The 4th of July!!!!!!!!!!

The 4th of July is one of my all time favorite holidays! Mostly because I love America. I love the chills I get as we stand as the flag goes by! I love that it's a holiday and I don't have to spend 3 months wages buying gifts! :) And I love family time and fireworks!!! And normally I absolutely love the demolation derby in our hometown. But this year we didn't go to our hometown. We planned on it, but several things came up and we stayed home. For years nothing went on around here and staying here was torture. But slowly things are changing and our little area is starting to celebrate with a parade and fun. We had a great time. Tammy and Clint and the kids came and mom and dad also came out for the parade. We had a bbque at home and then went over to the marina and played catch, and then kick ball... boys against the girls and the boys totally cheated and stopped the game when they were ahead by one point!!! :) Then we had some great fireworks. Let's not talk about why the show was held up for over 20 minutes... yes, let's not go there Garrett, Jace, Adam, Dani, Caitlyn.... let's just pretend that they weren't out on the marina in the canoe, just a little too close to where the fireworks were going to be set off and that the firemen yelled and yelled at them to back up but they couldn't hear and hundreds of people waited and waited and waited for the show to start!!! Yep, leave it to MY children and their friends for this to happen! But when the show started, it was definately worth it! I got some great pictures I will post on here. Yep, all in all it's been a great day, lots of fun, hanging out with my sister and her family, had a mean game of kick ball, great food, great family. But oh how I missed the derby!!! It did get so chilly that we were wrapped up in blankets which is just wrong considering it is the 4th of July!!! But we sat on the 'beach' and watched a great fireworks show, so no complaints there! Happy Birthday America.... and here's to many, many, many more. What a great place we live in. What a blessing it is to be free. Thank you to all those that fight to keep this country free! And all those that sacrificed before so that we have the right to worship how we choose, to celebrate how we choose. What a gift we have in our freedom!

5 days this week...

Katie and I started walking last week. We MADE it... it's Friday and we walked everyday (Monday through Friday). It's 4.6 miles up a huge hill and back around to our houses. Our legs still hurt from the hill. I would hope that at some point I will start seeing a difference!!! :) I definately need to get new shoes. A pair a year has left me feet in desperate need of some support! I'll put that on my list of things to do tomorrow! As Kami says all of the time, "It's good for your buns and thighs!"

As if the towels weren't bad enough...

I spent 4 hours folding laundry yesterday... between cleaning, getting one out the door for scout camp, dealing with a half dozen plus bored children, and hitting not one, but two doctor appointments. I only matched socks for an hour which means I didn't even put a dent in the THREE laundry baskets full of unmatched socks. I managed to get Nate in for his ear recheck and the infection is gone. But Kami had 103.7 degree fever and had to be taken in last night where we waited for an hour and a half to have her seen. She has an ear infection on top of the nasty flu going around, that makes your knees and joints just ache! (I had it last week and it isn't fun!) We waited another hour for prescriptions and got home to a mess from dinner. UGH... So, this is what I accomplished, and it isn't even all of it, this doesn't include what I put away, the blankets, the socks or what was done after this picture was taken. I think we only have 4 or so loads to be somewhat caught up again! Gotta love the laundry. If I could slow down and be home everyday to do 4 or 5 loads this wouldn't be a problem!!! Ohhhhhhhh, I'm so glad it is Friday! Date night, here I come!!!

My husband...

It's a little cheesy, but I just have to say I am in love with my husband. He amazes me and he takes my breath away. I am so grateful for the man that he is, that man that he has become. I am amazed at how he works, his ability to do what he needs to do with integrity and grace. He is such a gift to me and I am grateful for the way that he loves me. He still makes me laugh and I love being with him. He is the greatest father and I still love to see him with his babies. I see him with Nate and it takes me back to when we first had Garrett and I can't believe the depth of love we share. We thought we knew something about love back then, now we know that we are just starting to 'get it'.... and I am so happy to be able to spend my life with him.

Towels!

And I wonder why I HATE summer!!! Seriously I tell my kids if they are going to run through the sprinklers to do without 15 towels everyday! They SNEAK them out side anyway and though I am completely overwhelmed with laundry as it is and THIS is what I got to do today... fold towels. Would it be obnoxious to say that this isn't even all of them??????? Yep, without a doubt I HATE summer for this very reason!

Never mind... I made it through the day....

Just when I was feeling overwhelmed and completely down in the dumps I got home from the video store and a delivery man showed up on my doorstep with something special from my sweet hubby.... and I am no longer down in the dumps! :)

Today...

Have you ever just known when you wake up that it was going to be one of those days, and you wonder how you will ever get through it? Yeah, well... today is one of those days!

Sick to death of medical billing!!!!!!

