BREEZY FIELDS

My Michael is coming home . You can't just say it. You have to SING it. Tomorrow my tall, strong, gorgeous, husband will be here and it will be beautiful. He will nestle into the life of our family and we will have him with us, here, in our house, in our family . He'll help put on jammies and read stories, and tutor Jane in math. He'll take me on dates and wrestle at least one child during sacrament meeting. He'll snuggle me in bed at night and nuzzle my neck while I'm doing dishes. We'll go for walks and play games and watch movies and do fun family Saturday stuff. He'll help carry a kid down to the car and then he'll drive while I put on my makeup ! We love him, we know how much he loves us. We can't wait! Don't worry, I won't work him to death. I won't make him cook dinner every night for the next 10 months or hand over the kids and take off to the spa for the weekend (tempting, but... no). We just want him HERE. I kee...

Have not been blogging for a while. Sorry I have been super busy. I am so excited for dad to come home. We are going to have a big Thanksgiving Day with Dave and Adina and Grandma Barb and Papa(so excited to see you guys by the way!) Well, I better go. Nothing too interesting going on otherwise I would blog more tonight. I love everbody. Jane

Wow, Congrats Geof. Geof., I am so proud of that killer math grade. Truly a Bennett. Leash and Lyd, I've had a hard time even thinking about writing on the blog, how can I put into words my extreme jealousy? I have only wanted to go to a U2 concert since 1992 but the timing or the money has never worked out. Mike looked into getting me a ticket for this concert but it was so expensive for two and I didn't want to be a loser and go by myself. So... I guess I'll be seeing them when they are 65 or so on some reunion tour. Leash, I would have felt sorry for you about the toilets until I read about U2. Adam and Mindi, I'm glad you are having such a great month. Your family has been truly blessed. Cameron, Leash, Jess, anyone else that I don't have an address for. Will you please post your addresses on the blog and sometime during the holidays (possibly including Valentine's Day) you will get a Christmas card. Life here is great. Very busy. I took the girls on a t...

Part of what I wanted to do was eventually transfer over past blogs from our family blogs. Since I am slammed right now, trying to get everything ready for my husband and family I thought now would be a fabulous time. So here is a poem I wrote for Mike after he complained that I hadn't mentioned him in my blog (he was in Korea and feeling very left out). It was written in about 15 minutes so don't expect perfection- )Oct. 2005 ODE TO MICHAEL Michael, my love, you were sent from above to fill my life with joy. We have three gorgeous girls, two that have curls, but alas we do not have a boy. But that's cool with you. You've never been blue, you've taken it all in stride. Our life has been magic, sometimes a bit tragic. But hey, that's part of the ride. Whatever I do, I know I have you to back me when things get rough. I know you're a softie, a lover, a friend, although to a sranger you're tough. When I think of you I see Mt. Dew, poured into glass...

Ask me just how I get sucked in to watching made for T.V. Disney movies about cyber chicks and finding that Hannah Montana lines are now part of my every day dialogue. "Why, why, why, why, why, no, no, no, no, no, you, you, you, you." Yep, that's Jackson on Hannah. It's a phrase that comes in quite handy though. Like when Sawyer dropped a glass bowl tonight, or when Ellyn dropped a glass yesterday, or when Ellyn dropped a plate Monday (I am running out of glasses, really and truly. I don't think I will replace them with glass, maybe some lovely Walmart plastic-BPA free of course). Or when I'm blaming my children for having my brain sucked away by the Disney channel this evening. Also, another fun line is "Daddy's little convict says what?" Billy Ray Cyrus a.k.a. Robbie Ray uses that one. I am neither a dad nor do I have a daughter that is a convict yet I still enjoy saying it. What can I say? An hour of Disney (tonight 1 and a half) kee...

