And...We're Back Online

Finally we have the internet again! Life here in Heyburn is slow but we get to see a lot more of Chris so I'm not complaining. Gordon and I have had some great conversations. Here is one we had yesterday.
(We could here our neighbor girl screaming and so Gordon said she was throwing a fit and got locked in the tower FOREVER. After discussing the many ways she could escape, Gordon told me a dragon knocked down her door and saved her.)

G: And then the dragon will come and eat you.
M: I thought he was a nice dragon?
G: He is. He only eats fat people.
M: I'm not fat.
G: Yes you are.
M: Gordon, do you even know what fat means?
G: Yes, it means you are like an elephant. And you are like an elephant and you have an elephant nose.
I stopped the conversation after that before he could come up with even more insults!

Let's Be Honest

The real reason I haven't been posting (or posting anything real) much because I have had only one thing on my mind as of late and it wasn't really a subject I wanted to share with the world. As most of you know, Chris graduated in May in Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning. Finding a job has been tough.

Plain.
old.
no.
fun.

After about a month of rejections (about 5-10 a day) Chris decided to give it one more shot. (Now you have to understand here: Chris had NO job once school let out because during school he was a teacher's assistant so we needed something quick.) He applied to an international company hiring in the middle east, specifically the Kingdom of Bahrain. At first I was like, "Yeah, okay, apply for a job in Bahrain or whatever. It is not like we are going to ever move there!" Then I started to really consider it when the company was actually considering Chris. We did a lot of thinking and praying, talking and fasting, back and forth-ing. Right around the same time my brother Brett offered Chris a job at the family business. Now things were heating up. We had to make a decision. Chris and I both felt that Bahrain was the right thing for our family. We were so excited and started dreaming of our life abroad. When they finally offered Chris the job we were ecstatic. We both have never wanted something so bad. This was the biggest decision, since marriage, that either of us had ever had to pray over. We felt everything was falling into place. Then the contract arrived. The company was not willing to pay more than they would pay a middle eastern worker which would definately not support our family. Chris was very disappointed and had to turn it down. Why then, did we both feel it was the right choice? After months of stress, wondering, hoping, praying...we were left broken hearted. I told Chris we had one day to be angry about it and then we are moving on. We came to the conclusion that maybe the reason we felt it was right was because if we hadn't put all our effort into getting the job we would have always wondered, "what if?" Now we can move to Idaho, moving forward with no regrets. Knowing that we gave it our all.
So...Chris has been living and working in Idaho (and loving it!) for the past month or so and I have been here trying to adjust to single motherhood, pack, and find a place to live 135 miles away. It has been a little hectic around here. In fact I have had this post for about two weeks with no time to finish it up. Well its time because we are moving in two days to little, old Heyburn, Idaho. I mean, I don't even know if they have internet there! =)

My Hero

Gordon was sitting on the rocking chair pushing against the desk with his feet. "Mom, look at me. I am so strong. I am growing so strong and healthy I am going to be big like daddy and never bleed." I responded with, "Dads never bleeds, huh? How come?" "I don't know, they just don't." He said it so matter of factly it was precious.

Oh, The Cars I've Had

I saw this done a long time ago and I can't even remember where but I liked it so I'm copying...
I have had a lot of cars in my life so sit back and relax as we take a little drive down memory lane. My first car was a 1991 Pontiac Bonneville = grandma car!
And it was pretty much like that except for it was light blue and no where near as shiny. I think it was my dad's business car if you can believe it. Then my mom's run around town car. Finally, it was my first car! Then I drove this lovely '94 Geo Metro, looked like this except no spoiler. I really liked this car for the 2 or 3 months I drove it. My parents bought it for Sarah for when she got back from her mission so I had it until then. Along with this '94 Subaru Legacy they bought for Chad before he came home from his mission. Mine also had a ski rack on top and tinted windows.

I think I drove this 1990 Jeep Wrangler for about 2 weeks. My parents bought it for the "teenager car" when my oldest sibling started driving. It went through 1 sister and 3 brothers before it got to me and it just couldn't go anymore. I felt a little cheated. For years I looked forward to driving the Jeep and my time came and went before I could get any good use out of it. (By "use" I mean, having a wild good time and picking up hot guys!)But then my parents bought this. A 1995 GMC Pickup Truck. Mine was white with the truck bed going in on both sides of the tires for like little steps. Does anyone know what I am talking about? Anywho, I loved it and the guys did too! In college I got around town using these:
When I got married I inherited "Brandi." Why is it guys name their cars? Chris had purchased this car when he came home from his mission. A 1998 Nissan Altima. He loved that car. And I did too until it broke down on us the first thing after arriving in California.

Being stuck in CA with no car and needing one badly, we bought the first car we felt was a good buy: a 2002 VW Jetta. The guy was selling it for super cheap so he could have money for college. It was a nice car and I would have liked it better if I was single or newly married with no children. It was just too small. We sold it as soon as we got back to from Cali. And got this beauty. Ours was black and Chris fell in love with it at first sight. He went to an auction with his dad and got it. But soon we had to face the reality that it was just too much gas money. Chris's parents ever-so-kindly took it off our hand for us.

