Logan's Latest

I have often said that I could write book with Logan's latest antics. Though I've missed the majority of them, here are a few highlights:

Watered my flowers with his bubbles . . .

went to bed with a pen . . .

and cleaned out my frosting bowls . . . all by himself!

What do I do with this kid???

Happy birthday Tyler!

Tyler turned 10 yesterday and we had a great day celebrating. He started out the day with his favorite breakfast - chocolate chip pancakes, homemade syrup, and sausage. He got sung to at swimming lessons and had a fun party with great friends. We went miniature golfing at a glow in the dark course. We had the place to ourselves and had a great time.

What do you want to be when you grow up: video game designer

Favorite book: The Hobbit

Favorite food: cinnamon rolls

Favorite family activity: camping

Favorite free time activity: reading

If you had a million dollars: buy lots of DS games and have an endless supply of cinnamon rolls

My favorite things about Tyler: Tyler is the most creative person - his imagination is always going. Another favorite is that Tyler always has a book in hand, and he will use anything for a bookmark - pencil, CD, spoon, whatever is closest at hand he'll use. I love finding unexpected bookmarks in his books (the library probably doesn't love this trait!).

Funny Side of Bay

Here's a few of Bailey's more classic comments:

Yesterday she was watching High School Musical and Zac Efron was singing -

Bailey: I like that kid. He's handsome and has a good voice.

For FHE last night Tyler was Activity and he picked Open Mic Night - basically everyone got 2 minutes to have the floor, with everyone's goal to make our family laugh. Tyler told jokes, Bailey danced, and then for Emmy's turn she danced.

Bailey: Do something funnier!

Yep . . . we had a heckler at FHE.

Oh baby . . .

Tyler's teacher is pregnant and due this month, so when I was volunteering this week we were talking pregnancy and babies and she said, "You can tell this is old news to Tyler". I asked what she meant and she said "When we were doing our Oregon Trail project Tyler was a father of 3 and his fake wife was pregnant - and had the baby on the trail. In his journal entry after the baby was born Tyler wrote, "the baby kept us up all night!". Tyler knows a thing or two about babies.

Shhh . . .

This is what I found last night hanging on Emmy and Bailey's

door when I went to check on them:

Logan Yells at the Home Teachers

Today our home teachers came over. We have the best home teachers - they always bring a great lesson geared for the kids, and then at the end they quiz the kids about the lesson. Every time they get a question right they get a piece of candy. The kids love for the home teachers to come.
So today we had the lesson and the quizzing had begun. Tyler had the first question and got peanut butter cup for his correct answer. Logan saw that Tyler got a treat and wanted one. The home teachers had gone to Emmy next and Logan was getting nervous about getting his treat. After a minute of fussing about it he went into our pantry where our candy jar (unfortunately) was within reaching distance of him. He found in the candy jar his own peanut butter cup and was quite proud of his problem solving skills. He was showing off his candy to all of us when we all started laughing at him (more with him, than at him). Then he got embarrassed and took his treat into the pantry and shut the door (so he was just standing in their dark!). So then we really were laughing at him (this time, definitely at him). Then he got mad . . . and he'd open the door and yell "Not funny!", we'd die laughing, and he'd yell "Stop it!" It was hilarious! We'll see if they bring candy next month . . .

Bailey Crack-ups

Here are a few things Bay has said lately that has cracked us up:

(The background you need for this story is that in Cinderella 3, Anastasia says, "Stop the wedding Mother!" - and this quote is said a lot at our house -

I don't know why . . .)

Last night we took the kids swimming, and as we were coming out of the gym the kids had wet hair, were in flip-flops, and it was in the 20's. We were all freezing! Derek had just buckled up Logan, and then while he was starting the car he said, "Stop the wedding Mother!". Bailey yells to the front of the car, "Dad, there's no time for that - get the warm air going!"

Today in the middle of Sacrament Meeting Bailey leaned over and asked, "When you were a little girl did you love the number 4?"

Bailey has changed her name to Jailey. In preschool they all say their name with their first letter replaced with whatever letter they're learning that week. So Derek and I would be Jerek and Jamy. For whatever reason "Jailey" has really stuck with her. She came home Thursday telling me to call her Jailey. She's started writing "Jailey" on all of her things (with the J backwards every time), and told her Primary teacher today to call her Jailey. In a moment of frustration this weekend when no one was remembering her name change, she said to me "Why can't everyone remember to call me Jailey?!".

That girl's a crack up.

