Sewing can be cool.

I bought this dress ages ago-probably 4 years ago from Charlotte Rousse. I absolutely fell in love with it, BUT it was just too short to just wear. So i debated about whether or not i should cut off the bottom and make it into a top, but I just couldn't stand the thought of cutting up a dress just to make a shirt. So I finally decided to make this a wearable dress. As you can see, there is a white ruffle along the bottom of the skirt. Here's the secret-its a slip! I simply sewed some eyelet lace to the bottom of the slip!

I wanted the slip to elongate this dress as much as possible, so I bought a couple yards of the widest eyelet lace I could find and sewed it onto the slip in 2 rows. Tada!

The best part is that i can use this slip with as many dresses as i want! For a tall girl like me-adding a couple inches to a dress or skirt is priceless. I just added 3 dresses back into my wardrobe, and the possibility of SO MANY other dresses out there!

I love this slip.

In case you haven't looked outside...The snow is pretty intense. The roads are bad, the air is freezing, everything is closed, and there is more on the way.

So since we're stuck inside all day we are wearing big boy underwear. No more diapers...hopefully. I put up their favorite Thomas tent and we are all trying our best to make potty training really fun.

We have wooden Thomas trains, bathtub trains, thomas stickers, and lots of track and free time.

It's been hard on all of us.

I'm giving you The Finger!

I'd like to lie and say that I was brave and calm. Such was not the case. Thank heavens Joe was home for lunch when this happened.
After laying around the house for several days while I'd been recovering from pulling BOTH my hamstrings, I was beginning to feel much better. I'd decided to be a good housewife and load the dishwasher. Joe had been doing most of my chores for the last couple days and I was feeling pretty guilty about it. So I started doing the dishes, starting with the silverware. I actually thought to myself "self, you should maybe turn that knife blade down-just to be safe...nah, I don't think it'll get as clean and I want my NEW KNIFE SET to stay nice and clean."
yes, i realize it's stupid. Hindsight is 20-20. So of course as I attempt to load another spoon in next to the knife-OUCH!
ya, it hurt. I could tell from the amount of pain and the blood dripping on the floor that it was bad, so I started freaking out. Joe literally had to tug and pull my arm to keep my hand under the cold running water. Looking back at this now, the dialogue is pretty funny. It went something like this:
Me: (screaming like a 5 yr old) AAAHHH! IT HURTS! THE WATER'S COLD-ITS TOO COLD AND IT HURTS!
Joe: (calmly) Its okay, the cold water is going to help stop the bleeding.
Me: is it bad?! (sobbing) I don't have to go to the hospital do I?
Joe: ya, we're going to have to get stitches
Me: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Joe: jessica, calm down. we're going to have to do this so just calm down.

I didn't calm down.

Me: JOE! (gasp) My face is tingling! (gasp)
Joe: you're hyperventilating. you need to calm down.
he grabs a box of GF macaroni and dumps out the noodles, hands me the empty box and tells me to breathe into the box. It helped the tingling to stop.
I'd been to preschool earlier that day and remembered Angela Dougherty saying that Joseph had the afternoon off. So I called him on Joe's phone and asked him to watch the boys while Joe took me to the ER. It sounded something like this:
Joseph D on the phone: Hey
Me: Joseph (gasp) can you come (gasp) over to watch (gasp) my boys so Joe (gasp) can take me (gasp) to get (gasp) stitches?

Yes, I realize I'm quite pathetic. As my freaking out continued Joe's patience with me was wearing thin. Here its a snippet of the yelling that went on as we drove to the hospital.

Me: (crying very hard)
Joe: Jessica, calm down!
Me: It hurts!
Joe: No, it doesn't. It doesn't even hurt anymore. blah blah blah medical jargon and that's why it doesn't hurt.
Me: Yes it does hurt! it still hurts!
Joe: Jessica, you need to stop crying. you don't want to show up to the ER like this.
Me: I DON'T CARE IF YOU'RE EMBARRASSED BY ME!
Joe: Jessica! look at me! look me in the eyes! stop freaking out!
Me: (looking around the hospital) I HATE UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL!
Joe: you'd hate ANY hospital right now, you're acting ridiculous!
Me: WHERE'S THE EMERGENCY ROOM! THEY SHOULD HAVE BIG RED SIGNS SHOWING US WHERE TO GO!
Joe: We'll find it! Stop freaking out!
Me: THIS IS THE WORST HOSPITAL EVER!


