I’ve been out of sorts for months now. I haven’t been dealing as well as I have in the past with the lessons life is throwing at me. Today I changed my mind. I decide how I feel, I decide how I think, I decide how I deal and tonight I decide I can handle it. I will learn and I will grow and I will be stronger. Simple, straight forward, that’s it. What will you decide?

Ok so I know it’s been a really long time since I’ve blogged anything, I doubt anyone even bothers to check my blog since it’s been so long! But to those one or two people who may still check in on us here goes.

Looks like the last time I did anything was just after Jasmine’s birthday so we’ll start there, funny thing is I have to grab my calendar and go through May to remember what we did! About May we decided to sell our house so we’ve been having a lot of people come through. We’ve had 2 offers both fell through. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

On that same front we have moved to a new house in the Avenues downtown. It’s a gorgeous house that a couple my sister used to nanny for own. I am absolutely ecstatic to be back downtown. I love the area, I love the life and the people. Jas and Nyah are now sharing a room which they seem to really enjoy. It has been hard trying to fit the two girls and all their toys into one room, but we’re getting there.

Jasmine was initiated into Bethel 13 of the International Order of Jobs Daughters in May. Personally I am really excited for her to have joined this group. For those who don’t know Jobies (for short) is a youth group for girls that is associated with the Masons or Shriners. They do a lot of service projects, like feeding the homeless, raising money for the Hearing Impaired Kids Endowment fund and gathering donations for Shriners Hospitals. The girls range in age from 10 to 20 and are all instant friends. I was in this group when I was younger and it provides a lot of good things for young girls, all of which I think will benefit Jasmine as she grows up. Nyah is already looking forward to when she turns 10 and can also join.



In June Jasmine got out of school and left to go to Colorado with her grandpa James to visit her Aunt Kami and cousins. She spent about 10 days there and had an excellent time.

The next weekend was Grand Rally for Jobies, which is all of the jobies from all over Utah getting together and having competitions in Skit, Choir, Drill, arts and crafts and tons of other fun activities. This year it was held at the Marriott in Provo. Bethel 13 took first place in drill, which the girls had a alot of fun with.

Unfortunately the next week we had a very tough decision to make, but decided it was time to have Lefty put down. He was in massive amounts of pain, and 10 years was a long good life for him. Before Lefty I never really loved any dogs. But he was the greatest dog I ever knew. Brandon made an amazing video that I still haven’t been able to make it all the way through because I start crying too hard. If you’d like to see it grab a box of tissues and visit www.branitt.com

Then we started moving and now here we are in July, all moved into the new house, and Jas is in surgery as I type this. Another extention of her growth rods. She has been handling it amazingly well. The doctors said if all goes well they might let her go home tonight, I hope I hope I hope! The girl in the bed next to her snores like a bear in hibernation, and I fear sleeping here tonight.

Nyah is doing well also. She loves sharing a room with her sisters and copies everything Jasmine and Hannah do. Sometimes this is funny other times it’s a little nerve racking. In the past month she’s eaten grass because she wanted to be a camel. Eaten mud to clean off the pencil she stuck in it. And eaten both Lefty and Bella’s dog food, she says it tastes great and would happily eat it for dinner every night. She continues to amaze me with the concepts she understands and ideas she comes up with. I hope to have her in a full time preschool program this fall, which I think would be really good for her. Our newest game is she has to spell a word to get us to stop tickling her. The first word was STOP. She can also do dad, mom, Nyah and cat. We’ve been working on dog which for some reason she’s having a hard time remembering.

All typed out, this doesn’t seem like a lot but living it it has been slightly over whelming, but we’re living through it and surviving. When it comes down to it life is good and I’m grateful to have such a wonderful little family.