The Groundhog was Right

Though Puxatony Phil seemed to get his forecast wrong for most of the country, he seemed to get it right for me. Yesterday I saw my daffodils had poked through. Part of me says: oh little daffys, I think you might have jumped the gun a little! I hope a frost doesn't come that does you in! But a much bigger part of me says YAY! YAY! YAY! The first day I see my daffodils come through is really and truly one of my favorite days of the year. I love to think that we are through the worst of winter and spring is on it's way. I love that it's getting lighter and lighter in the morning. I love that soon I will not be fighting coats and socks whenever we go somewhere. I love that soon I will not be cold all the time - I am always telling Derek I've been cold since October. I love that my kids will be playing outside longer than it took us to get them ready to go oustide. Spring cannot get here soon enough.

Emmy is Baptized!

Emmy was baptized last Saturday, February 5th. It was a great day because we had so many people there to support her in this decision (Allyson's family had plans to come from Utah, but their family got hit the flu the day before and they weren't able to make it).
She was the most excited person I've ever seen to get baptized. She talked about it nonstop for weeks prior to her baptism. The night before she was up at 11:30 pm coughing - when Derek went to check on her she said, "it's almost Saturday, and that's the day I get baptized!". She was the most excited to be baptized.
Her baptism was at 6:30 so we had dinner for all of our family before and then were off to the baptism. Only 6 kids were baptized that night so even though Emmy was last it was a quick wait.
Our Bishop was there and had Emmy come up and look around at how many people were there. Then it was finally her turn to get baptized. They had filled the font earlier for a baptism before our stake baptism so her water was really cold. It was so cold that was all she could pay attention to. She got in and told everyone it was cold, she got out and told everyone it was cold, the next day in primary she told eveyrone it was cold - she really got preoccupied with it!
Afterwards everyone came to our house for dessert and to enjoy our great day together. Thanks to everyone who came - we really appreciate it!

It's Great to be 8!

My little Emmy turned 8 a few weeks ago and would definitely say "It's great to be 8". Her birthday was on a Saturday so we were able to celebrate all day. She had her favorite breakfast (eggs and sausage) and then a friend party. We only do friend parties on even birthdays so this was very exciting for her. We had 11 little girls here for games and lunch and Emmy loved every minute.
After her party my mom took her shopping to pick out her own birthday present. This is Emmy's dream come true. The girl can change her mind 1000 times about anything. My mom let her walk up and down every aisle and change her mind again and again. Finally she came home with 2 gold fish, a giant heart shaped pillow that says BFF on it, a giant red teddy bear, and many other treasures.
We met Emmy and my mom for dinner at the restaurant of her choice (Wingers - loves that popcorn). Then we were off to our school swim night at the YMCA.
The next day Derek's parents came and we had another party with grandparents and cousins - it was such a fun weekend celebrating Emily.

Fortune Cookies

Tonight we had Chinese take-out for dinner. After dinner Tyler was reading his fortune.
Me: What does your fortune say?
Ty: It says carolers will be coming to our door.
Me: Tyler, it can't say that.
Ty: It does.
Now I'm starting to think maybe they make holiday fortunes . . . ?
Me: Let me see it.

The actual fortune: Don't be hasty, prosperity will soon knock on your door.

I'm hoping for a more financial prosperity over some singing.

Snow Day

Tuesday night we got a lot of snow (here that equals 6-8 inches) so school was cancelled yesterday. The kids were so excited! There was just a sense of excitement at our house. Dance and scouts also got cancelled so our whole day was empty. What a perfect way to spend a snowy, snowy day. This is how we spent our day:

making snowmen (of course!)

decorating gingerbread houses

and making igloos with friends.

The kids had a blast - they'd play in the snow, come in to get warm, have something to eat, and head back out to the snow. Last night it was dark and I still couldn't get Bailey to come in the house. My kids were betting on another snow day today, but their luck ran out, and they're back to school. We had a great snow day.

Gems of Bailey

Here are a few gems from Bailey after the past few months:
One day I was helping Tyler practice the piano in our living room. Bailey and Emmy were playing in the family room. All of the sudden Bailey starts crying. Not "I want attention" crying, nor was it "I want Emmy in trouble" crying (moms can differentiate). This was "I'm really hurt" crying.
So I go into the family room to find her really hurt and laying on the floor. I ask her what happened and she yells, "Emmy made me do the splits!" Isn't that hilarious? To comfort Bay this is what Emmy added, "But Bailey, you really did the splits!"
Then this week Bay went to preschool and I heard this report from her teacher, "Bailey came up to me and told me she had an announcement" An announcement? From Bailey? What does she have to announce? Her big announcement to her class: "I'm popular".

That's what she told them - aye, aye, aye.

