Wednesday, February 3, 2010

The things kids say....

All in all I'd say January was a pretty good month.  However,  I AM ready for more sun, I AM ready for warmer weather, I AM ready for cleaner air and so it's a good thing I'm going for a weekend break with Brian to Arizona! But to recap the past week, Elizabeth thought she'd doll up Caroline. This was her finished product. Later that day she said, " Mom, I want to be a person who does hair and make up when I grow up. I don't know what it's called, but I'm good at it aren't I?". So cute.


Elizabeth talked me into letting her have a friend bday party. Brian.... not so much. I started out telling her she could have 3 girls, but somehow we ended up with 7. It was fun though.  First we started out with them painting their own shirt. It was fun to see how creative they were. I remember doing this with my parents when I was younger. I think my Dad still has his... just kidding Dad. (Actually, I might need to check his closet!) I forgot to mention it to the Moms so they wouldn't wear nice clothes, so last minute I came up with this great idea of cutting a hole in the bottom of a trash bag and slipping it over their heads. It worked great as an apron!

Elizabeth wanted to play all the games like Twister, pin the tail on the donkey and Limbo, so we did. I thought this picture was so cute of all of them.

After Twister, we had a treasure hunt with about 8 different clues and at each spot there was an envelope with 2 puzzle pieces in it. Once they collected all of them, they were to put it together and figure out what it was. It was a picture of Elizabeth.

After presents, cake and ice cream, we watched the annual bday video. I love watching my kids and how much they love watching them and love showing their friends. Makes it worth the time and effort of putting it all together.... like 8 times. (Our program was wacked!)



I think they all had a great time. A final shot with them all in their creations. Good group of girls!

I'm a little behind in getting Elizabeth's 7 year old picture done and now we're going to have to wait even longer because last night we had an incident! I was wrapping the kids up in a sheet and they were trying to get out. They were laughing and having so much fun and then they wanted to make it harder and do it one at a time. Well I wrapped Elizabeth up and tied it behind her back and put her on her stomach on the floor and said I'd be right back. Well a minute later she came hoping in behind me and right as I thought.... bad idea, she full on face planted it onto our scale. I mean full on facial impact. No bent knees, no hands bracing her fall, just her mouth and nose. One step more and she would have smacked either into the counter or the handles on our drawers. She was bleeding out of her nose and her mouth so I couldn't figure out where the problem was at first, but then, of course, it was both places. She immediately had a bruise on her nose and her lip was swelling by the second. No teeth were  knocked out though, so that was good, although we could have easily fixed that! :) Her nose didn't seem to be too bad. The bleeding was minor and the swelling wasn't too bad, until later that night. Then I was worried she had broken it. I ended up taking her into the doctor and they said she should be fine. No xrays were necessary, just some good old ice and time for the swelling to go down! I wouldn't let her look at it because I knew she freaked out, but a few hours later she caught a glimpse and said, " that looks painful." Such a funny girl. She also said," Mom, I learned an important lesson today didn't I?" I didn't know what it was, so I asked, " I learned you never walk with your hands tied behind your back." Glad we're learning something!


On a side note, I was rough housing with Cooper and Caroline, and Cooper had me in a choke hold, so I prenteded to die thinking he might give up. Well, about 10 seconds of my charade Caroline threw her body on top of me and was sobbing. I had no idea what had happend. "I thought you were dead and it made me so sad." How sweet and sad is that? I said, "well that makes me feel good that you were sad instead of jumping up and down saying "yay, she's dead". Oh the sweet moments. Ha!



Wednesday, January 27, 2010

January 27th, 2010

Last Saturday I took the girls to the bridal fair up here in Logan. I thought it'd be a fun "girls date" and they would have fun seeing the fashion show with all the dresses. Well, I was right. We had a great time together and best part.... it was free. We got there and looked around at the different booths and at just about every booth they had chocolate, a sucker, cake samples, ice cream, eclaires... just about everything. We ran into a lady from our ward and she told us they had the upstair catered for samples as well, so we went up there and had crackers, cheese, grapes, sandwhiches, delicious chocolate goodies, coconut dipped in chocolate and wedding cake. Mmmmmmmmmmm! Then we hit the wedding dress fashion show. They were so much fun to be with. I loved it and so did they!



