Special visitors

Had a good week with Caroline and Jayde here. They ended up staying a few days more than expected since they couldn't move into their place. It was great to have them here. They played fun games with the kids, like some trampoline game and red rover. It was fun to watch. Yep, I watched. Nice to see the kids having fun and being able to just sit! Thanks you two!

I wanted a pic with my kids too, so we grabbed one. I thought the colors were great.

The kids had a real fun time playing red  rover. Even Charlotte got into it. She had a pretty determined face when she ran. Wish I would have caught a picture of it.




It rained nearly every day they were here. Brian and Jayde were able to get out for one mountain biking trip. Other than that, most the time we just hung out at home doing the normal stuff, but one day we did go take the coal mine tour. It was pretty cool. The kids really enjoyed it, except for Charlotte. She cried the way down into the tunnel. 

Of course we had to grab a picture with the hats on, but I think the only person that kept one on was Bri. Cooper tried but it was too big.

 It was fun having them come visit. They're off to Boston for the summer for an internship so hopefully we can get up there and visit them. Fun to have some of my fam on the east side! :)

Elizabeth

I knew that as the kids got older they'd be faced with kids that did or talked about inappropriate things. I just didn't expect it so soon, or didn't really think about it. Well, we're there. The first issue we faced was hearing "God" in vain, ALL. THE. TIME! From kids and adults. We tried to help the kids understand why they might do that and to try and not overreact. They've done well with that. But Elizabeth has a group of friends that apparently were talking about inappropriate things and she said she had to walk away from the group to not be a part of it and when she came back and they were still going she tried to get them to talk about something else or just go play. I was so proud of her.

A few months ago we read a story out of the Friend magazine that talked about a girl who kids were really mean to and how someone went off their own to make her feel like she had a friend. Liz came home from school and said there was a girl like that who came up to their group and asked them if she could play with them and no one said anything, so she just walked off. Elizabeth followed after her and played with her. Those "friends" ended up being kind of mean to Elizabeth because she left them for her but she felt good about what she did. I was so happy for a few reasons, 1- because she isn't one of the mean kids, 2- she learned from something we had talked about, 3- she knew what was the right thing to do and although not easy, did it anyway, 4- she told me about it! Love this girl. I'm so proud of how she's growing up and the choices she's already making at this age!

Angel?

Don't let this little angel face fool you. Although at times, yes, she can be an angel, other times... not so much, especially lately. Had a rough go of it with Bella and Caroline. Caroline's had 4 good days in a row though, and yes, I'm counting. Matter of fact, WE are. She's anxious to see how many days she can be good. Ha!

I told Brian the other day that I cannot remember the last time I had a day without a drama meltdown and it can be about the silliest thing. We had FHE and Brian had us do charades of different things and this thing for Bella was to act disrespectful, like she was back-talking, without using words. She had the motions down and this was her face. Think she's made it a few times?! Love this bipolar nugget!

Outdoor Love

So we had a really nice warm spell there for a few days in April. We'd put Charlotte down for a nap, then Cooper, Bella and I would go outside and snuggle on the trampoline. We'd take a blanket if  there was a breeze. One day we brought out books, but most days we just went out and I laid down with one on each arm. Probably my favorite thing to do with my kids. Just snuggle. Cooper is by far the one who loves to do it most. He asked me 3 times today to just go sit on the couch and snuggle with him. He wasn't feeling well, but on a good day, at least 1 or 2 times he'll ask, and I do 'cause I love it too!

This particular day I told the kids I'd make them a picnic lunch to eat on the trampoline. They were totally excited about that!

Once they finished I wanted to try and get some cool jumping pictures. They look kind of funny though 'cause you can't see any motion in them, just frozen in place, but we had fun trying.

And yes, Cooper is still in his pajamas. He loves those things! Superheros are a good thing to him!
Bella always gets the best static hair. Had to snap one and I love her face in it!

Cooper just looked cute in this one so I had to share it. He looks like such a big boy in this one. I hope he'll still snuggle with me the older he gets.