P.S. to the Fire Alarm

My friend, who's in Scouts, just told me that for Pack Night this week we are having a fireman come to talk to the boys . . . I just hope we don't recognize anyone. Or vice-versa. That is hilarious timing.

Worst. Stake Conference. Ever.

We just got home from the worst Stake Conference ever. Harsh, you say, hear me out. A few weeks ago a couple friends and I decided we should join the choir singing at Stake Conference. For them, it was about a love of singing and hymns being praises and such, for me it was a way to sit and listen to Stake Conference, from my cushy seat, for 2 hours, while Derek had the kids. Genius I'd say.
So today I was enjoying Stake Conference while watching Derek and the kids. Halfway through, I saw Derek take Logan out and leave the other 3 kids on the bench. Not too concerned at this point. Our last speaker was Cecil O. Samuelson - as in President of BYU and General Authority. Derek and I were at our Stake Center, becuase I was in the choir and all, but it was also being broadcast to 2 other buildings and 2 nursing homes (do we live in Utah?). He was in the middle of his talk when all of the sudden the fire alarm goes off. Ear piercing fire alarm. People covering their ears fire alarm. Babies crying fire alarm. It is so loud that he had no choice but to stop his talk. Through the siren he did manage to say, "kids are cute, but there are things they shouldn't touch".
Emmy and her friend were out getting a drink from the water fountain when the alarm went off, and they both sprinted outside.
The fire alarm is going and going and High Councilmen and the Stake Presidency have gone out to the halls to figure out what is going on. My friend Kim and I start asking ourselves if there's any way it's either of our 2 year olds, since they were both out of the chapel at the time. No way we convinced ourselves, they're 2 - they couldn't reach the fire alarm. It's definitely not either of our boys.
Finally, after several minutes, like 5 ear-splitting minutes, while Elder Samuelson can't do anything but stand there, the siren goes off. The strobe lights on each alarm, however, are still going strong. A counselor in the Stake Presidency comes back and assures Elder Samuelson that it was accidental, and we don't need to start evacuating, to which Elder Samuelson says to everyone, "It was an accident, we'll have a disciplinary council after the meeting. If you need surgery repairing your ear drums, send your bills to your Stake Presidency." And the meeting proceeeds.
Here's the unbeknowst to me part . . . Derek had Logan, and his friend (partner in crime I'd suggest) in the Relief Society room listening to the talk. Derek saw the boys looking at the fire alarm lever and he distracted them away from it. Ten minutes later Derek saw Logan beelining for the fire alarm - despite Derek's chase, the alarm was pulled. When it started Derek was hoping it was just in the Relief Society room, when he heard Elder Samuelson say, "Everyone stay calm" Derek knew he was cooked. Derek ran out of the room to see the High Councilmen looking to see what alarm was pulled. Derek told them where it was, and they told him to stay put. They had a key to turn off the alarm, but not the strobe lights. So the alarm was off, lights still going, and Derek and Logan had to wait otuside for the fire department to come.


After they got the lights off, they had to have a talk with Logan. I'm sure that went well. The firemen said since he had called them, he might as well get a tour of the fire truck. So Logan got a tour of the fire truck and met his first fireman.

Right after the alarm got turned off, Derek's friend - who was another building - text him and said, "It was your kid wasn't it?" Other favorite texts have asked if we think the fire alarm will make the report that Elder Samuelson gives when he gets back to Utah, the fact it was Logan who pulled it "was no shocker", and when will his disciplinary council be. My brother thinks we should print the picture of Logan and the fireman and mail it to Elder Samuelson with a note that says, "It was me".

When I first saw Logan after the meeting all he could say was "loud, loud". After we went into the Relief Society room to see just how low this fire alarm lever was. Logan was so scared he didn't even want to go in the room. Maybe the fireman's talk did sink in . .. . Needless to say, I will not be singing in the Stake Conference choir again - we need all hands on deck.

Heat Wave

We have had unusually hot weather the last 2 weeks. Today's October 1st and the high is 91. It's just still hot, hot summer around here (which I do not complain about, winter will be here soon enough).
This week Emmy wore a dress to school and she wanted to wear her dress boots with it. I told her it was too hot to wear boots to school but she insisted and off she went. She came home from school taking off her boots as fast as she could.

Me: Were your feet hot in those boots?

Emmy: Yeah! I told my teacher my boots were full of sweat!

Is that the sickest thing you've heard all day?

