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Help!  I don't know what's going on here, people.  I'm trying to comment on many of y'all's wonderful blog posts, and yet it's often a hit and miss exercise.  It's always the ones where I have to enter which profile I'm posting from.  Yet this morning I was able to post of Jess's blog without incident. Any ideas what is going on??

Irises, Irises Everywhere!

One exciting thing about moving into this house has been the spring.  Since we bought the house in August this is our first spring in our new home.  It all started when we got home from South Carolina and found daffodils all over the front and back yard.  The excitement has escalated as we had some new blossoms springing up several weeks ago...

(Note: All photos taken by Olivia)

What were these funky-looking flowers?!  At first I thought it was some sort of lily, but after a morning spent identifying them online we knew for sure that wasn't the case.  So what are they?

They are bearded irises, to be exact.

There are three petals standing up called "standards" and three petals that swoop down called "falls".  And where is the beard?  This fuzzy thing right here:

Theses are easily the coolest flowers we have ever seen.  Every morning the girls want to go out and count how many blossoms we have.  They're all over the back yard...

...white and yellow/white ones in front of the old shed...

...pure white ones hidden behind the workshop...

...a hoard of lavender ones along the back fence...

...and a few cool two-tone purple and white ones off by themselves.

The girls counted this morning and we have 99 blossoms and another 90 buds that will break out sooner or later.  Pretty cool, eh?

The Well

This last Friday night, Olivia and I were invited to a benefit dinner for The Well, which is an organization to benefit the people in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).  It is actually part of a larger organization called No Boundaries International, which helps people all over the world, including the US.  (For more info on The Well, click here; For more info on NBI, click here.)

I guess I should start with a little background.  Olivia and Kelsey have recently started taking swimming classes at the YMCA.  Olivia, being the social butterfly she is, has made a new friend, Uzima, who is just two weeks younger than her.  Last Tuesday at class I met Uzima's adoptive mother, Debi.  She happens to be one of the co-founders of The Well, and invited us to attend the benefit dinner on Friday.  She also told me of some of her experiences in the DRC and some of Uzima's history.  Uzima is Congolese and has only been in the US about a year.  She is amazing, let me tell you.

Olivia and I spent the rest of the week looking forward to this dinner.  Friday night came, and off we went.  I expected the Congolese dancers.  I expected the performing artist, Xola Malik.  I even expected the keynote speaker, Ben Kalala who is president of the United Congolese Community of America and future presidential candidate for the DRC.  What I did not expect was the heartstrings. 

To be honest, Africa is not one of those places I have given a lot of thought.  I have never been there, I wasn't following world news during the times with Darfur and Rwanda were capturing a lot of national attention, and it just seemed so very far away.  Sure, I know people who have gone there or moved to the US from there, but we've never really talked about just what it is like.  So if you were to have asked me what I thought Africa was like I would have thought about movies like "The Lion King" and "Hatari".  Yep, that's me.  Really educated.  In Disney and John Wayne, that is.

Fast-forwarding to Friday night.  I know it's a benefit.  I know they are going to talk about the poverty, the violence, the orphans, the needs.  I should have expected my reaction.  I can't even spend time at a nursing home without attaching to one or two of the residents.  I just love people too easily.  And of course, that means I want to help them all.

So Friday night, Olivia and I got home about 10:30.  She went straight to bed and I sat on the couch next to Ben and talked about our evening.  And I talked about how I'd love to move to Africa and spend time serving the people there and trying to do a little to improve conditions.

And do you know what Ben said?

He said, "Sorry, honey, I like my toilet paper."

I guess it just proves it.  This romanticist married a realist.

Drama Drama Drama

Do you ever just have those days (or weeks or months) where it feels like the drama never ends and one thing after another comes at you and you can barely keep up with your life??

Welcome to my April.

We started off the month with a nice visit from Niel's family and General Conference.  It was a great visit, but no matter how great the visit it will increase anyone's stress levels to have an extra 6 people in his/her house.  From there we went to...