Bella and Cooper play so well together. I love seeing their relationship grow. It's probably a good thing that she'll follow him the next year after Kindergarten. It's only half day, so for the next 2 years she'll only be home 1/2 a day without him. Love these little stinkers!

Cooper- 5 years old

Yeah, I was about a month behind on getting Cooper's 5 yr old pictures done. Liz asked me when I was going to take hers and I decided to take them yearly around their birthday until their 8th birthday and then we'll just do them in the fall before each school year. So... here are a few of my sweet little boy. So blessed we have him in our family.

Char-girl

One of my favorite things I've enjoyed as a mother is getting my kids out of their crib in the morning or after naps. I love how they look up at me with their big eyes,  reach their arms up and wrap them around me when I pull them up. I am going to miss that little thing as our baby is going to be out of the crib before we know it.

Charlotte- 18 months

So it took me a while to get some pictures of Charlotte at her 18 months old. For some reason it felt overwhelming to me to try and do, but we finally did and the first round did not go as well as I had hoped. I still got some of her true expressions, but I wanted to try again.

 So...... we tried again and I got a little more of what I was trying for.

She looks like such a big girl. I love it but it makes me sad too. My baby is growing up. She found a pacifier, or a pinky-pink as we call it, in a drawer and had a sudden taking to it. It's been like 7 months or more since she's used one, but she sure enjoyed it! Found her like this:

Love her!

Easter

Easter weekend was good fun. We had an egg hunt on Saturday with all the kiddos. Everyone came over for a bbq and then we followed it up with the egg hunt in the backyard. It was fun to watch all the kids run around. We couldn't find where we packed our easter baskets, so luckily our Halloween baskets we got on clearance for $. 25 this year were spring colors.Haha!

Easter day we had a great program that Brian put together for church. Julia was kind enough to come up and sit with our kids so I could also sing. I realized I miss singing. I haven't done it for a while 'cause once Brian opens his mouth in church, he is immediately sought after, especially for the choir, so I usually let him go, which is great. Not complaining. Just saying, it's been a while. He did a great job with the program.

Later that day we headed up to his parents house for a yummy Easter meal and the kids did a little egg hunt in the house as well. Great weekend and lots of yummy chocolate!

Sled Jumping

So after it snowed the first time after we moved here to PA, the kids went looking for our sleds and we couldn't find them. They must have gotten lost somewhere in the move, so I bought one to use the next time it snowed. Well we never really got enough snow to go sledding except one day and they were sleeping over at their cousins house.
  I ran a quick errand and came home to find this sport happening in our backyard.

That's all the use it got this year! Charlotte is not a fan of the trampoline, so she sat on the swing and looked at a book. Love my fam!

 

 I filmed some of it and then after everyone went in, Bella was outside by herself and came up with this.... made me laugh!

Arrrrgggg!

I can't do it! I cannot let it happen! I can't let another month go with only one post. How am I getting so lazy and behind on my posts?! I have been re-energized though and am going to do better. I did FHE on journals tonight. Brian tried to leave the room, his excuse being that he was watching Charlotte, but he needed this lesson just as much as the kids did! I talked on the importance of journal writing, or just documenting, be it through photos, writings, blogs, etc. I told the kids that my mind isn't the strongest and if I hadn't written in my journals, I wouldn't have half the memories from growing up, or them growing up. I had a few of my journals out, our blog books, their journals that I write in and a Father's journal I gave to Brian. I pulled out the Father one that I gave to Brian about 6 years ago and said to the kids, " how many stories do you think are in here about your Dad?' I kind of flipped through the book excitedly and then announced, "none". Both Caroline and Isabelle's excited expressions turned so sad. I thought Caroline was seriously going to cry, so I fed off it and said, " wouldn't it be terrible if Daddy died tomorrow and you didn't know any stories about him growing up?".  Brian was laughing of course, knowing that was all directed at him and told them, " just ask Grandma and GrandChud". Elizabeth told me to stop saying that because I also used that one on her this morning when she was using a very rude tone at me. I said, " boy I sure hope I don't die today and you end up feeling guilty for the way you treated me the last time you saw me." She got mad at said, "don't say that Mom!". I laugh thinking about it but I guess it probably isn't the best way to encourage kind tones. Anyway, I talked about how important journals are to me and my pictures. I got emotional as I told them that when we were moving the only 2 things I cared about being in the car with us and not on the truck were our journals and pictures. They are true treasures to me. Irreplaceable! So..... now I've got to update our family going-ons.