Late Start Wednesday

Every Wednesday our whole school district starts school 15 minutes later. The point is to give teachers 15 minutes of grade-wise collaboration time. So instead of school starting at 9:05, we start at 9:20. Last year we had Late Start but the buses still came at the same time - the kids just played on the playground for an extra 15 minutes in the morning. This year, due to budget cuts, the buses come 15 minutes later so they don't have to pay for the extra playground duty-people.
I love Late Start Wednesdays. School starts so late already that I never have to wake up my kids. So on Late Start days we get so much done before school. Both Tyler and Emmy get through their piano lessons, and can work on their spelling.
Tyler has the same spelling homework every week. On Wednesdays his assignment is to have his spelling list in one room and his paper in another. He looks at his list, starts with the first word, and spells it outloud while he walks to his paper and then writes it down. Logan has caught onto what he's doing and every Wednesday morning Tyler walks through the house spelling words outloud with Logan a step behind him yelling E I E I E I E I (I'm guessing from Old McDonald). Another reason to look forward to Wednesdays.

Second Grade Spelling

Today Emmy came home with the homework assignment of having to write a sentence for each of her spelling words. She decided that each of her sentences would be about apples. Here they are:

I studied about apples.
I hurried to pick apples.
I cried when there was a worm in my apple.
I worried about my apples.
People gave me apples when I got married.
(This was orignally: I married apples. I intervened.)
I carried my apples everywhere.
"I love my apples" I replied.
I tried to get my apples from the tree.
I copied my neighbor picking apples.
I fried my apples so they would be good.

I thought they were hilarious!

Mama

Tonight Derek is out with Tyler and Logan at our ward's Fathers and Sons. I love Fathers & Sons, and not because I get a break from the boys in the family. But because I love to have time with my girls. We planned a girl night - eating out, going to a park, and watching the latest Barbie movie.

When we were at the restaurant the waitress kept calling me 'Mama' - "Mama, can I refill your water? Mama, did you save room for dessert?" All night she called me Mama. Emmy said, "How does she know you're a mom? Is it becuase of me and Bailey?" Yes, it's because of you and Bailey. I hope everyone knows I'm a mama. I was proud to be called 'Mama' - even if by some stranger waitress.

7 Years Down the Road . . .

The rule in our family is that you have to be 12 to get your ears pierced. My girls talk about getting their ears pierced quite frequently - planning what kind of earrings they'll get, if it'll hurt, etc. But lately Emmy has been telling Bay that she'll wait until she's 14 so she and Bay get their ears pierced together when Bay's 12. That puts this 7 years from now.
So this week the girls come to me with a plan: they're going to get their ears pierced the same day and then they wanted to know if we could go out to lunch afterwards. 'Sure' I say, you got it. Then they say, 'can we go to Wendy's?' (I know, dare to dream girls). Again 'sure' from me. Then they say, 'I hope it has a playland!'
We'll see if 7 years changes things.

Family Laws

I just got home from Education Week in Rexburg. I got to go with my 3 sis's-in-law. We had a blast staying in an off-campus apartment and having some mom-time.
One of the classes I went to talked about having Family Laws. She told us that you need to have the kids help come up with laws and consequences so they buy into the laws. So the kids and I had a family meeting where I wrote down on all their rules they wanted for our family. There were some goodies:
No tattling
No arguing
Include everyone
Don't slam doors
Shut outside doors
"No" means "No"
Clean up after yourself
No jumping on others
No pouting
No screaming
Don't climb on couches
No blaming others
No hitting
Take turns
Share
No lying
No running over people with your bike
No food on the carpet
No whining
No punching
No choking people
Don't make others do what you want
No kicking
No pinching
No breaking stuff
Be tough about little things
No bragging
Don't put 2 things in the oven at once
No name calling
No pushing
Don't shoot anyone with your BB gun
Don't throw the exercise ball at others
Don't feel sorry for yourself
No touching others

I thought there were some solid new rules for our fam! Just in case you're wondering what we're going to do with 30+ rules, we put them all into 4 different categories so we now have 4 family laws, which covers everything - even shooting others with our BB guns.

Pine Wood Derby

The Pine Wood Derby

a.k.a. Night of Horrors

Last night was our first Pine Wood Derby. Tyler and Derek had picked out a model to make online, and then went to a friend's house who helped Tyler cut it out with his saw. Tyler sanded it, painted it, added a Batman tattoo, added wheels, and soon we had the coolest Batmobile in town. Not only was last night the Pine Wood Derby, it was also the night Tyler was going to get his Wolf Badge. This was a night I was really looking forward to. My parents came to cheer on Tyler.

The night had excitement . . . the night had promise . . . the night had some problems.

Now Derek and I are not the handiest when it comes to tools - and car making might be at the limit of our handy skills, so on the way there we really had one goal - just not to be embarrassed. We didn't need to win, we just needed to not be embarrassed. That was the whole goal of the night.