So, if you haven't already guessed, the doctor had to give me a sedative in order to get anywhere near my hand. Strangely, I felt a lot better after that. Go figure.
My doctor was actually really nice and funny and kept my mind off of my injury as she told me little anecdotes about her 20 month old son. She gave me six stitches and told me I'll always have a memorable 1/11/11.
Later that night as i was "watching" the boys-i was still pretty groggy from the sedative-they managed to shatter one of our glasses, and I cut my toe through my sock while i was trying to clean it up. Great. Fantastic. That's EXACTLY what i needed. it was bleeding through my sock and leaving little bloody toe-prints on the carpet, so i asked Joe if we needed to go back to the hospital. He told me it definitely wasn't an option because he'd end up in prison, and our kids would go into social services.

Now Joe is back to doing the dishes for me again. I'm a total wimp about my hand and i keep it in close to my body like Mr. Burns for fear that I'll bump it wrong or something. And i do pretty much the same for my toe. I limp around keep it elevated and all those things that are completely unnecessary, but make me feel better. Yes, I think its safe to say that I'm a wuss.

Too much to blog!

Its been so long since my last post, that it would be way too overwhelming to tell every story in detail. so instead I'm doing a quick recap of the last few months.


This is the reason why I have slowly slipped out of the social networking game these last few months. The boys decided that their favorite thing to do was to pluck each and every key off of the laptop. Joe and I tried to re-assemble the keys several times but the boys wouldn't let it stay in one piece for long. Joe ended up buying a replacement keyboard on ebay and used his amazing handyman skills install it. But once the computer was fixed I stilled stayed away because I've enjoyed the freedom of not having to check my blog/facebook/email everyday.

For Thanksgiving we had our good friends Keenan and Britney and their adorable little girl Camden with us. Keenan is going to Medical school in Wisconsin so it wasn't too far of a drive to come visit us in Iowa. Camden and the boys played so well together. We had a ton of fun making turkey, potatoes, cookies, gravy, apple crisp, and gluten free stuffing. It was delicious and we loved having them in our home.

We went to Utah for Christmas and sadly didn't take many pictures as per usual, but we did get one picture of "The Six Pack" together. ("The Six Pack": Our twins, and two other sets of twin boys from my brothers Justin and Joe) We had a really good time visiting with family and friends.

Overall the trip was great, but out of our two week vacation we were driving for six of those days. As you can see, we got a little bored. Notice Noah's starburst sideburns.

The boys have been doing really well since we have been back. They play with their new trains all day. We came home to new counter tops and a new sink courtesy of our landlord.

I don't have any pictures from today but I had to take a quick trip to the ER to get six stitches after slicing my finger with a knife while doing the dishes. Shortly followed by slicing my toe while cleaning up the glass from a broken glass the boys were playing with.

On a side note...I decided to exercise and pulled both my hamstrings. Pretty sure I will never be whole and without injury. When it rains it pours I guess.

Halloween Early Preview

These are pictures from our ward Halloween party on Saturday. As you can see, Ethan is Woody, Noah is Buzz, and Joe and I are the children who own these toys...or the bratty kids at the daycare-take your pick.

Yes, we do realize these aren't flattering for some of us. Joe was very worried about his blacked-out tooth. We used a sharpie and yes it did come off with a quick brushing. I am posting these pics as per the Whitehead family's request, but also to show off a little. My sister in law sent us this awesome buzz costume, but the woody i bought as a size 7-8! It was huge and I hemmed and took in -nipped and tucked until this bad boy was a 2T. (silent applause) thank you thank you.

*I tried to post this on Monday, but for some reason blogger wouldn't let me post. Strange.
So to continue my update, Ethan is now sick...again. It is starting to get ridiculous how often my family is sick. In the past 3 weeks I've been sick, Joe has been sick twice, Noah has been sick 3 times and courtesy of this last ear infection, Ethan has been sick 3 times as well. Of course the boys would never get sick at the same time-thats not how it works, oh no. That would be too simple. One would get sick-we'd work through it and as soon as he starts getting better brother would get sick too. Maybe it's better that way since I can't cuddle them at the same time. I mean, I could. I'm capable. They don't really let me though. They just end up squirming and fighting for position and kicking or hitting each other. Anyway, back to the point. I'm sick of all of this sickness. I'm sick of Joe and I being up all night, and I'm sick of being stuck inside.