This morning Mike was reading a part of my brother and sister-in-law's blog to me out loud. Tracey was saying that they had just purchased a new camera for Christmas. She said that Christmas always comes in November for Tom. This made me giggle. It is the same at our house, Christmas in November, Mike's November birthday in October, Father's Day in April. The boy knows how to work the holidays (can I ever just let him get absolutely nothing on the actual day? Well, yes, sometimes but not often). Except... this November the Christmas came for me. Mike bought me a new camera (we didn't even know that both families were buying cameras). My poor Canon SD 1000 never completely recovered from the Gatorade. The monitor is faded with crystal like stars across the surface. The pics do turn out, if you can tell what you have taken a picture of to begin with. Antyway... last week my sweet husband suggested that we might go for a more professional style camera. He sai...

Scrubbed up the strollers and the dog crates and cleaned up the garage . We were going to put up Christmas decorations but it was 82 degrees, that's right- BEAUTIFUL!!!! Not Christmas decoration putting up weather. Decorated Sadie's Feather for her 1st grade class Thanksgiving project. Is that a killer feather or what? Made several batches of truffles . I had made the ganache for Enrichment Tuesday night but it didn't cool in time. Dang. So I took soup and a centerpiece (my new calling is being on the Enrichment Committee) and called it good. Oh, I did help set up, that's what we did as one of our errands on Tuesday. Do you see how I am rationalizing the fact that the girls and I made truffles off and on for about four days and ate them all ourselves? Sadie loved to dip them in the unsweetened cocoa. We have a fine layer of cocoa on dishes, counters, clothing, etc... Took the puppies to the Carmel Community Park . It is a great big field where a million dogs...

Yesterday Ellyn and I had appointments at the dermatologist. Ellyn has some little flat warts above her upper lip and under her chin and I have to have a full body check every 6 mos. after my little brush with skin cancer last fall. We were off to an auspicious start when Ellie began working on a poopy diaper about 3 minutes before we pulled into the clinic parking lot. We were already running 5 minutes late due to the fact that I thought my Dr. had said that the clinic was in the Valley when it was in fact in downtown Monterey and I hadn't given myself enough travel time and hadn't looked up the actual address until it was too late. As we pulled into the parking lot, whilst trying to talk to my husband on the phone, I look over into the passenger seat and realized I didn't have my diaper bag. I had just picked up my van from the body shop and I had grabbed the car seats out of Mike's car but not the diaper bag. I scrounged around and found three Sawyer diapers tucked i...

Mike thinks my blog about being Alpha makes me sound psycho. It could be because I am. Our four day weekend is over, very sad. However, today did not feel like a day off. It was full of appointments and running around, mostly scheduled when I didn't realize it was going to be Veteran's Day and the kids would not be in school. They were such champs though, especially Jane, she took such good care of her siblings. Actually, they were all pretty incredible in their own way. Mike and I are on the phone hanging out in companionable silence right now. He's listing all the places he's lived on some sort of Facebook application and I am writing this blog. I can't wait till we can hang out in companionable silence in the same room. He can lay here on our bed next to me with his lap top propped against his knees and a big comfy pillow behind his back and I can do the same. Except.... I can tuck my feet under his and he can keep me warm. Mmmmm.... that will be f...

Sawyer cannot hang out lower than the dogs for the next little while. Sawyer's spit is to be put in the dog's food before they eat. Sawyer must be carried through the doorway first, ahead of the dogs. Sawyer is on a total power trip. It's all going to his head. NO, not my cute little Soy Bean. We had a little incident the other night. Sawyer grabbed at Joe's face and Joe 1 snapped at him. Not an "I'm going to bite you" snap, I don't think, but alarming and scary none the less. I don't want to hear "Sawyer shouldn't have grabbed at his face" because I don't and he's learning. This also came after the puppies started gaining all sorts of freedom in the home- being potty trained and all. Google to the Rescue- I was reminded that we need to establish each member of our family as "ALPHA." We are now doing Alpha Canine Bootcamp (luckily I have read Eclipse and Breaking Dawn and perhaps I might have learned ...