So we get to the church for the official weigh-in. Our car was too light so Derek added some weights to it. He taped the weights onto the bottom of the car with electrical tape, got it exactly 5 ounces and we were off to the races!

The gym was divided in half - for spectators and racers. To get into the 'pit' you had to have a 'pit pass' that all of the boys wore quite proudly. The races started and Derek said to me that he was worried that with the weights on the bottom he hoped Tyler's car wouldn't get high-centered down the track. "Oh that won't happen" I assured him.

Then they called Tyler's name - Derek and I were on the edge of our seats - with one goal in mind: don't get embarrassed. Off they go . . . and then his stops . . . half way down the track. The race-director-man declares a need for a pit stop so Derek can move the weights to the top of the car. So Derek goes off (calling himself Guido from Cars) to fix our Batmobile. Now the race has to stop and wait for our car because the race-director-man's brackets are on his computer and he can't skip Tyler and then come back to him. Well Derek thinks they're going on with more races, so he takes his time . . . his sweet time . . . his 'take all the time you want' time to fix the car. And the rest of us are just waiting for him to come back. The race-director-man starts telling jokes to fill this time. People start wondering what Derek is doing to this car. People start wondering where Derek went to fix this car.

Finally Derek comes back and the race is back on. Tyler puts his car back up on top and off they go . . . and Tyler wins (fastest time thus far too). So we won one heat - which wasn't even the goal, but we had lots of embarrassment which was the goal (so not really a victory). Then Tyler went on to win a few more heats - making our initial embarrassment lessen. We get through the whole race and Tyler ends up taking 5th - way better than we ever thought we'd do. Unfortunately, the story doesn't end here.

So the race is over and while they're letting siblings race their cars and getting ready for the awards I was standing at the back of the gym holding Bay. She had fallen asleep at home taking a really late nap, and when we went to Pack Night we had to wake her up and she never fully woke up. Through the races she was really clingy and kept trying to fall back asleep. So I'm standing at the back of the gym holding her, when all of the sudden - and I don't know if I heard it first or felt it first - but Bay starts throwing up . . .gallons. Gallons and gallons. It's everywhere - in her hair, in my hair, our shoes, and all over the floor. We're just soaked in the stuff. And I become a deer in the headlights. I don't even know what to do or where to start. As I'm standing there, horrified beyond belief, I just hear moms telling their kids not to get in it! While I'm still standing there petrified a few friends and Derek start bringing me paper towels - they're wiping me down, their trying to mop up this giant mess - and a few paper towels are not going cut it. So we're doing our best to clean up and in walks our friend with the giant mop and bucket (you know the one you never want to have anything to do with). So Bay and I head out to the car - where another friend gives me a gallon ziplock bag so I can strip Bay down. And we just wait for the rest of our family to come out. While I'm dealing with Bay, Tyler gets his Wolf and I miss it -though Derek did want Tyler to pin the 'mom's pin' right on me and my puke shirt! Derek gets Tyler a ride home with someone else so we can go home and end the horrification.

Poor Bay was really sick - after I scrubbed her to death - she climbed right in bed and went back to sleep.

The whole thing couldn't have been more embarrassing - and that was the whole goal of our family!

Notes to self for next year's Pine Wood Derby:

• Use electrical tape to add weights
• Tape weights on top of car
• Don't throw up

*Think this might win for longest post ever?*

Eenie Meenie

Both my girls are obsessed with doing 'eenie meenie minie mo' to decide between anything. They do it to decide who puts them to bed, what shoes they're going to wear, and how their hair is done. But Bay's Miley Cyrus twist cracks me up every time: "Eenie meenie minie mo, country-fi it, hip hop it, and my mother says that you are not it".
And here's a compltely random side note: since this week is Teacher Appreciation week, all of the kids in Tyler's class had to write a thank you to their teacher. I just got done assembling them into a book. Here are my two favorite (thankfully neither were from Tyler): 'You are stern, but fabulous.' and 'I like Mrs. B. she eats chocolate.' Kids are too funny.

First Grade Pen Pals

These are two letters from Emmy and her pen pal Jadan, who goes to a different school. Spelling and punctutation have been left alone.

Dear Emily,
my hair is blond to. I have the wii do yuo. I like you. My favorite color is pink! my favorte shape is harts What is yuor favorite shape. do you have a dog I do it's name is Magee! do you have a fish I do!
Love, Jadan

to Jadan,
I do not have a dog. Happy St. Patricks day. when is your birthday? Do you like Hershey Bars? Did you ever loos a tooth. I like pink to. I like you. Do you like the moon?
love, Emily

Church Comparisions

The Setting: Sacrament Meeting, during the sacrament

Bailey: Ya know what would be good, if we could have 2 breads and 2 waters.

