A Wren's Life

Who is this you may say. I know it has been way too long since my last post. I have been super busy trying figure out how to be a mom of five, I still haven't figured it out and things still are not finalized, soon however, very soon!!
The only reason I am taking a few minutes (it has taken a lot longer than that because I forgot how to do all this posting stuff) is to introduce you to the hot new up and coming Author and to ask you to check out her new blog. I am proud to say I have personally known her my whole life. She is a fantastic writer. Her mind is and always has been in some other world where there are stories going on. I wish her the best of luck and hope you will check out her blog and from there check out her web page. So why are you still reading this? Why haven't you already gone to check her out? Oh you say, because I haven't given you a link? oh well yes I have, she is over there to the right in my blog roll under A Wren's Life. See it now? I also have linked it in the title of this post, but for all of you who can't pull your eyes away from my fantastic writing then simply click here. Why haven't you done it yet? why are you still reading this? Fine I get the hint I guess I better stop typ.....

I'm a winner!!!

Look what I just won!!!! This chair is a winner of Good Housekeeping's 10 Best VIP® Awards for 2010, the Insect Shield TravelChair from Plow and Hearth.
You all have to check out my friends blog Steals and Deals they put a lot of work into it. They always find amazing deals and often have great give a ways such as this one I just won!!!

To feel guilt or not to feel guilt ...

I have tremendous guilt about not keeping up with my Blog. I love reading others posts. In fact every morning I get on here to read what is going on in the lives of all my friend who are so faithful in keeping up with their blogs, but once I have spent the time doing that I feel it's time to get off the computer and spend some time on toilets or bedrooms or laundry or or or.... the list could go on and on. So I reluctantly slide off the chair and get busy on other things. The whole time feeling guilty that I just read about everything that is going on in everyone's lives and not shared a smidgen about what is going on here. I feel kinda like a freaky stalker or something wrong like that. The truth is I don't have a whole lot going on from day to day or I have a lot going on and don't want to take the time to write about it because it usually involves toilets (who would have thought that adding 3 more children [2 of which are boys] to the family would result in such nasty bathrooms, I need a maid) or something as mundane as that.
So the question is who out there really reads this and would benefit from hearing from me more often? I can do it, and I will do it if there is a need.
Just leave a comment would you?
No promises that I will be any better at posting. I just want to know how guilty I should be feeling!!
Thanks and with Love
~Laura

Where has the time gone

I have been so busy and this blog is one thing I have neglected, for those of you who care I am sorry. For those of you who don't read it then you haven't missed out (come to think of it you won't even know I am apologizing because you won't read this).
Anyway I found a few minutes today and thought I'd mess around on this blog and it seems I have really messed it up Grrrrr.
I want all of you to know that we are doing good. The adoption process is moving forward, but not nearly as fast as we all want it to. We are all learning to adjust to the changes, well for the most part. I don't want to sugar coat anything and will say it is hard, but at the end of the day I find myself thanking my Heavenly Father for this blessing. And that is truly how I feel. We have been blessed with them and I hope they feel blessed to have us. I can't wait 'till I can post pictures of our whole family and introduce them to all of you!!
Wish me luck on fixing this ugly blog!!
'till I post again c-ya
You may have better luck finding me on facebook. It takes so much less time!!

Thankful

What I am thankful for:

Are we ready?!

(I'm not sure if I can post pictures of them yet so this will have to do)
OMGosh that's my family

This past weekend we had all the kids with us for an overnighter. We took advantage of Emmitt's game being canceled and took the kids down to the "flats" and did a little tourist-ing. We went to the blacksmith shop, because every kid in Nauvoo has to have had at one time a prairie diamond. Then we took them on a carriage ride. They fit right in with our other kids because they thought it was pretty boring. Sorry if that offends anyone!!
As of tomorrow they will all be in our home permanently. We are all so excited. Life is about to change, ready or not here it comes!

Change is happening in the Skog family.... and it's a good thing

To all my friends from facebook visiting for the first time, welcome.

Well here goes!

For about the past 6 years we have been wanting to have more children. And for whatever reason we have not been blessed with a successful pregnancy. So we considered looking in to adoption. Jason and I could never agree at the same time that this is what we needed to do.
Without having to wast your time and my fingers telling you the whole story (call me sometime if you want to hear it) I will just say things finally clicked for both of us back in November of last year.

However we decided to become foster parents with the option to adopt.
We took a while to talk about it together just to make sure we both were still feeling this is what we wanted and should do.
After more talking, praying, and fasting we decided to find an agency to work with with us. We then talked to Emmitt and Constance and asked them how they felt about this. Emmitt was very supportive and couldn't wait for everything to get started. Constance on the other hand was a little reserved and had to take a couple of days to gather her thoughts. The day she came to me and told me she was okay with it she cried and said she felt really good about helping other children, and she was excited to get a little brother or sister.