...Connor puking (on me, in my bed, at 9:30 on a Sunday night)...
...to piles on laundry on Monday...
...to dentist appointments and moving pianos and swim lessons on Tuesday...
...to Olivia puking and being sick and picking up a loveseat on Wednesday...
...to an OB appointment and more swim lessons on Thursday...
...to me puking and sleeping on Friday...
...to camp meetings and Kelsey's birthday party on Saturday...
...to company for dinner and moving our entertainment center (while we had the help) on Sunday...
...to major house rearranging and a Mommy meltdown (yes, that would be me) on Monday...
...to more swim lessons and Kelsey choking on a piece of candy in the van and me jumping out to save her life and forgetting to put the van in park and therefore running the van into the fence at the YMCA on Tuesday...
...to produce co-op and the van's starter finally dying in downtown Oklahoma City and requiring a tow on Wednesday...

... and now we're back to Thursday again.  Fortunately, my taxes are filed and I'm stranded without a car today, so maybe things will start to slow down a little.

Or then again, maybe not.  We do have a few things coming up:

...more swim lessons today (and for the rest of the month of April) and hopefully a car repair...
...a special fund-raiser dinner tomorrow night with Olivia's new friend from swim class who came here a year ago from the Congo (not missing this one for the world!)...
...birthday parties and baptisms to attend on Saturday (and can Ben and I PLEASE have a date sometime?!)...
...church and choir practice on Sunday...
...starting our 8-week training class for Trixie on Monday...
...more swim lessons on Tuesdays and Thursdays...
...and it goes on and on and on...

Oh, and did I mention I need to call a plumber?

Toilet Paper?

I overheard a conversation yesterday between Kelsey and Olivia that made me laugh.

Kelsey (calling from the bathroom): "Olivia, can you get me a roll of toilet paper?"
*Note - I'm on strike in the girls' bathroom and won't keep it stocked with toilet paper since they never replace the roll when they finish it.  They'll learn soon enough if they have to do it themselves.

Olivia: "Sure.  (Short pause)  Hey, look!  It's the good stuff again!  Yeah!"

Kelsey: "Woo hoo!"

Now, If you know me, you probably also know that I am "frugal", which is a nice way of saying cheap.  In fact, when I came home with ginger ale for my sick daughter on Wednesday she said, "Great Value ginger ale, too?  Do you get everything Great Value?"

I don't get everything Great Value, but I do get a lot of generic stuff where I feel like the quality is about the same: peanut butter, aluminum foil, sliced cheese, milk, etc.  But I have my name brands that I must buy, too.  Such as All Free & Clear laundry detergent, Nature's Own 100% whole wheat bread, Bounce (dye and scent free) dryer sheets, and last but definitely not least: Charmin toilet paper.

I have finally come to the conclusion after 33 years of life that I just hate cheap toilet paper.  I mean, really.  Of all the places in the world that I should have my creature comforts, the bathroom is the most important.  And so I started buying the jumbo packs of Charmin because it's not as expensive if you buy it that way.  Imagine my excitement when I discovered that they had dropped the price at Wal-Mart and the 24-roll pack of Charmin was now $11.50!  That's less than 50 cents/roll, which is what I had been paying for the White Cloud cheap-o stuff!  So of course, now I'm addicted.

However, every so often, I just can't get to Wal-Mart, and while I'm at the grocery store I find that I can't talk myself into paying $8 for that 12-roll roll-pack, so I opt for the cheap stuff thinking it won't be so bad for a few rolls.

Apparently, I'm not the only one who notices any more.

Kelsey is Six!

Today our sweet Kelsey is six years old!  I know a lot of people say things like "I can't believe she's so old already!" but I'm not.  Because the reality is I keep thinking she's like... seven or something.  She's just so grown up for her age!  She's been ready for all-day kindergarten since she was four, and wants so much to do everything that her big sister does.  I really can't believe she's only six.

My sassy lady wanted to dress up for school today, so our came the dress, stockings, and "tap" shoes.  (In other words, the shoes make a tapping sounds when she walks on a hard floor.  No soft rubber-soled shoes for this lady since she was three!)  Then came the posing for the camera.  She's got a very strong personality and is always the goof.  But she is also very, very generous and always shares treats with her sister and brother.  She is so much fun to have as a daughter.  Even though she makes people crazy sometimes.

(And just for the record, yes I know she needs a haircut to get her bangs out of her eyes.  She's just fighting me on it because she LIKES having her hair in her face!)

And rather than listing my favorite things about Kelsey, I'm going to have her tell you her favorite things:

1. Dresses
2. Connor
3. My birthday
4. Blue
5. Playing with my best mom
6. Brenna (her best friend)