Me: Yeah, that'd be good. Ssshhhh . . .

Bailey: Cool churches give you 2. But we don't go to a cool church.

Division Obsession

Tyler has a serious obsession with division right now. He had to pass of his division facts through 12's in school and the boy can't stop. He looks for division problems everywhere. His favorite place is a digital clock. He'll see the time is 7:28 and that's a math problem to him. He'll tell me the answer '4'. That's all he says, '4'. But if I don't look at the clock, see it's 7:28, acknowledge that the answer is 4, he keeps saying '4' , louder and louder, because he has to get me to see it before it turns 7:29! He tells me no less than 30 'answers' a day from the clock. Some times I'll see him just watching the clock if he knows it's about to be a math problem - like 5:14 - he'll just sit and watch it until it turns 5:15 so he can tell me '3'. Derek has now joined in and tries to beat Tyler to yelling out the answer - but you can't beat Tyler. He doesn't miss one. It was getting a little out of control so we've had to set some rules:
1 - he has to stop at 8:56 (7) at night. Every night Derek and I are happy to hear '7' come out of his room because we know that's the last one of the night.
2 - he can only tell me the answer twice. If I don't acknowledge after twice, he has to let it go.

We were driving through our neighborhood the other day and he saw an address that was a division problem - that's his next source of math problems. I'm all about loving math . . . but this is a little much!

Come, Come, Ye Youth

This year our ward's youth is doing a pioneer trek. This is replacing our Girl's Camp and the boys' High Adventure. When I got called to Young Women's last summer I was told that this year we were doing trek - this was the best part of being called to YW. I have always wanted to go on a trek and now I get to with the girls I've been working with for a year. I can't wait for trek. It's going to be 4 days and 17 miles through nothing but desert but I think it sounds awesome.
I really wanted to go, but Derek also is in YM so he really wanted to go too. So we've persuaded people to take our kids for the 4 days we'll be gone. So now that we've got them squared away Derek and I are set to go. Since we're both going we volunteered to be a Ma and Pa. We'll have 6-8 kids in our family to pull our handcart (Derek wants the Ma's and Pa's to get together and hold a draft to pick the kids - I don't see that happening). Everyone gets a 5 gallon bucket, and 17 pounds to bring with them what they want.
Everyone has to be in full Pioneer attire - no jeans, no ball caps, completely authentic (down to the bloomers). Everyone is responsible for their own clothes - buy it, sew it, borrow it - just get it. So today I went to the fabric store and picked up my fabric for my skirts and apron (I'm buying the bonnet off eBay - I hear they're tricky to make - and I'm trying to keep this authentic right?
So now me and my electric sewing machine can really start feeling like pioneers!

It's Not Just Me . . .

Today I noticed that my daffodills are poking up out of the ground. They're about 3 inches high. Nothing gives me more joy than my spring daffodills telling me winter is on it's way out. Coming up in January makes me think it must not just be me who's got spring fever.

A Fish Tale

A few weeks ago I needed to clean out our fish tank. So I moved the fish into Temporary Housing (a.k.a. a bowl on the kitchen counter). I cleaned out the tank, filled it with clean water, and left it on the counter so it could get to room temperature before I moved our fish back in.

Much later . . . Logan woke up from his nap and I put him in his high chair for a snack. His high chair, unfortunately, is right next to the counter where our 3 little fish were hanging out in their Temporary Housing unit.

Not giving my homeless fish a thought, I went upstairs to talk to Derek for a few minutes. All of the sudden Emmy comes running up the stairs yelling, "The fish! The fish! Logan got the fish!" Instantly I know what she's talking about - Logan in his high chair, perched next to the counter with the bowl, pulled it over for a closer look - dumping out the fish. I start yelling at Derek telling him he's got to save the fish (Derek has no idea what I'm talking about - but there isn't time to explain). So we all run downstairs and find exactly what I'm afraid of - the bowl, water, fish all on the floor. I fill up the bowl as fast as I can with new water and am yelling at Derek to pick up the fish. At this point the little guys aren't flopping around anymore - they're just lying there still, with their big eye staring at us. Derek's trying to scoop them up with the net and I'm yelling that their isn't time for the net - just grab the little guys with your fingers! He's yelling at me that if he touches the fish their fishy oils will rub off and they'll die - all the while, we're getting stared at by their big eyes! Derek finally scoops up 2 and gets them in water - then we realize we can't find the third fish. We're looking frantically for him when I have the horrible thought to look on Logan's high chair tray - yep . . . one still fish just lying there. Derek scooped him up and we took a collective sigh as all three fish are back in water - and miraculously are swimming around.