Ya ya I know it’s been forever . . . but not a lot to blog about. Still not a lot to blog about. Jas is still doing ok. A few days before the appointment referred to in my last post Dr D’Astous’ assistant called and asked if Jas was having problems and if she wasn’t Dr D didn’t see a reason for her to come in so we cancelled that appointment. However since then Jasmine continues to say her back hurts almost every day, at first I was again thinking she was just playing too hard but since one of her hooks had slipped off last time I decided to make another appointment with the doctor to make sure that’s not the issue, so now she’s going back in on April 15. Hopefully it is that she is just playing too hard. Other then that she’s doing good. As always she’s one of the top in her class but she just can’t seem to keep her desk clean. So her teacher writes a note in her planner every day if Jasmine has kept her desk clean and she gets more computer time for that. This is kind of helping, about 75% of the time she keeps it clean. Hopefully it’ll just get to be habit so that this isn’t an on going problem. Jasmine’s birthday is coming up and for her birthday party we are going to the Desert Star to see American Fork Idol. If you’d like to join us let me know and I’ll get you the date and time we’ll be going. Adult tickets are around $11 and kids are about $9, then you can buy food too if you want. (we’ll be going to a matinee show) She’ll be turning 10 this year! Totally blows me away! She is also is asking for a Nintendo DS for her birthday (thank goodness for ebay where I can get one for close to half of what you’d pay in the store!) but the games run anywhere from $13 on up if anyone is looking for presents for her. Nyah as always is Nyah. Cute, sweet and smart most of the time but if she doesn’t like something or if it’s not working the way she wants watch out! She just might blow up! She’s recognizing about half a dozen sight words right now, and is very into having books read to her. She also loves to draw and anything to do with mermaids, drawing mermaids is even better. I have a vast collection of drawings of me as a mermaid. As me for I continue to clean house, make cables, and take care of kids. It’s a lot of repetative action. I have signed up to run the SLC 5k on April 18th, and been training for that also. I found a running stoller on craigslist for $20 and once it warms up a bit will have Jas ride her bike to school and run along with her. Mapmyrun.com says it’s almost a mile and a half to her school from our house so round trip it will be pretty close to running a 5k (3.1 miles appx) I guess that’s about it for now. Hope all is well with everyone else out in blogging land!

Well I realised it’d been a bit since I blogged and thought I should post something, but really there isn’t anything too interesting going on in our lives right now. It’s a lot of repetative motion. Get up, get ready, take Jas to school, clean house, pick Jas up, cook dinner, give girls baths, put them to bed, get myself to bed after resting for a little bit and then rinse and repeat. Very interesting let me tell you! Somedays I feel like I’m running around in circles. But let’s see what new things are happening?

I have instituted a new reward system for the girls. They earn time to play their computers or the Wii by doing chores. They lose time when they disobey. It’s working pretty well actually. Jasmine is saving her time up till she has 2 hours, she’s at an hour and a half right now. Nyah is more of an earn and use as quickly as possible girl, but at least she’s helping out around the house a lot more lately. Their rooms are staying slightly cleaner, they’re both learning valuable skills and they’re saving me a little bit of sanity!

Jasmine continues to do well. She does have some pain when she plays too hard, but a little motrin helps and she’s back to normal. Next week we have her check up with her back doctor to see how things are going, I have my fingers crossed!

Nyah is . . . well Nyah. She’s doing fine in school although she seems to have a problem with authority. She gets bored and will go off and do what ever she wants to do and gets rather upset when a teacher tells her she needs to do something else. I’m not really sure how to handle this one, but we’re trying to get her to understand she needs to follow the rules and directions even when she doesn’t want to.

As for me I’m doing fine. Really busy for not a lot going on. I’m trying to go through each room and clean and organize it before moving onto the next. So far I’ve done th kitchen, front room, and master bedroom. Next is the garage, laundry room and my office. That’s my exciting life for now. I’ll update next week after we go to Jas’s dr apt.

It’s past midnight, I have to get up in less then 7 hours to get Jasmine ready for school (yes I’m making her go to school in the morning even though we have to check into the hospital by 130, I’m a mean mom I know!) but I just wanted to give a quick up date on the plan. Like I said, we check in about 1:30, I will be spending Monday night in the hospital with her. Tuesday morning will be the surgery, should be quick, about an hour or so. That night her dad is staying with her. Then Wednesday morning hopefully we will be going home! Ok so I’m not really writing this as an update cuz I know I’ve said all that before, I guess I’m writing this as therapy for myself. Some how repeating the plan and continually chanting “It’s going to be ok” helps . . . in some small way. Guess that’s why I plan and repeat the plan, and keep telling myself over and over “she’ll be fine” it’s the only control I have over this whole shitty situation. Ok going now before I make myself cry. I’ll keep this and facebook updated as much as I can.