We bought this little Toyota Corrolla with our tax return. The only reason I love it is: its paid for! Chris drives this one around, back and forth to work. Oh and it is the ugliest shade of green ever. And I get to drive our 2005 Chevy Malibu Maxx. I felt kind of bad insisting we get a newer car but I wanted something stable and one I wouldn't have to worry about it breaking down everytime I was on the freeway! Can you blame me?
And that ladies and gentlemen is the history of the life of Emily's cars. Thank you for joining us.

Country Anyone?

I have liked country music now for about a year or so but I need some new songs. I am sick of playing the same 40 songs over and over again. So of course I enlist your help. What else is the Blogging community for except to help each other through our crises. Am I right Ladies? Anywho, tell me who your favorite hidden artists are, songs you sing in the shower, old songs you used to love, tell me everything. I mean I obviously know who Taylor Swift is and Rascal Flatts, I mean obviously!! Oh, and go ahead and throw in any songs (not country) that you LOVE to listen to. Please do not include any songs that have lyrics: "Sssh baby, shut your lips, do the Helen Keller and talk with your hips." Dead serious, heard it on the radio today taking Gordon to Pre-school.

Marriage Math

Five Years of Marriage Equals:

5,437 Kisses
168 Date nights (not nearly enough!!)
74,382 Smiles
3,867 I Love Yous
985 I'm Sorrys
730 Dinners made with love
4,745 Diapers changed
264,398 Tears dried
276 Late nights
86 Plans for the future
15 jobs
7 hospital visits
4 different apartments
2 angels to cherish
1 man to love forever

A Mother's Nightmare

Once again, we spent our Saturday evening in the hospital. I sat there feeling so awful, wishing I could take away my little boy's pain; beating myself up thinking I could have prevented this. Am I really that bad of a mother that my children are in the hospital every other month? Gordon HATES hospitals ever since last December when he had to go in for dehydration and we had to pin him to the bed to get an IV in him (it took 4 tries because his veins kept collapsing). He was so scared and I just wanted to take him in my arms and make it all go away with the power of my hug.
What happened this time, you ask. We were finishing a wonderful day at the local swimming pool, I had just wrapped Gordon tight in his towel to keep him warm; he took two steps and fell flat on his face, with no arms to catch his fall. There was a lot of blood and tears but over all not a big deal. We stuffed some tissue up is nose and in his mouth and started to head for home. And then the nightmare began. This was our conversation in the car ride:
Gordon: What happened?
Me: You fell down.
G: Where?
M: At the swimming pool, remember?
A few seconds pass
G: What happened?
M: You fell and hurt your nose.
G: Where?
M: At the swimming pool. Do you remember swimming?
G: Yes. (Few seconds.) What happened?
M: (I'm really starting to freak out now, too many medical dramas on TV pop into my head) Honey you fell down. Where did you fall down? Do you remember?
G: Where? Tell me.
This went on and on for about 5 minutes. Then we told him he was going to the hospital and he started crying. After a few minutes he asked where we were going. Again, to the hospital. Crying.
Long story short. A lot of waiting at the hospital to find out, after the Cat Scan, everything was fine. Just a concussion. Phew!!

The Wind Caves

The Tatton family decided yesterday to take advantage of all this time we have with daddy right now. We went on a hike to the Wind Caves. Yes, we took Gordon AND Edison. Gordon did such a good job. It took us about 2 hours to hike up and only 1 hour to hike down. The hike is 1.8 miles one way. To say the least it was much easier for Gordon on the way down. I kept asking him if he wanted to take a break and rest seeing as how we took one every two minutes on the way up. He kept telling me, "No, we have to get home." I have to say, the hike down was much harder on me. I felt like me knees and hips were going to pop out. I am not supposed to feel like that yet!

About half way down Chris rolled his ankle and said a few choice words. It really scared Gordon and he kept saying he didn't want daddy to die like daddy's grandma did. (We went to a funeral on Saturday for Chris's maternal grandmother.) He was really quite distraught about it even after Chris got up and started walking. He has such a tender heart!

I am really quite amazed at how well Gordon did. Edison did good too but all he had to do was sit in a front carrier the whole way. It was a fun but exhausting day!

Power to the Little Guy

I may be behind everyone else but I am just starting to love Etsy. Not everything. But there are some pretty cool things out there. This last Christmas, Chris and I went way too overboard for our kids and we realized, they don't care! It was such a waste. A few presents would have satisfied them just fine. I told Chris this year for Christmas we are doing ONE gift from Santa (store bought) and all the others will be handmade. I am making Gordon a rag quilt, Edison a quiet book, and I haven't thought of anything for Chris yet. But I am working on it. Then I saw these on Etsy and I thought they were so amazing. I think instead of making Chris' gift I will find something handmade on this wonderful website that gives anyone a chance to be a small business owner. How cool is that?! My friend also had a good idea for Christmas: "something you want, something you need, something to wear, something to read." I know, I know... why am I thinking about Christmas in May?