Our sweet Elizabeth turned 7 on Monday. It was a crazy day. Wee-Mama, Papa John and Caroline (my Caroline) went to lunch at her school with her. After school she had a piano party until 5:30, then we ate dinner and opened presents. Every Sunday she's been saying she wants the Holy Bible, I think because her friend has it, but whatever. So we got her a set with her name embossed on them. She was pretty excited about that. It's been a great 7 years with this girlie and we sure love her!




Sunday, January 17, 2010

For me

I love pictures (as we already know) and I love seeing pictures and the way people change over the years, especially my kids. But I like seeing how I've changed too and looking back over the years, so today, since I actually straightened my hair, I thought I'd go take some pictures of myself. I think every Mom and woman needs a good picture of themselves that makes them feel pretty. Now, I'm not saying all these make me feel pretty, but it was kind of fun. I'm not a hat girl, but something happens when you put on a hat, it can give you a different personality, or am I just weird? Like a sports hat makes me feel more athletic and guy-ish, or a cowboy hat make me feel like a cowgirl. Am I the only one? Anyway, this hat was fun to play with. It made me feel stylish and girlie even if it looks silly on me. I think I need to get some more hats!


Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Amen!

How could you get mad at a face like this?! So cute!



Monday, January 11, 2010

18 months and ice skating

Well today marks 18 months for miss Isabelle. It's kind of crazy 'cause she seems so little to me. She's such a sweetie though and I love seeing her learning and growing. She basically only says "daddy" still. We almost got mama but she's not giving me that kind of satisfaction too soon I guess. We still need to get her off the passy. I think tomorrow is the day... after the shots of course. I can't believe she's still on it. None of our kids lasted past 4 months. It's been nice though, until now... the breaking off stage.



The girls have been wanting to go ice skating, heck, it seems like they've been wanting to do everything lately!!! But there's a park that floods out the area and makes an outdoor skating rink, so we took them there today. The skates were horribly dull so I could barely even skate. Luckily I had the stroller to keep me balanced. I don't know how the others managed. Bri says he can't even remember not being able to skate. Lame! But, I did catch him skating backwards, so he has got some skill. :) I'd say it was fun, but I'm not so sure it was. Caroline had an okay time, Liz didn't until she was in her boots on the ice.


Thought this was a cute picture. Love this girl!



The temple was in the background which was pretty. Brian was even able to skate holding Isa. I told him he must have been born wearing skates. :)

Monday, January 4, 2010

I love pictures!


I love pictures! I love them! There are so many great things about them. Capturing expressions, laughter, joy, personality. Capturing a moment you don't want to forget. I love seeing colors, clarity and a billion other things. I love this picture. I know it's not all professionally set up or no matching clothes and such, but I LOVE it! Mom and Dad you look great! I think everyone looks good in this picture.

And just as much.... this one! I love how Bella is covering her eyes and I think the funniest is .... Greg. I have to laugh out loud about that one. I don't know if he knew we were doing funny faces or not so it makes me laugh even more! Mom and Dad you look great!

We had a great time with the fam for New Year's. Caroline (Big Caroline as we call her) put together a game tournament. Each couple was in charge of a game, treat and prize. We did Wii bowling for ours, then there was a race in  Perfection (the game), nerf darts and foosball and Greg's personal favorite... Time's UP. Acutally, not really his favorite. It was good times.

Isabelle got this super cute dress for Christmas and I had to get a picture of her in it. She is growing up, yet not really getting any bigger. She seems to petite to me. Her cousin who is 7 months younger is taller and heavier. She's like our little pixie doll.







After dinner we had some cupcakes from a friend. I love her smile, her eyes and the messy face. Can you ever get enough pictures of that?!


Today she grabbed a dress up and I put it on her. I can't believe that I've only put a dress up on her one other time and that's when she got one from WeeMama for her bday. Elizabeth lived in dress ups by this age! Oh the difference! Doesn't she look so cute?!


Cooper got all snazzy for church so I had to grab a picture. He wouldn't keep the tie on. A few too many Sundays without a tie. Hope we can work him into one.



So far, a good start to the year!