We're all starting to calm down when Emmy says, "I'm so glad my fish already died so he didn't have to go through that!". Even though that third fish didn't have the fall from the counter to the floor we're pretty sure he got the worst end of it being within poking distance from Logan. Amazingly enough . . . all three fish are all still alive, I don't know how. We now call Logan "Darla" from Finding Nemo. Now there's a fish tale!

Chappy

Emmy came home from school yesterday saying her lips were really dry. She demanded requested politely that I give her chapstick to take to school. Then she tells me that her teacher said she could bring some chapstick and keep it in her pocket. Then she tells me that she went to the school nurse for her overly dry lips.

. . . the nurse . . . over dry lips

Yes, you can call her Napolean.

Money Bags Bay

Last week at church our ward's financial clerk gave Derek the tithing statements for our family. He told Derek he'd need to look over them because he was wondering if there was a mistake on one of them. When we got home we opened the envelope wondering what kind of mistake could have been made. It didn't take us long after looking at ours, Tyler's, Emily's and Logan's to realize that something was definitely odd about Bailey's. Apparently in 2009 she paid $2,000 in tithing - in several different payments. We laughed all week thinking about how Bailey's making such an income - all in secret - and definitely against child labor laws.
So today we went to tithing settlement and I explained to our Bishop that there was mistake - Bailey hasn't cleared $20,000 this year. He just laughed and laughed and kept telling Bailey "Way to go Bailey!". She'd just smile at him and say, "thanks". It was hilarious. If you need a loan, I know a girl . . .
Just as a p.s. - I just found Logan hitting our decorated Christmas tree with a Fat Bat. When I took that away, he quickly picked up a basketball a chucked it at the tree. And people tell me we should add a dog to this circus!

How Happy Would you Be . . .

This happened months ago, and I'm still laughing - must be post-worthy!

The background info needed for this post is that my brother Robb has a dog named Rusty.

My parents were tending the kids while Derek and I went out. When we stopped by to pick up the kids my dad told me that Emmy had asked him a question he couldn't quite answer. Knowing Grandpa can answer any question my kids have, I was intrigued. Here's the stumping question:

How happy would you be if Rusty was your dog?

Bad for Everyone

Today's conversation with Bay:

Bay: What are we going to do now?

Me: We're going to dust.

Bay: I don't like to dust.

Me: Me either.

Bay: Dusting's not good for everyone.

Me: What is good for you?

Bay: Church. Church and peanut butter.

Now I'm off to dust - even though it's not good for anyone.

Skeleton Sentences

Emmy came home from school with this today. I don't know what I like more - what she said or how she spelled it!

Skeletons

by Emily

translations below each line

Skeletons are ckreeppee.

Skeletons are creepy.

Skeletons are nis.

Skeletons are nice.

Skeletons are wite.

Skeletons are white.

Skeletons cant wock.

Skeletons can't walk.

Skeletons are in yoor botee.

Skeletons are in your body.

Skeletons are skaree.

Skeletons are scary.

Skeletons plteck yoor botee.

Skeletons protect your body.

I licke my skeleton.

I like my skeleton.

Evre in the wrld hass a skeleton.

Everyone in the world has a skeleton.

First Day of School

I'm thinking a better name for my blog would be "Better Late than Never" because that's certainly how I operate! I know it's October, but I'm finally getting around to posting first day of school pictures. I can't believe I have two kids who are gone all day - Tyler in 3rd and Emmy in 1st. They get on the bus together, are gone all day, and come home together.
We got great teachers this year and everyone has settled in and is loving school. Tyler still eats hot lunch most days, and Emmy is mostly a cold lunch eater. They play together on the playground - with Emmy's friends chasing Tyler's friends.
The biggest change has been for Bailey. Poor Bay has lost her best friend - she just doesn't know what to do without Emmy. And Logan isn't cutting it in the friend department. She follows me around the house all day asking if she can go to a friend's house. We have the discussion that you can't invite yourself to someone else's house every day! So we have friends over all the time, we go to story time at the library every week, and she's in dance, but it's not enough to fill her social calendar. I have a feeling Bailey will be more than ready to start school!
On a side note, I've noticed that Emmy is transitioning into an Emily. She's writing Emily on all of her papers - whereas in kindergarten it was always Emmy. She wanted her teacher to call her Emily. "Emmy" has been my favorite - I'm starting to get sad thinking she could be done being Emmy.