Saw this on my friend Whitney’s blog and tried it and also found it VERY amusing . . .

Go to google, type your name and then needs eg Melissa needs and see what pops up!

1. Melissa needs to take a break (yep seriously this was the first result!)
2. Melissa needs to board the blob ship that is hovering overhead. ...
3. Melissa Needs a Miracle
4. Melissa needs lots of guidance
5. Melissa needs hydration after the walk. ..
6. Melissa needs her meds, and I'm sure Mikey won't get them for her. ...
7. Melissa needs to find a new agent
8. Melissa Needs Maintenance Manuals!
9. Melissa needs to get on board with her new body
10. Melissa Needs Help - Catch Me... If You Can

I did the top 10 because I was so amused!

I arrived Thursday late so we just went back to Brandons apartment and went to bed. Friday morning we woke up got ready and went into his work. I spent the day playing on my computer, which was nice and relaxing. Finally about midnight Brandon got done and we went back and went to sleep again. Saturday morning we went down to Venice beach in the hopes that it wasn’t raining, and we lucked out! We spent the morning walking and looking at shops and stopped and got some lunch. (I can’t believe how expensive food is down there!) Then we went to the Santa Monica Pier.



We walked the pier, looking at vendors and talking. Then (ya!) we went down on the beach and I literally dug my toes into the sand! I hadn’t been to the beach in some 15 odd years so I was really excited by this.


After walking in the sand we went back up to the pier and found this really cute little aquarium that was only $2 to get into and free for kids (it’s under the pier if you ever go) I touched a star fish! They’re really slimy. We also got to see shark eggs which were neat and some other cool little artifacts like a whale vertebrae.



Then we ventured up to the J. Paul Gettty Museum. This was a really cool museum. It’s set on top of one of their “mountains” (more like a hill) We parked under ground then road the tram up to the museum.










The architecture and landscaping fascinated me more then the artwork. It was beautiful! But I’m more into the history of art, and thus also like Chinese and Eygptian art more then anything else. But it was an amazing experience! This was pretty cool, up top the water flowed through the little hole Brandon’s looking down into (I made him look again because I didn’t get my camera out fast enough)



And then flowed out of the little hole in the ceiling on this side.



Then we went back to try and go to dinner at this cool little restaurant on the Santa Monica Pier (seriously fresh fish!) but it was closed (weird for a Saturday night, it was only about 6) So we went to the restaurant on the end of the pier, which was also good! Then off for some sight seeing (did you know the Hollywood sign isn’t in Hollywood and also it’s not lit up at night?) I don’t feel as bad not going to the gym this weekend with all the walking we did on Saturday. Sunday we just had time for breakfast before I had to be to the airport and Brandon had to go back to work. (We lucked out Saturday night that he didn’t have to work) I had a bit of a wait in the airport due to my flight being delayed because of the storm here in SLC, but other then that it was uneventful.

I have to say a big thank you to Denise for giving me a buddy pass making it so I could fly. To Sicily and Shonette for taking me/picking me up from the airport, to my neighbor Stephon for watching the dogs and to Eddie for taking the weekend off to watch Nyah. I appreciate all of you even if you don’t read this!

I’M GOING TO LA! Sorry kind of excited I want to shout it from the roof tops to everyone under the sun!

What would you do to spend 48 hours with the man you love whom you haven’t seen in 17 days, and before today didn’t have the prospect of seeing until the middle of March? Last night in talking to Brandon he said it might work for me to come out there for a weekend so I said I’d look into it. Originally I thought I’d try and go out there in 2 weeks, the weekend after Jasmine’s surgery but then Eddie told me that’s the weekend he’ll be in Denver for training, nix that idea. The weekend before I have the girls and will need to be getting ready for Jasmine’s surgery. The weekend after that will be my weekend with the girls again, so it could either be this upcoming weekend or wait till February 21st! I decided to take the challenge and see if I could make this weekend happen. I had heard about Southwest flights being sold for $100 round trip which wasn’t bad, but then I looked up the flights and they weren’t doing the ones to Burbank, nix that idea. Then I remembered my friend works for Delta and said she’d be willing to give me a buddy pass. So I’ve been texting with her and found out I could fly there for a max of $75, pretty good deal. I decided to try and sell a few things on KSL to see if I could come up with the money, and started making phone calls to see if I could get the kids and dogs taken care of for the time I would be out of town. Luckily I have a wonderful group of family and friends 2 of whom agreed to help with the kids. Now i’m just trying to make arrangements for the dogs. So to answer my question, personally I’d bend over backwards, do 2 back hand springs a double flying backwards somersault all while blind folded just to spend 48 hours with my husband. And yes, I’d do it all over again, any day of the week!

