Winter

Welp it's official...winter is here. And as you can tell by the first picture Kodi was a bit confused as to why everything was "white". I let her play in front of the window and caught her a few times looking out with this bewildered look on her face...

At least winter is well... trying to be here. All the snow melted pretty much hours after it fell. And me and the Kodster had a nice walk to the church this morning, it was such a beautiful day, just a bit too windy for my taste though. We were both bundled up pretty good though.

Then after church I got some great pictures of Kodi "kissing" the baby in the mirror (see below) and after that we went and visited Great Grandpa out in North Pole.

Needless to say the day went great, although her teeth were bothering her pretty badly today she was pretty made everytime I had her in the car seat with no distractions to un-remind her of how much her teeth were hurting her.

And tomorrow I start the new job. I'm pretty nervous. But I have everything laid out so that I don't forget anything. All our clothes, stuff for work, lunches etc...this new schedule will be a new thing for us. Mornings instead of afternoons. But it'll be for the best I suppose.

We had a few pictures taken....

Well as you can tell we had a few professional pictures taken and I'm pretty excited to get them developed and off to family. 

(Phil, don't show Lynn I have to copy some and I'll bring them down to Canada)

Got some pretty cute ones of Kodi, the girls and even some pictures of Dan and I.

Exhausting

What an exhausting week! This happened to be my last week at the UAF School of Fisheries department and it couldn't be over soon enough! Thank God! 

The week started out simple enough and I tried my best to get my work done, even though I suffered from 'short-times' and was completely unmotivated. During the middle of the week I realized that the department was throwing me a going away party and that I'd need to come into work 1 hour early to attend. This wasn't that much of an issue but i would have to drop the baby off at daycare early or bring her in with me for the party and then drop her off afterwards. 

So I woke up around 3am to check on her (she sleeps in her own crib now) and she was awake but rolling around and keeping her self entertained, so I fed her and laid her back down. I wandered down stairs and now fully awake thought it would be a good idea to clean my desperately-dirty house. For some reason or another, weather, mood, hormones, whatever, it hadn't gotten done all week and needed to be done badly. So for about an hour I cleaned the house and then managed to get back to bed around 4am. 

We slept in until 8am and the day was non-stop from that point until about 9:30pm. 

I've been following the political debate more consistently this week and I'm pretty exhausted there as well. 

I guess all in all I'm pretty tired and my eating the past few days has been pretty lame as well. i notice that when I eat poorly it affects mood and everything, so I need to get that back under control.

Dan called this evening to tell me that they are sending him out "remote", which in itself is pretty ironic considering him working in Prudhoe Bay isn't exactly the metropolis of Alaska. LOL. So apparently he was catching a chopper to where ever this remote pad was located, he said that he would be there for at least 3-4 days. So I probably won't be able to talk to him during that time being that he will be out in the middle of no where.

Well to sum it all up, it's been quite the week. Kodi is getting HUGE so I'm pretty excited to see that. One-tooth, crawling and getting cuter everyday she's quite fun to get to know.

TPS REPORTS

Ok. Time for a little office humor here....and some advise from the Queen of all Paper Pushers!!!
Fun stuff first...
Dom Portwood: Hi, Peter. What's happening? We need to talk about your TPS reports.
Peter Gibbons: Yeah. The coversheet. I know, I know. Uh, Bill talked to me about it. Dom Portwood: Yeah. Did you get that memo?
Peter Gibbons: Yeah. I got the memo. And I understand the policy. And the problem is just that I forgot the one time. And I've already taken care of it so it's not even really a problem anymore. Dom Portwood: Ah! Yeah. It's just we're putting new coversheets on all the TPS reports before they go out now. So if you could go ahead and try to remember to do that from now on, that'd be great. All right!

OK. So for anyone who has ever watched Office Space the movie you'll understand the humor in this and why sometimes in our lives we get stuck with the stupidest bosses of all time. Uhhhh....YEAHHHHH....*nodding*

So here's a word to the wise from an auditing stand point...

If you need to turn in anything resembling getting reimbursement from any state run / federally funded organization please do me a favor!

1.) When you turn in your paper work, know what the heck your doing and fill the dang forms out right.
2.) If you want to get reimbursed for it here's a thought,....we in the paper-pushing world call these things 'RECEIPTS'. *nodding*
3.) If you don't want people to REDFLAG you, turn your crap in right and if you don't know how to fill something out, for goodness sake ask someone how to do it.

Think of it like this...if you turned in a screwy set of TAXES to the I.R.S do you seriously think that after they have audited the crap out of your paperwork that they don't "REDFLAG" you and every other time you turn in paperwork and go...

"Ahhhhh John Smith turned in some taxes again, let's nit-pick him and see where he screwed up this time!!!! AHHH hA HA HA HA HA...."
Trust me. I know. I'm the queen.
The queen of the "Paper Pushers".
No I wont' sign any autographs.

Hmmm we love our stroller!

Kodi has this awesome jogging stroller and it's pretty sweet. We really like it and it's so sturdy I really think I could take her anywhere, even offroading!

But I guess that's what the HUGE tires are for... :)

The love of a child

There is nothing more magical than the love of a child, or the way that your heart leaps within you when they open their arms up and cry for your attention!

I'm sometimes struck with the awesomeness of what great responsibility I have as a Mother. Sometimes I think that I don't really realize what I have in front of me and I seem to take it for granted.

This little person, has been intrusted to me to raise, to love, to be there for her for the rest of my life! I can't simply give up, when the "going gets tough" or slip away for vacation and forget what responsibilites I have anymore. It's a BIG thing.

But at the same time, the love I have for her is so amazing! I look at that smiling face at 12am, 2am, 4am, & 6am in the morning (yep!) and when she grins up at me saying "good morning Mom!" all of my irritations seem to melt away and I remember...

All of the jabs and leg "kicks" mean so little, my sleep means to little, and the fact that my house is dirty and I "only wish I had more time" doesn't quite mean so much.

I just do the best I can, love her, put Him first, love my family, serve them and all the rest seems to "fall into place".

What an awesome gift! I am so blessed.

Now it's off of my lazy, procrastinating rear end and off to take a shower and clean my house while that little "booger" sleeps...

:)