 So Cooper turned 5. Yep! The big 5! I called a gal I met in the ward who is amazing at cake decorating and asked her to help me make a cake for his birthday. He said he wanted a Mario cake since he's been totally into Marion Kart on the Wii. She came over with the cake made and frosted and Mario, the wheel and some of the little decorations already made. They had to dry in time, so she did that earlier and then she showed me different things as we rolled out the fondant to cover the cake and then I did all the little squares around the base and made a few little mushrooms and different pieces. It was fun. The kids came and watched some and really wanted to get involved, but it was bedtime. Sarah, my friend, let them cut some shapes out and let them eat some of the fondant and left some for the next morning.

We didn't let Cooper see it and hid it under a box. The next morning I was finishing up his birthday video and looked and saw Bella had the wheel in her hands. It too was hiding under the box, but she found it and I ran over there to save it before she broke it, only to find out that she had taken 3 bites out of it!!!!

I was so mad, of course, but luckily there was some left over white so I patched it up best I could. I don't know that anyone else noticed, and it was just a small piece of the cake, so it turned out okay. She was pretty upset and did apologize later. She just thought it tasted too good to pass up I guess.

 

Well Cooper did like the cake. I was hoping for a bigger reaction, but he said, "where's Bowser?".  Of course he let me know he liked it, but I was hoping for screams and what not, although I didn't think it'd really happen.

Other happenings..... absolutely beautiful weather! It's been a mild winter and early spring. I have to think that part of that is Heavenly Father blessing me because I absolutely hate winter and being in a new place cooped up for months and months is not easy. So I am thankful and we try to get out as much as we can. Amazing that the house can still get so messy so quickly! The kids have been wanting the trampoline up since we got here, so we finally put it up last week and surprisingly they are playing on it a ton! Seems to be a hot thing right now. They've had this boy Josh from down the street come play with them. He's 1 year older than Liz and there's been a little crush going on there and it's funny to watch and hear. Am I really getting this old?! On Saturday, after our "treasure hunt" from the Leprechaun, Brian played duck duck goose on the tramp with them. They love having him play with them. Fun way to play the game. You can't run, you have to jump to catch them. They were running here though.

I've started playing in a vball league and that's fun. Only had 1 game so far. I got called into the cub scouts and do that each Wednesday. Brian got called to be the choir director along with his calling of  teacher for the 10-11 year olds.

The kids are doing well. I keep getting frustrated with lack of respect, barking at them to do chores, home work and piano, little fights, unkind words, etc. I keep looking for ways to improve things things and keep praying we'll have more kindness in our home but it is hard! I can't help but think Satan is trying extra hard with our little kids because they are so awesome. We'll win though! We just keep trying and trying and praying and praying. Guess that's basically all we can do. I love my family! I've been noticing how quickly Charlotte is growing and it makes me sad. I'm pretty sure she's our last one and I've been feeling sad a little about it lately. I love my babies and she's nearly a toddler. I mean look at this one. Her hair is getting long, her facial features are changing and she's getting older.

She's been so fun. Her favorite place to be lately is the dryer.

She's got such a big grin. I love it! I love my kiddos.. Big and small. I've been aware of all the kids getting bigger. I keep thinking about Elizabeth getting so much older and aware. I remember being her age. It's scary. I see how people say it goes by fast, and treasure those moments, and I get that. I will miss them being small because I love so much about it and as soon as they get older, they're going to be gone so much more to various things, and then just gone. Makes me sad to think about, so I just won't. Well, that's about it for now.