In February we started all the paper work that needed to be done. In June we enrolled in classes. We went into the classes with the idea we did not want to become full time foster parents we only wanted kids that needed to be adopted. By our third class we had changed our mind and were 100% committed to become foster parents and help families be reunited by helping the parents over come whatever problems the were having so they could be reunited with their children.

We finished our last class on June 29th. On July 1st we got a call from our agency saying they were looking for a pre-adoptive home for a sibling group of 3. (A 9year old boy, a 5year old girl, and a 4 year old boy) My feelings were, but we are so ready to go out and save families. When Jason came home we talked all night about it. We couldn't get out of our mind that everything was working they way it needed to be. For every negative we thought of there were at least 3 positives that out weighed the negative. The next day we called back the social worker and said let's move forward slowly just to make sure this is what should happen.

So that brings us to today. As I write this I am waiting for the oldest boy to get here. And in a few weeks after some transition time the younger ones will join us.

There you have it!! We are so excited, nervous, happy, scared, grateful,, blessed...!!!

A funny thing happened

One of the highlights of our sister's getaway this year is thanks to this sweet little old man.

We were sitting on the beach our last night together enjoying the sound of the waves and the approaching sunset. When one of us notices this adorable man, cane in hand, literally hobbling down the beach towards us. He makes it thankfully with out any falls or broken hips. He finds his spot and spreads out his towel and ever so gracefully he sits down on it. Then proceeds to take off his shoes and socks, then his shirt. Then again with grace only someone in their 80's has mastered he gets back up on his feet and with his cane starts walking to the water.

The waves were fast and hard this day so we were all on the edge of our seats ready to jump in if he should go down. Kim is reviewing in her mind all she just learned in EMT classes.

He wades out a bit farther. He's now up to his chest. A wave comes and then he's gone we all have our hands on the arms of our chairs ready to jump in when we see he was just behind the wave and started swimming still holding his cane. We all laugh at ourselves and say that he probably has been doing this every day of his life and can out swim any of us.

We let the guy swim in peace with out our watchful eye stalking his every move. He enjoys a good swim then rides the waves in to the beach then again with that grace I mentioned before he gets up on his knees and then onto his feet and walks to his towel.

He has a seat on his towel, wraps the edges around him Then proceeds to shimmy out of his wet trunks. Now those stalker eyes are back not because we want to see anything but (pardon the pun) it was more like a train wreck we just couldn't help but look. So our dear Mr. then trys to wrap the towel around him the best he could and dry him self off. He reaches for his bag and pulls out a pair of whitie tighties and (again remember the grace) works them over his feet, up to his knees, stretches them to cover the front and gets back on his knees....lets just say we saw the moon before we saw the sunset, and it was a full, saggy moon friends!!! We were in complete shock I didn't even think to take a picture I was frozen!!

He then reaches behind and pulls up the back of the under clothing. That is when my senses returned and I snapped a picture.And that's when we "spot" that the whitie tighties are not so white or tight. Oh sweet little darling old Mr. How we love you and the show you put on for us that night.

Who would a thought....

... paradise could be found in Michigan? I really didn't want to write about my amazing two weeks, because when you do it is the end. Like the final report. So I put it off as long as possible. Yes the time has come to end the summer. The kids head back to school in 5 days (noooooo) I hate school starting just as much or maybe even more than my kids do. So maybe this is a good time to write about our vacation, this way I get to relive it just a little longer. So here goes

The first week was our annual sisters get away to the cottage named Haliakala (Don't ask, I don't know! it's Hawaiian or Samoan or something like that, and it's probably not even spelled right. I don't want to find the phone to call my mom and ask)

This year we were down in numbers. We had Mom, Ann, Kim, Me, and Sarah, and guess what we didn't ever get a picture of all of us but I did think to take a picture of this...

What?!?! did you think we would all use the same scrubbie? That's gross!!

We all had a great time just sittin on the beach talking and catching up on each other and our lives. No one would allow a camera during this time so sorry no pictures of that!!

And mom's favorite thing to do every day... watch the sun go down. It is so beautiful and when you see the sun sink into the water we would applaud the day.

At nights when we were in the cottage Mom would teach, all who wanted to learn, how to knit a dish cloth!!

Ann was so proud of herself!! Through out the week she would remind all of us that she was "pretty much a knitter" now. We were all impressed (Sorry Ann for such a horrible picture, but you never read this anyway so won't even know I posted it. That's what you get for not reading my blog) Mom feeling like she was home!!!

Then the day came when some had pack up the beach chairs and load up the cars and head home.

But for others of us (Ann and I) looked forward to our families joining us for another fun week.

Stay tuned I will post more of that week later.

Where's Waldo... I mean Laura

See that Picture up there? No not in this post, all the way up there at the top. That's where I'm going for two whole weeks.
See ya when I get back!