As always the hurricane of my life is blustering on and on and somehow I can’t seem to cram it all in (weird!). I am grateful for the daily grace the Lord shares with me to accomplish all that is required of me.

It is officially spring break and I am determined to update my blog. A week of academia-free revelry will do my school-sick soul well, although a week to lick my wounds is no where near long enough. Don’t they know it’s cruel to rip off the Band-Aid when there’s a healing scab underneath? Owwee! Oh well, I am off the Seattle to visit my sister then it’s back to the grindstone. It is probably well since my highlighter and backpack tend to whisper mutiny. The wrath of JanSport is not to be disregarded, scorned lover and all that.

I am thinking of starting a foundation that specializes in selective amnesia, A Save-Your-Mind Foundation…ahhh, what was I talking about?…yeah, okay—so I’m not just the President I am also a member. I’m thinking the mission statement, the creed should say, “Pessimistic scholars everywhere, forget the horrors of the last diabolical semester and bask in the spring thaw of purposeful, studious disregard”, if ignorance is bliss than my organization will be peddling ecstasy at 1/4th profit margins.

Regardless of parental exhaustion life marches on and deadlines inch closer. How grateful I am for Richard's help in all things domestic. Trying to be responsible parents involves many, many, many late nights helping distracted procrastinators do state reports, valentine boxes, and science fair projects. Agghh! I totally think that parent's should be exempt from colds but to no avail. Our entire crew is coughing, sputtering, sniffling, and gargling in phlegm. It is a plot designed to rid me of my revulsion of sputum.

'till next time...

Here is my latest Kara story:

Kara was getting a bit of a cold and was very frustrated with her runny nose one morning as we were getting ready for church. I hear her in the hallway talking to herself, "…agghhh, [growling] I'm going to have to shove toilet paper up my nose to get it to stop."
I didn't think anything else of it, until Rich was unbuckling her carseat and getting her out of the car. With an incredulous look on his face he says to me,
"I think she's got something up inside her nose." So I ask her,

"Kara did you really put kleenex up your nose?"
She stares at to me with this "duh" look on her face,
"Well, it wouldn't stop running!"

She really did shove a tiny piece of toilet paper clear up in her nose. I thought we were going to have to go the ER and have them fetch it out with their fancy tweezers.
We circumvented the ER trip through some serious nose blowing coaching. She was able to successfully launch the vile wad of tissue down far enough we could get it out. Solved the problem of a leaky nose I guess. Sheez, she is nothing if not inventive huh?

Merry Christmas to All from the Reep family!

That was an unnaturally fast year. I suspect Nargles are behind it. Phew, I almost let the season sneak by without giving those I love a yuletide update. So before you boil me in pudding and bury me with a sprig of holly through my heart let me share a few of my [Meggan's] favorite memories from 2008.

January started out with a bang…actually more of a crash. We woke up one morning to a destroyed Christmas tree and a guilty looking cat. I reasoned that since the kids were older I could get out my ‘nice’ ornaments--CRASH--Christmas carnage all over the living room floor. Funny, the one year the cats decide to play ‘touch the star’ is the year I put up my favorite porcelain ornaments? The good news is Richard and I discovered a hidden talent for adhesive-repair. Date night became “Pass me that arm will you?” “Sure honey, do you want the severed head and broken wings to go with that?” What began as a mess turned into a family joke. The felled tree ushered in the mantra I’m sure the kids will engrave on my headstone: People (and cats) are more important than things.

Another highlight for the year is that I have worked my way up the seniority list at the hospital so that I was able to shift from working graveyards to daylight hours. Hah! Now the kids may remember their mother for more than her closed eyelids and unique snore. I was starting to envision Ally writing a best seller autobiography, “Attack of the Narcoleptic Zombie Mom—Memoirs from my childhood”.

Another favorite memory is “Bucket-Head”. As the mother-helper in Logan’s Kindergarten class this past year I was in charge of bringing a heart-themed game to play at this year’s Valentine’s party. We needed something messy for this party—think Nickelodeon messy. Ally and Logan helped to create a new game we deemed “Bucket-Head”. The point of this quirky little relay race was to have the kids transfer as many conversation hearts as possible to their team’s collection bowl. With buckets attached to each player’s head and 20 lbs of conversation hearts to transfer one to another, the kids were to yell “bucket-head” before dumping their hearts into the next player’ bucket. Watching the hustle of uncoordinated kindergarteners yelling “bucket-head” at each other—what a riot! The number of conversation hearts that actually made it into the bowls paled in comparison to the sea of sugar that littered the teacher’s floor. Heh, heh, heh.

Our little Kara had her first “Big-Primary” debut this year. Our ward’s Junior and Senior Primary combine for the first little bit of the block and of course Kara went to sit with Ally, whom she thinks is the greatest person in the world. All seemed fine until it was time to split up into individual classes. Yeah—Kara started screaming at the top of her lungs, “I DON’T WANT TO GO TO CLASS! AGGGHHHHHHHAAAGGGHHH (breath) AAAGGGHHHHHHHH. Ally pops her cute little head out the Primary door and whispers to Rich,
“Dad, they might need a little help in here”. Her first impression ended with our cute (albeit noisy) Kara being bodily carried down the hall to her class. It was a rough first couple of months.