I think it is just my hormones or something out of whack... but I am so tired of dealing with life... well, okay, not life, but I feel so tired. I am tired of dealing with dishonest medical billing for right now! We have had so many bills from different companies that were paid by our insurance 100% but they are still billing us ( thank goodness we were warned that this might happen and have kept every statement sent by our insurance!) . The oxygen company was paid 100%. The other day I got a really rude letter demanding payment or legal action would be taken. I went through the insurance statements and found all of the payments to this company and found they were paid. So I called. I called the company and as she was telling me that we were going to be sent in for legal action it pops up that OH, guess what, the bill had been paid in full! Oh, whoops, so sorry. Okay, sorry, you can threaten me but now, oops! So, the ambulance that took Nate to the hospital billed the insurance wrong (as far as we can tell). They paid a portion of the bill immediately (100% of it I might add) within 60 days but because of the mess up more had to be paid. So in May they paid the rest of the bill 100% but I keep getting this bill for $48.49 and demanding payment. Okay... I get that billing the insurance is courtesy but still, it wasn't our fault it was messed up to begin with and our insurance has been awesome (and I don't usually say that about insurance companies because our old insurance was horrible!). It doesn't say why it is that much, just that we now had a 71 cent service charge on top of the $48.49 bill. So I called, it took me 7 tried to finally get through. The first lady I spoke to was all kinds of snotty to me and I was being nice. She informed me that it had been 6 months (hello... he was flown to Salt Lake in January and it was paid in May... maybe their adding skills are the reason for the messed up billing????) and it was a courtesy to bill the insurance and THAT was the service charge for our insurance not paying for 6 months. I explained again that it WAS paid in a timely matter, that their billing had messed up because the insurance had to be rebilled for different charges and that it was all paid and wasn't that a little excessive considering the bill was PAID IN FULL??? She again exclaimed in a loud and rude voice that IT HAD BEEN SIX MONTHS!!!!!!! WHAT part of him being life flighted in January and the bill being paid in FULL, completely, in May can they not understand??? So in the plainest English I know, I explained the whole thing AGAIN... and then asked to speak to her manager... And explained AGAIN... to somebody who was even more nasty than the first. I finally said in a nice voice, "Look, I am not sure if you have ever experienced having a child life flighted, almost die, spend time in the hospital critically ill, come home with a feeding tube, oxygen, taking care of a family and trying to make sure that every single place and doctor billed the insurance right as to avoid a $50 service fee, but I really had no choice as to your services and you have been paid in full for those services and maybe it means nothing to you but it means gas in my tank for me so I really don't understand this!" She rudely said it had been SIX months and they only give 60 days. WHERE are they getting six months from??? Are they going by his birthday or what? The DATE OF SERVICE says January 10th, the bill was paid mid May... HOW has this been 6 months??? So then she tells me, "FINE... JUST THIS ONCE we will take that off your account!" Ummmm... okay, well sheesh, I surely hope I never need their services again but if I do, you can believe I will hound the insurance to make sure they read this company's mind and get them paid in full before they even bill us. I said thank you and she again informs me that it had been six months. Okay, I should have hung up but I told her that January to May was not 6 months and they had really deceitful business dealings but me and my 15 kids surely appreciated her being able to purge my account of that $48.49 bill. And then I sat in the parking lot of the grocery store and cried for 15 minutes because, well... I don't know why. I just felt like the weight of the world has been sitting on my shoulders and that was the straw that finally broke me!!!

Attack of the doll!!!

Nate is so funny with baby dolls! He thinks they are real live people, and I think he probably thinks having somebody smaller than him is a real treat. We give the baby doll to him and he makes the funniest faces and squeels and talks and kisses on and loves the doll! It's so fun!

I am amazed....

I am amazed by my kids. They are simply incredible. Each one is so unique and amazing and I can't help but just stare in wonder at them. Today Hayden is home from church because he is sick. He's 8 and he gets the same wonderful (NOT) migraines that I get. He only gets a couple a year but you can literally watch it come on and wipe him out. That happened last night. We got it under control but he is sick to his stomach today so here I am, missing church. (Which I hate to do, by the way!) I was feeding Nathaniel in the chair next to Hayden. He started telling me a story about cub scout camp yesterday and his eyes lit up. As I was talking to him he just kept looking me in the eye and smiling. He does this a lot. I will find him just watching me, or Thayne, with a big smile on his face and a look of absolute love and devotion in his eyes. Sometimes I will say, "What?" and he will just smile and say, "Oh nothing... I just love you!" And you know it is true! His eyes sparkle as he stares at you. He has done that with each of his siblings too. When Kami was born he would stand over her just smiling and would tell us "She is my precious!" That's what he called her forever. Still does on occassion. He will watch Nate sleeping and just have this look of love on his face like he would take on the world to protect him.

Yesterday Kassi was holding Nate and kept telling him how much she loved him. Thayne walked in and they were both looking at him and smiling and talking about how amazing he is. Then Thayne said, "You know that we have felt this way about every single one of you kids? We could look at you like this for hours and be amazed at you." He told her that with the birth of every baby each sibling felt a love like that for them and that we would all sit around and marvel at each one. He's absolutely correct. Even as we share our time and energy with each child, anything they may miss is compensated in so many other huge ways. I can't imagine any child not being born into a family where they are adored, loved and cherished. Last night Kailee was telling me how glad she was that she had big brothers and a dad who were such good examples on knowing what to look for and expect when she starts dating and looks to get married. She said how lucky she was to have her siblings. It just takes my breath away to see how they love and honor each other, even though like everyone they have their disagreements at times. I am amazed when I hear them pray for one another and worry about each other.

I am just grateful that for all of my shortcomings, I can look into the eyes of my little ones and see the love and devotion there. I am amazed and in awe of them and all they are and all they are doing, and in all they can become! What a blessed mommy I am!!!