Day one
I confess I haven’t been to the gym in months. But today is the new begining. I am doing the Salt Lake City 5K in April with my sister and I haven’t even started training yet! I’m feeling a little pressure. I know, a 5K isn’t much but for an ex-smoker who hasn’t been to the gym in at least 4 months it’s pretty much a marathon. So today I am going back to the gym. My goal is to go 4-5 days a week, which I was easily doing last year. Plus Sicily has also started back at the gym which is also good motivation for me, I like to work out with her. Plus I’m hoping with quitting smoking that training for a 5k will help me be good.

Wish me luck, I’m going to need it!

So I was told by someone that they didn’t like the set up of my blog, having to click the link to get into to read the newest entry. In their utter laziness (love you C!) they didn’t want to have to do the extra click, so here you go, easier just for you!

For those who haven’t heard yet, I quit smoking January 1st. I didn’t want to make it too widely known till I felt like I was doing good, and knew in saying it that it’s true. I’m done! It was a lot easier while Brandon was here. Each day has gotten harder, luckily I have friends who are also quitting, so that helps. Also I have one amazingly supportive sister who has come up with motivational surprises for me, so I have those to look forward to. Also the single digit temperatures help in deterring me from wanting to go outside. The thing is I don’t know what to do with myself when I’m bored now. I need a new hobby thats easy to pick up, and put down. Doesn’t require a lot of attention and very little training. It can’t take up a lot of space and needs to be easy to transport. I was thinking of knitting, but I need someone to teach me. Oddly enough I already have a lot of the supplies but haven’t put in a lot of effort. Maybe there is a website that can teach me. Anyway, day 6 almost down and counting.

Christmas morning was the usual chaos of paper flying and kids squeeling their delight. As always watching them open their presents was th best part. Thanks to the Gilberts for joining us for presents and breakfast! We then braved the snow on our side of the valley to venture to the Ellsworth’s, only to find that apparantly it only decided to snow on the west side of the valley. Again we ate and then the paper flew as we watched more presents being unwrapped. Thank you to Mike and Cindy for having us up to your houseand for a delicious brunch!

The present from Santa this year was a Wii and then they each got a few smaller toys too.








As Brandon would say we need to buy Nyah some hips to keep those pants up! (belts do not work!)

This year we spent Christmas Eve with my side of our family over at my Grandma and Grandpa Gilberts. We always have a great time over there and this year did not disappoint. We played Wii (Jasmine the natural was in excellent form as always) We ate all the delicious food and even saved some room for pizza. Then we played SANTA bingo, and even more Wii before the night was rounded out with presents. As usual the girls got their new Christmas jammies. Thank you Norma, Richard and Julie for making this Christmas eve so much fun!

Nyah looks a little too excited about her sprite


Bingo, Nyah was “helping” call out the numbers, at least when she wasn’t dumping the cup on the floor



Jasmine LOVES my moms newest dog SuzyQ


Christmas jammies

Yes Grandpa Richard is asleep



Notice Nyah’s tongue.

I love to cook, I really have a good time doing it. Deserts are fast becoming one of my favorite things to make. Being Christmas time I was reminiscing about my favorite thing my mom used to make, chocolate covered peanutbutter balls. So of course I decied I needed to make all of these for our neighbors just like mom used to do. The recipe is really quite simple and we had most of what we needed so Nyah and I set to work this morning. After the peanut butter balls were in the fridge cooling Nyah wanted to make cookies to, how can I refuse a girl after my own heart? She really is cute with the whole helping thing, at least until she starts sticking her fingers into batter, eating said batter and then going back for more . . . oh well the finer points of cooking will eventually sink in I guess. Here is everything I made today, 50 PeanutChoco Balls and 75 cookies.