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Winding Down

Well, tomorrow is the last day of 2009. 2010...weird. We've had a great couple of weeks. Bri's been crazy busy at the office and we've been doing fun things here and there. After Halloween I bought some makeup on clearance and thought it would come in handy some time and sure enough... we got bored and played around. I got progressively better. I started with Elizabeth, then Caroline and lastly Cooper. His was the best IMO. It wasn't the best stuff, and I'm by no means a drawing/painting artist, but they seemed to enjoy it none the less.


We had some fun in the studio. They actually asked me to take their pictures. Now that's something we can have fun doing together! There are some more here if you haven't seen them. I LOVE this one.

We did another round or two of sledding. We went to the Utah State campus hill this time. It was way better! It was a blast. The kids had a great time. Even Elizabeth did some pulling up the hill with Isa on the sled. It was cute and so fun to see the kids enjoying eachother.


Since our last post we've caught 2 more mice. Who knows how many are in this house. Anyone want to come visit! Luckily the only signs of their presence have been in the kitchen. Well, luckily and still gross!

Christmas Eve the kiddos got to eat their gingerbread houses. They didn't get very far. Kind of gross after a month of sitting out!

Christmas was great and so fun to watch the kids open their presents. Isabelle was the funniest. She "wowed" everything. It was super cute. We were blessed with a great Christmas.

I had a lot of fun with this Christmas making gifts this year. I made Cooper a Superman cape which he loves. We've been tying blankets around his neck for the last few months. This one was super easy and fast (thanks to a tip from Mom). No sewing required! I made 2 in less than 45 minutes. I made an apron for Bri and my bro-in-law Paul. I think they turned out pretty good. There were a few other things and it was a lot of fun. I think I might try it again next year.

My cute family. The kiddos are all in their PJ's made by Grandma (Chudleigh). Don't they look cute?! Thanks Mom. I just love Isabelle's face in these.

We hope you all had a great Christmas season and we're looking forward to 2010! Love you all!



Saturday, December 19, 2009

Sledding

Brian's been so busy with his choir stuff this week that since we had a few hours this morning, I thought it'd be fun to go sledding. One of the very few reasons to be grateful for snow! Well, or at least one of the few ways to enjoy it... for me anyway. It was fun.




I love my bunch!They can be a lot to handle, but they can also be lots of fun!



Brian is, of course, the more daring crazy one. I like to stand on the sidelines and document it all.



Even Isabelle had fun. She enjoyed eating the snow and a few runs down the hill.




I liked going on the tube. It felt safer to me. It was fun going down on our stomachs. The kids would hitch a ride on our backs. Good times, good times.


Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Brian's been in charge of FHE this month and has been doing fun things for the kids. Last night we made Rudolph paper bag puppets, the week before was gingerbread houses. I thought he was nuts. I didn't even want to attempt that, but he was so cute. He came home with bags and bags of candy and got to work. The kids did really well and it was actually fun.





Brian and Cooper worked on one together. There were a few fallen roof tops, but it worked out.



Elizabeth and Caroline did their own. Very creative work I must say!




Bri and Cooper's final product...



Caroline workin' the camera and showing her final product...



Elizabeth's final product.....



And eventhough I hate this picture, Brian said I had to put one of me in there, so..... my final product......

Now we're just trying to keep the kids from eating them until Christmas. So far we've only lost a few parts. Good times!

A poem by yours truly...

Hickory Dickory SNAP!
3 mice now caught in our trap
How many will be
Joining those 3?
Hickory Dickory SNAP!


Hickory Dickory one
Your dying was surely not fun
Still alive while smushed
Though your guts did not gush
Hickory Dickory one.


Hickory Dickory two
So sad you didn't get through
Your lungs must have failed
Under the fridge and lost your tail
Hickory Dickory two.


Hickory Dickory three
Your death was the most easy
You got caught by your head
and were hopefully soon dead
Hickory Dickory three.

Okay, kind of gross and we actually feel bad when we see these little mice, but how do you get rid of them  without killing them? We have a live trap out, but they aren't taking the bait (hahaha). Last night Brian and I were playing games and at the designated time (9:42-9:48) we actually HEARD the mice squeaking. The other two nights I heard them eating. Last night I think they were conversing  wondering where their peanut butter was that we've been so kind to put out for them to eat the last few nights. We've tried 3 traps. One (the clamp) they just eat the peanut butter and get away (well, except for number one). The other one is the live trap and after one night,  no success there. The best.... the old school wooden slats! FYI.