To fully appreciate this next memory, I must preface the story by telling you how central to day-to-day life Star Wars has become in our home. The kids and I were at the doctor’s office when Logan asks me, “Mom, is it true that if you stick your arm in the way of a closing elevator door it won’t really
chop it off?” “Yes buddy that is true and when we leave I’ll show you.” So when we are getting out of the elevator I told them to wait and as the elevator doors begin to slide shut I stuck my hand in the way and amazingly my arm repels the closing steel. Kara looks at me with big eyes, “Mom! You used The Force!”

I started the official Intermountain Health Care nursing program through Salt Lake Community College this May. The course is set so that I will graduate May 2010 with my RN and will work for IHC for two years in return for sponsoring my education. Kind of a modern day indentured servitude, or as I like to think about it, a guaranteed job.

Due to the time constraints of school, after 11 years of acrylic nail artistry I bid a sad farewell to friends I’d literally held hands with for years to begin this new full-time adventure. The choice to stop doing nails was a difficult one to make but ultimately the right one.

Richard is now and forever my covert superhero. He never fails to impress and amaze me. No mountain of laundry too high or river of chaos too wide for him. He has taken it all on. He is kickin’ butt and taken names. How grateful I am for him and the partnership we share. Go Team Reep! He continues to work for Wells Fargo and they have set it so that he is able to work from home twice a week on the days I have class and clinical.

I’d like to share a day in the life with you…September 26, 2008: “I spent 8 hours today in a stuffy lab practicing placing nasogastric feeding tubes. Foley catheters, stoma bags and my all time fav…the enema. Yippee. Never underestimate the glamour of higher education. Last week we dazzled our study partners with our ineptitude at intradermal, intramuscular, and subcutaneous shots. We spent hours playing variations of “I-stick-you-you-stick-me” needle fun. I am glad however, that we didn’t have to practice on our fellow students this week. Can you imagine the weirdness of practicing a large volume enema on your buddy?”

I have come to the conclusion that nursing school will be manageable as long as I continue to put the grievous hours of studying in. I may develop a permanent crick in my neck from all the reading and spend the rest of my life glancing sideways up at people like Igor. Mad-capped tales of cell differentiation and proliferation don’t always hold my interest but the grotesque pictures of diseases do. Seriously, one word…caffeine. With a tasty beverage in one hand and a highlighter in the other I can actually focus long enough to make sense of the text. Mercy me.

Logan likes to be my “highlighter”. I read aloud my textbook and tell him where to highlight with the marker. Somehow he thinks that this really cool. Maybe he is just sniffing the marker? When he starts shouting things like cardiomyopathy and thrombocytopenia at the neighbors as insults I’ll worry. Maybe he is just showing an aptitude for medicine at an early age…Dougie Howser? Nah. He says he wants to grow up to be a ninja.

My beloved Grandpa Dunford use to say to me all the time: “That which you persist in doing becomes easier, not that the nature of the thing has changed but your power to do has increased (Heber J. Grant)”. I say this phrase over and over to myself all the time to the point it has become my daily mantra. I’ve decided that life is about challenges and choices. We arise stronger and more seasoned on the other side of the gauntlets we conquer and/or survive.

May your New Year be merry, may your burdens be light, and may your heart be full of love and kindness.

Merry Christmas,
Richard, Meggan, Ally, Logan, and Kara

Halloween 2008. Kara wanted to be Catwoman this year...meow. She was so excited and animated about dressing up as the famous femme fatale. She would crawl around on the floor pretending to be all stealthy and cat-like while she was in her costume. Purr-fect choice my little one.

Halloween 2008. Logan wanted to be something scary this year and picked The Grim Reaper. Rich did his make-up in with oil-based rather than water-based so he could run and play and not worry about smearing his face paint. It was a riot to watch him be "dusted" with baby powder in the bathroom to set the paint...hehehehe.

Halloween 2008. Ally wanted to go as a Ragdoll, not Raggedy Anne but not quite Sally from Nightmare before Christmas so she drew a picture of what she wanted and helped me put it together. I think that there is a little piece of fabric from every sewing project we've ever tried on there.

"Hmmm...Judge me by my size do you?" --Master Yoda

For our 12th wedding anniversary Rich and I took an impromptu trip to Anaheim. I found this really cool t-shirt in Tomorrow Land with a picture of Yoda starring up at a "you must be this tall to ride this ride..."

Life is about the little things, like eating homemade popsicles on a hot summer day.

Here is a wonderful example of what a wonderful, caring daddy Richard is. He is painting Kara's fingernails her favorite color, brilliant red. "I want my fingernails pretty Daddy, please paint them for me".

Welcome to my family blog. Here I can share some of the daily adventures of our little crew. Everyday is a new adventure in life and parenting. How grateful I am that Richard and I are in this together,
Go Team Reep!

This is Ally, she is our imagineer. She is so creative and comes up the greatest things to do.

Logan's disappointment echoed throughout the campsite, "Okay, seriously...who took the last of the licorice?!"

Kara has the craziest sweet tooth...thankfully today she is opting for a few pancakes with her brown sugar.

I Love Fall! September and October are my absolute favorite months of the year. I love the crispness in the air and the colors of the changing leaves. There is just something timeless about picking out the perfect pumpkin for a jack-o-lantern masterpiece or the time spent creating an original Halloween costume.