Thanks to Shonette I finally got our Christmas tree up. Unfortunately Bella seems to think it means Christmas has come early for her, she has eaten 6 ornaments so far. Most of them have been plastic luckily, but she did eat part of a glass one I think, so I’m really hoping she’ll be ok. So far no complications, luckily. I sprayed the entire tree with sour apple spray to hopefully keep her from eating any more, but if you come over to our house don’t be suprised if there’s ornament pieces all over the floor!

Looking for some inexpensive fun with the kids I corralled Sicily, Hannah and Erin and we ventured downtown to look at the Temple lights. Thinking it was going to feel like 20 below I bundled the kids up with several layers, coats, hats, and gloves. Suprisingly the weather was very plesant!



Hannah Stepping on cracks to break her mothers back


Nyah clinging on for dear life



Sicily being just one of the kids, playing on the wall

What an excellent Thanksgiving! Wednesday night Brandon got home! YAHOOOOOO! Thursday morning found us at Erin’s house helping her get ready for dinner at her house. Then we went to Grandma Vera and Lawana’s for the Ellsworth family dinner. Then back to Erin’s for the Handley Kilpatrick Gilbert Haggin Jacobsen Sweeney Ellsworth dinner. After dinner we started playing Apples to Apples while Brandon and Grandpa Richard took a nap on the couch.


Friday we got both the girls back and spent the day playing and having fun. We started out making a gingerbread house.



We tried to watch a cute movie called Flight of the Navigator, but the girls got bored within minutes of it starting and went to play in the toy room. Luckily I got a few cute pictures of them cuddled on the couch with Brandon first, then Brandon and I finished watching the movie.



After the movie we went up to Brandon’s parents for fun, family, dinner and games. Thank you Kevin for organizing this and to Mike for buying dinner!

In case any family reads this before tomorrow night we are having a cousin party at our house 6pm. Give Brandon or I a call if you’d like directions. You are welcome to bring your kids.

This is it! Ya! I’m really excited about learning how to make this site into what I want it to be. Unfortunately I haven’t had a lot of time to devote to it, but I’m hoping I will soon. For now here are the updates:

Me: It’s been hard with Brandon out of town, but I’m surviving. Luckily I have a lot to keep me busy which makes it a little easier. I’ve had a bit of a cold the past few days but nothing too serious. Earlier this month Brandon and I had decided that it would cost too much for us to fly him home for Thanksgifing and Christmas and that we’d both rather him be here for Christmas so I had resolved myself to the fact that I wouldn’t get to see him until then. But Saturday Brandon called and said his boss had bought him a ticket to come home for Thanksgiving to partially make up for all of the long hours Brandons been working! YAHOOOOO! Most of the weekend the girls will be with their dads so I’m looking forward to a weekend spent relaxing and watching movies with Brandon. Both the girls will be with us Friday so he will get a chance to see them.

Jasmine: Continues to heal just fine. She’s really upset that she can’t do a lot of the things she’d like to do, like participate in gym, but I explained again to her why we had to do the surgery and that it was the best option we had to ensure that she’ll be healthy as she gets older. In school she’s doing well, for awhile she was having a hard time paying attention but I think we’ve nipped that in the bud.

Nyah: is . . . . well Nyah! She loves school and has a great time there. She wants to go everyday, but unfortunately can’t until next year. I’ve volunteered in her class a few times and it’s really fun to watch her interact with all the other little kids her age. She continues to blow me away with how smart she is. Her latest thing is trying to spell words, and asking how to spell everything.

Bella and Lefty: are also doing well, although I think before long I might go crazy with Bella. She’s in all out tantrum mode, I think because I’ve been so busy and haven’t been home as much as she’d like me to be. So she has been chewing up everything she can get her mouth on. I’m also looking for ways to train her to stop barking when I tell her to if anyone has any suggestions!

Well that’s it for now, I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and that I get the chance to see you all over the long weekend.