Mike just called and I have to say I was still fairly breathless. I could not wait to tell him what I had just been doing. Ellyn and I had just finished a game of peek a boo. A game of peek a boo where Ellyn said "peek a boo" about 10 times! It gets better. After we had played peek a boo for quite a while (we do this by throwing her quilt over her head and then pulling it off and tickling her cute little neck) I told Ellie it was time for bed and kissed her and turned out the light. After a few seconds she started crying. I came back into her room and sat on the floor and started singing, I had a feeling she might get upset, I have to kind of distance myself at bedtime or she is really sad when I leave her. So... I was singing to Ellyn for a little while and she was quiet for a bit and then she started crying again. I looked up at her and asked if she still wanted to play and (drum roll please) SHE NODDED HER HEAD YES!!! It gives me the chills just to write that. ...

Mike made fun of my overzealous use of font colors and sizes. However, I was so amazed to find that it had only been a tab away this whole time that I just couldn't resist trying it out. So mostly just to annoy the husband that I love, I just might be writing in color alot.... Mom: So Sadie, we haven't heard from you lately, how's it going? Sadie: Good, are we doing that question thing? Um...Great! Mom: What did you do today? Sadie: (she wants pink, daddy) I went to lunch. I talked to people. I had lunch recess. I chased boys, that's all I did. I chased boys everywhere. Mom: Why were you chasing boys? Sadie: Because I like to, it's an Army game. Mom: What do you want to do with daddy when he gets home? Sadie: Play the wii with him and Guitar Hero and Rock Band and the boardgames ( Jane is begging me to add that she agrees with Sadie). Mom: Sadie wants me to ask her if she wants a laptop. Sadie, do you want a laptop? Sadie: (Now she wants red, this ...

Yesterday was an amazing Ellyn day. So amazing that she gets her own little post. Yesterday morning we dressed her up as a princess . I wondered if she would care if I put on makeup. I brought out my huge hand mirror and put this color eyeshadow on her eyes. She looked in the mirror and then smiled and touched her eyelids lightly with her fingertip. Then... I got out my lip gloss and instead of trying to eat it she pursed her lips and let me put it on. We were all so excited. The next beautiful moment came in the van. Jane had already left on her bus and we were waiting for Ellyn 's. We were singing Primary songs and started singing " I am a Child of God ." This is Ellyn 's favorite song, it soothes her like not many things can. Sometimes I sing it over and over in the night to help her calm down and go back to sleep. I decided long ago that this was the message I wanted Ellyn to absorb more than anything else in this world, that she is a beloved child...

You know how some holidays just pass by before you even know it? I am happy to report that Halloween did not, at least not this year. Last Saturday we had the Trunk or Treat , Wednesday night when we got home from Young Women the owl that hangs out in a tree near my bedroom window was hooting eerily in the dark night . We all spent a few minutes getting ourselves a little freaked out. There is a reason that owls are Halloween birds, they sound very, very creepy . Unfortunately, when I wake up in the middle of the night the Who Who Who keeps me awake and a teensy bit frightened. But I digress, Thursday night we watched "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," "Skeleton Dance," and "Lonesome Ghosts" on my lap top. It wasn't the fabulous Halloween picnic by the lake that the Washington Bennetts had but it was pretty fun. It was raining and blustery outside and the girls had to sleep on the couch. You know how scary those Disney cartoons can be. F...

Okay, Mike and I have not had to pay for utilities because of gov't. housing for many years. We are kind of out of touch on the whole cost of utilities thing but I just got our new Oct. bill for gas and electric and it was for $355.00. To me that feels outrageously high. Before any of you answer. Our gas is $45 for heat, we don't even have Mike's computer here yet. We don't even really watch t.v. on the weekdays, not even on the weekends for that matter, and I don't have my deep freeze plugged in. No xbox, wii, nothing (that's one of the reasons I am very frightened). I'm freaking out a little bit and I need input before I approach the electric company or my rental agency with some kind of conspiracy theory. Let me know, PLEASE!!!! P.S. The flute is safe and sound. The camera is recovering slowly.