On a more positive note, Noah finally catching on with his "S" words. Not that "S" word obviously. I mean saying "snake" instead of "nake" or "stop" instead of "dop". Noah and Ethan both can tell me whether they pooped or just farted. Noah also does a pretty good impression of a burp. Ya, we've been stuck at home for 3 weeks, what do you expect? We appreciate the simple thrills i guess. In retrospect I could have spent this time potty training, but I really didn't expect one sickness after another. Plus the boys are still terrified of the potty. Well, this is getting to be a long post so I'll just end with a postitive. Noah was making me laugh so hard as he was repeating me instructing Ethan to go to bed. How can they take me seriously when I laugh the whole time? I couldn't help it. This is how it went.

Translations: Noah says Ethan like E'ees, and he says lala as a transition between words.

Me: Ethan, go to bed

Noah: E'ees! Lala bed!

Me: Ethan lay your head down please

Noah: E'ees! uh head uh down! PEESE! (he's yelling)

Ethan: NO!

Me: Ethan (in a warning tone)

Noah: E'ees! (in the same tone)

I'm trying not to laugh

Me: Ethan, its time to go to sleep-now!

Noah: E'ees! a lala SEEP! NOW!

Me: (laughing) JOE!

Noah: (laughing) DOE!

Ethan: (laughing) DOE!

I got a pretty good kick out of it.

Celebrate Good Times!

i don't know how joe did it, but he did. I wouldn't say that he is the very best at computer stuff, but he's pretty darn good. He was able to recover our pictures and home videos! He recovered over 6,000 photos and i'm so grateful to have them back-hence the picture overload here. There is no possible way for me to caption each pic-sorry. you'll just have to look and enjoy...or look and get bored bc there are SO MANY pictures!

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

its been a month now that I've been ignoring my blog. Sorry guys. Our lives have been pretty boring over the last month. well, as boring as it can get with my two little monsters running around. Our lives have consisted of battling the boys over meals, getting dressed, and going to bed. I've been trying to get them out of the house more often so they're at least a little tuckered out during nap time. it's helped a little i suppose. But the boys have mastered the art of driving me insane during nap time. they play and laugh and fight, and then they get naked, tear out all of their clothes from their dresser and closet, and then pull the mattresses off of their beds EVERY DAY. its getting ridiculous really. I'm trying to rely more on the Spirit to help me since I have already tried, taking away toys and blankies, yelling, putting in time out, spanking (which i HATE doing), or even giving in to their every request. I'd tried everything I could think of, until i listened to General Conference. I'd hear in several talks about the importance of relying on the Spirit to help you, so I'm trying it out. Hopefully it works out.
So, now I'll address the title, starting with the bad news. i suppose the previous paragraph is bad and good new too. oh well. SO, the bad news: We've been having issues with our computers lately. First this and that was acting funny on the laptop, so Joe finally decided to completely reformat the whole thing. Before he did that, he transferred all of our pictures and home videos onto the external hard drive so we could start with a clean slate on the computer. Of course as luck would have it, the hard drive crashed. We lost probably over a thousand pictures. We've looked into data recovery, but that prospect is looking pretty grim. That's the bad news.
The good new is that i have the blog. I have those pictures and videos. I have the pictures that I've scrap booked and i was pretty much caught up. I have a CD with my bridals and our wedding pictures on them. We have a few videos on a mini DVD from our previous camera, and when Joe's parents were here this summer i collected about 20 of my favorite pics of the boys and put them on an SD card for her.
I am trying to be positive about this. In reality I am extremely lucky that i have as many pictures as i do, considering that i could have nothing. Thank you Tawnya for inviting me to scrapbook with you-i owe you a lot for that. I have my children now, and I can take more pictures. I have a family who loves me, and friends who are like family as well.
I'm counting my blessings, but I'm also urging you readers to BURN YOUR PICTURES ONTO A CD, or store them online.
sorry this is a depressing post. I'm committing to post my new pictures on the blog so they can be safe forever-and you guys can see them too!