Memories, Sweet Memories

I have been wanting to post this for awhile now but I keep forgetting. My good friend and college roommate for two years made a list of fun things we did so we could always remember the good times had. This was my second year at BYU-Idaho with roommates Kyla, Courtnie, Weezie, Noss, and Lindsay (wasn't that her name? She was engaged so we hardly ever saw her. And she was much too mature to participate in our ridiculousness.)

• John threw a big ball at Emily while she was eating a cookie so she choked on it
• Playing blind and not realizing people were watching us at our window...for several minutes, while we "watched" TV and had a blind dance party
• Noss standing on the couch and Kyla going to pick her up but then Noss fell on her and as Kyla was yelling Noss' belly muted her and instead made a zerbet/zerbert/raspberry sound
• Emily was trying to get her cookies down and they fell all over the counter then the floor and she was pretending to have a break down but then ended up really crying and went to the back leaving all the rest of us speechless...sort of.
• The blackout of 2004 when we all screamed as soon as the lights went out then stopped when they came on and then started when they went out again.
• Naming the fire works and then teaching them to roommates...
• Throwing the hard boiled eggs off the balcony trying to make it to the dumpster
• Throwing the math textbook off the balcony and trying to make it into Kyla's laundry basket
• The Ballympics- Seth's Seal, Martin's balancing on all fours, John's flying out the door
• Catching the ball with: two fingers, Tarzan hands, elbows, heads--Clark rolling the ball up Noss' body with his head
• Courtnie's 80's birthday party with Scott dancing to "867-5309" and pulling toilet paper out of his pockets that had a birthday message on it
• Weezie's "2 2" birthday party with the boys doing things of "2" like Austin spinning 22 times around a bat
• The "bad weekend" without the Pirate flag when all went wrong: couples breaking up and some couples on the verge of breaking up
• Noss and Courtnie's 16 hour date
• Having our couches flipped three times by different people and us taking pictures of it because we were so excited
• The prank war that never really happened because we took out all their lightbulbs and they didn't do anything back.
• Adam- inviting himself to things, staying past curfew, knocking that horrible loud rapid knock, hiding in the back sometimes when he'd knock. Kyla dumping him and him not coming back til the day before we left and then getting him to dance behind Weezie while whe sang like William Hung to "She Bangs"
• Eating sardines with Seth
• Playing steamroller lat one night and making it a difficult obstacle course by bouncing up and down for the next roller.
• Odd Talent Show for FHE
• Paper bag game showdown between Courtnie, Weezie, and Shaun
• The Stinky-but-delicious Pot Roast which made our apartment smell like urine/vomit/diarrhea all day but tasted so good when we ate it
• Singing goodnight with the guitar over the phone to boys in our ward
• Making farting/burping noises over the phone to boys in our ward
• Xandadu- nothing more needs to be said about this one
• Michael Jackson- learning "Thriller", watching "The Way You Make Me Feel" and concentrating on the beginning whe he yells "Hey!"; "You were scared" "Nah, I'm enjoying

• Kyla kissing the Chief of Police at McDonald’s…twice because the first picture didn’t take
• Going to Outback to get just cheesy fries as our meal
• Fat girl flipping us off on our way to DairyQueen
• Cupcake race to see who could make it the fastest also competing for accuracy, style and teamwork
• The Brownie race that started the cupcake race
• Michael Jackson- learning “Thriller”, watching “The Way You Make Me Feel” and concentrating on the beginning when he yells “HEY!”; “You were scared.” “Nah, I’m enjoyin this”
• Keyboard songs that we thought were so awesome and actually pretty good until we realized it was mostly because it was late at night
• “Johnny Snotty” being somewhat of our apartment’s theme song
• Tara’s birthday party that Emily and Kyla left early because Emily was pooping her pants, literally…just kidding…sort of
• Going to Salt Lake City to see Kyla’s family and finally meeting Mikey
• Noss hitting Sister Parkinson with the newspaper during the states game
• Our Quote Book
• Halloween cassette tape, primarily the select sounds of the man’s dying breaths and the scream that was in spurts
• Going out to eat sometimes just to get free napkins, lots of them
• The Monday Holidays: ugly shirt day, lobster day, middle name day, monotone day
• The psycho guys at the library that freaked Kyla and Emily out because they ‘hacked’ onto the computer and they didn’t know they were right next to them
• Weezie’s new hairstyle for Relief Society
• Making new bangs for ourselves like Noss’ 80s bangs and Courtnie’s asian bangs etc.
• Singing hymns loudly like men and then the neighbors below calling us
• The girls in 214 calling and pounding on the ceiling to get us to be quiet, especially Courtnie, the loud one
• Kara putting on chapstick

• Max’s proposal with the mix of Peruvian-Irish accents

Everytime I read this list I just crack up laughing so hard. I understand that obviously it won't mean that much to you but if there is a story you are just dieing to hear, let me know.