thing there is!! Okay, this is a silly blog post. It is amazing what is exciting to the stay at home mom!!

My kids need diversity training

On the way home from school today Kendall was talking about how excited she was when we move to Sacramento that we are going to get her a Bento style lunch box with rice and egg molds. I told her that some of her new friends might also have Bento lunch boxes because there will be lots of Chinese kids in her new school (it is 29% Caucasian and 28% Asian). She said "What!! I have to have Chinese friends??" Now I have to explain that her school here is very diverse. She has lots of friends that are Hispanic, African American, and Caucasion, but not many Chinese (because there aren't many Asians here). I said "Kendall, your sister is Chinese." She said "Oh yah, right." I guess Presley isn't Chinese to her, she is just her sister.

New House!!

The offer on our first choice house was accepted!! We beat out the second highest bidder by just $1,000!! If everything goes well we will be in by the middle of October. We LOVE it!! And if you are like me and love to watch House Hunters and could spend all day looking at houses, we have videos of a house just like ours. Derek videoed this other house about 6 weeks ago. We are so glad that we didn't get it, because our house is in such better shape!! So if you are interested, go to http://www.youtube.com/user/ameliser and click on the videos that say Avocet house.

Labor Day Weekend

We have had a great Labor Day Weekend here in Sacramento. The drive up by myself with 4 small kids was tough, but they did great! The kids have been having a great time swimming in Shannon's pool and playing their Wii. The kids have done great and Landon has done so much better than he did on our Utah trip. We will be so sad to leave tomorrow!!

On Sunday we went up the 50 to Sly Park and had a picnic at the lake. We then decided to drive up to Tahoe. We went around the lake and up to 80. We didn't stop and get out in Tahoe because it was WAY crowded and took about 1.5 hours to get around the west part of the lake! But it was a great Sunday drive!!


We put an offer in on 2 houses on Saturday. We like them both, but one of them we LOVE. Of course, everyone else will love it too and it will get multiple offers. We are hoping our offer will be strong enough!!

It's amazing what you find when you move.....

I was so excited to find a tote in the garage that had some clothes for Presley that I hadn't realized was there. When I picked up the tote I found something on the garage floor. When I inspected closer I shuddered because I thought it was a snake skeleton. I went inside and got some tongs and started to pick it up and it kind of freaked me out. When I got it inside I realized that it was a lizard. Funny that I was a little scared to pick up what I thought was a dead snake, but when I realized it was a lizard I wasn't as scared. Poor little lizard!! He must have gotten stuck in between the totes and couldn't get out. I'm assuming it was from last year because I think it would take a while for it to decompose like that!!