Yea Cement!!!

Living in a smelly apartment (leftover pet smells & stains) with five boys who are sleeping on the floor - with only a table, one mattress, and a washer & dryer (priorities!) for furniture, is making me very excited about cement! I can hardly stand it – We have a foundation!!! Bryan is in Houston this week, so he's living vicariously

through my photos. - Enjoy hon!

More, Boo, & Kisses

More

Boo

and Kisses

Who could ask for anything more?!

Sharing with dad

Mother of Sons

You've probably seen this e-mail from an anonymous Mother... Things I've learned from my boys... -A king size water bed holds enough water to fill a 2000 sq. ft. house 4 inches deep. -If you spray hair spray on dust bunnies and run over them with roller blades, they can ignite. -A 3-year old Boy's voice is louder than 200 adults in a crowded restaurant. -If you hook a dog leash over a ceiling fan, the motor is not strong enough to rotate a 42 pound Boy wearing Batman underwear and a Superman cape. It is strong enough, however, if tied to a paint can, to spread paint on all four walls of a 20 x 20 ft. room. -You should not throw baseballs up when the ceiling fan is on. When using a ceiling fan as a bat, you have to throw the ball up a few times before you get a hit. A ceiling fan can hit a baseball a long way. -The glass in windows (even double-pane) doesn't stop a baseball hit by a ceiling fan. -When you hear the toilet flush and the words 'uh oh', it's already too late. -Brake fluid mixed with Clorox makes smoke, and lots of it. -A six-year old Boy can start a fire with a flint rock even though a 36-year old man says they can only do it in the movies. -Certain Lego's will pass through the digestive tract of a 4-year old boy. -Play dough and microwave should not be used in the same sentence. -Super glue is forever. -No matter how much Jell-O you put in a swimming pool you still can't walk on water. Pool filters do not like Jell-O. -VCR's do not eject 'PB &J' sandwiches even though TV commercials show they do. -Garbage bags do not make good parachutes. -Marbles in gas tanks make lots of noise when driving. -You probably DO NOT want to know what that odor is. -Always look in the oven before you turn it on; plastic toys do not like ovens. The fire department in Austin, TX has a 5-minute response time. -The spin cycle on the washing machine does not make earthworms dizzy. It will, however, make cats dizzy. -Cats throw up twice their body weight when dizzy. -80% of the men who read this will try mixing the Clorox and brake fluid. Well, the boys called me in their room and ask me to turn on the light. I knew something was up, they don't turn out the light for one thing. So I looked at the ceiling fan first. Yea, right.

They've already done balloons, luckily not baseballs. This would be the place to try it though because half of the windows are already broken. (The previous tenants must have had boys.)

Scooby Snack

So Bradley is hungry AGAIN! He just loves his snacks. So far today he has had: french toast, milk, yogurt, raisins, scooby snack crackers, a peanut butter sandwich, a banana, peanut butter, and a fruit snack. And it's only 12:30 in the afternoon! It's the 3-year-old that's going to eat me out of house and home!

Bobert & Ray

So we went to "Walk a day in the shoes of your middle school student" night last night. Bryan "walked" in Brayden's shoes and I "walked" in Blake's. We laughed when we got home and compared notes. Blake's science teacher and a couple others were calling him RAY and Brayden's friends were calling him BOB - some of the cute girls were calling him BOBERT. Ha Ha. Those are, after all their first names, or kind of. These poor boys are going to be dealing with this their whole lives. Blake says he gave up on his science teacher, and Brayden says that he likes it! Just in case you don't know, Bryan & I made a DEAL before we got married that HE got to name all the BOYS and I got to name all the GIRLS. (Final score = boys-5 girls-0) That was okay for the first 3 boys - then it got hard. His idea was that he wanted them to all have the same initials RBH, like his brothers and his dad. I'm thinking that somehow he just didn't hold up his end of the bargain - there's got to be some loophole or something! He'll never make up for that one!

Mindy's Blog: Imagine That!

Mindy's Blog: Imagine That!: "Monday, July 21, 2008 Imagine That! We have a friend (pictured at left) who would always says, 'Imagine that!' whenever someone was asked to do something that he found to be a no-brainer. For instance, 'you want us to arrive at church 5 minutes early?' Imagine that. 'You want us to sacrifice our time' (even though it's for service to the Lord - or to others...) Imagine that. We're going to miss Mr. Imagine That (Bryan). He and his family of a wife and five boys (!) are moving to Wyoming this week."

Home Sweet Hole!

This is it! Our beautiful hole in the ground! Hopefully later this week we'll have a foundation to go in it. It is on 1.3 acres - none of which you can actually see in the picture.

Life & Stuff

Bryan is working for Chevron Mining and they love him. He told off a MSHA Inspector and the Union Representative on Friday - great! It was fun while it lasted! No - actually they both came and apoligized to HIM for some STUFF. Bradley is finally mostly potty trained!!!!!! The trick was giving him a "mild laxative" I'm giving him handfuls of raisins at every chance - they've worked like wonders! Now we owe him a trip to Chuck E. Cheese. Not really convenient, but when we were throwing out every bribe we could think of we lived closer to one. Bradley is by far my most ornery, but a totally funny boy. I told him "see ya later alligator." And he says, "You can't say that to me - only Tammy can!" So there Tammy!

Initiation

So my least favorite thing about moving is speaking in church. In true Hoggan fashion, after the Bishop finished warning the congregation that we would be the main act, 3-year-old Bradley jumps up and runs to the microphone and yells into it, "HI! I'm Hoggan Bradley!" he said some other stuff too before Bryan could catch him, but I was too busy laughing to understand. At least the ward knows now what to expect.

Welcome to windy Wyoming

We've arrived! Of course we are not completely here yet, but we've started the transition. The boys love school - Benson gets to swim for two weeks as part of his 2nd grade curriculum, then once every month after that. Blake is band vice-president and first chair playing percussion in the band - any mothers dream! Of course in any family with five boys at least one (or five) are going to want to play the drums. Blake has to fight Bryan to play though once Bryan gets home - like I said, any boy! Brayden is actually glad to be here and has some friends too. He's 4th chair playing trumpet. Both Brayden & Blake were bumped up a math class too. California schools did okay. Of course having only 5-15 other students per class is nice too! We have a washer & dryer and a mattress. The rest is still in California and will be there or in storage until about February. It is much easier to keep everything picked up and clean this way!