Weekend in Utah

We just came back from such a fun trip to Utah. It was my Grandma's 93rd birthday Saturday - so the family threw her a big surprise party. Derek and I left Friday afternoon and drove to Allyson's house in Logan. It is always so fun to stay there - she is the ultimate host. Everything's there waiting for you even before you think to ask for it - including made beds for all 6 of us - yes, Paul had set up the pack and play for Logan complete with baby blankets. The kids had the best time playing with cousins. We never heard a complaint from anyone - they were all having such a wonderful time with each other.
Saturday morning we drove from Logan to Lehi and took the kids to Cornbellys Maze at Thanksgiving Point. This is the funnest fall place to be. They had so many activities for the kids to do: a mountain of slides, jumping pillows, mazes, cow trains, hay rides, 3D haunted houses, pig races (with actual pigs of course - Bailey even got picked to be an assistant!), and tons of other things. You could play there all day with your kids. If we lived in SLC that would be definitely be a tradition for our family.
Then late that afternoon we were off to the party. It was at my aunt's house in Lehi and she had a house full! It was fun to be there to celebrate my grandma's birthday with her. My kids sure haven't grown up with her so it was neat that we could be there for this. It was fun to see all my cousins that I don't see as much I'd like to. It was such a fun night with dinner, cake, and games. My kids came home with more prizes than they get at Christmas! I'm really glad we could make it to her big day.
Afterwards we went to Orem to spend the night at my other grandma's house. It was also great to spend time with her. I just love seeing my kids get to know their great-grandmas better. It was certainly a busy weekend - and we crammed in as much as we could - but it was wonderful.

Newest Member of the Loser Club

Emmy is the newest member of the Loser Club (lost teeth, of course!). She's had her first wiggly tooth for the past week and every day it was getting more and more wiggly. She loved showing everyone how loose it was and giving everyone updates. Then last night during FHE she turned to Derek and said, "pull my tooth out". He reached over and had it out in 2 seconds. She was grinning from ear to ear! She's showed us all the whole in her smile a thousand times already.

She was so excited to have the tooth fairy come to her room in the night. Not everyone shared her excitement though. Bailey was very nervous about sleeping in the same room that some magical fairy stranger was coming. So Bay had to go to sleep in our bed and I couldn't move her into hers' until that scary fairy was gone!

I woke up this morning to Emmy right in my face saying, "She came! She came!". She was so thrilled with the treasures the tooth fairy left her. She's already on the prowl for her next wiggly tooth.

Bad Dream for Bay

A few nights ago Bailey woke up in the night and I put her back to bed. The next morning I inquired of her why we were up:

Me. Bay, why were we up in the night?

Bay: Because I had a bad dream.

Me: What was it?

Bay: I had a dream I was wobbly.

Me: Wobbly?

Bay: Yeah, I was wobbly.

Me: What's wobbly?

This part cannot be transcribed but let me tell you the girl started

shaking like she was having a seizure. Wobbly indeed.

Look Out Mia Maids!

Ok, this post is really old - this news actually is 2 months old - but if the old adage holds true, better late than never.
I got called to be the Enrichment leader in the end of February. I did one Enrichment - couponing - and quickly got released in June. It certainly made me wonder how bad that Enrichment was - - - I'm going with really bad. I mean, to be released after one?! Not even a chance to redeem myself! Yikes. But released I was . . . and Derek loves to point out that my Enrichment legacy is couponing. Yes I'm cheap, but I don't need the ward to know it. And I was loving Enrichment - loving going to Relief Society, loving not having to worry about getting a sub for Sunday, - Enrichment is a good place to be.
Maybe the Mia Maids in my ward have a spending problem because I got called to be the Mia Maids advisor. I've never been in YW before. I've always felt I am too selfish to be in YW - Sundays and Wednesdays seem like a big time commitment. I like to be with my family at night. And it's just not Sundays and Wednesdays - it's birthdays, girls camp, firesides, fund raisers and all the rest. YW is a big calling - and I wasn't sure I'd love it. Everyone I know who's been in YW loves it - they cry when they get released and beg to get back in. I wasn't sure I'd be that kind of leader.
But I have found out in 2 months why they love it - it is the funnest place to be in the ward. Hands down -it's the funnest. The girls themselves are so fun - and they can make any activity fun. I love hearing about school registration, sports, and all the rest of their activities. It turns out YW is a good place to be too.

Tyler's Baptism

Tyler got baptized August 1st. What a day that is, to have your kid be baptized! I'd felt the pressure of having him be baptized all summer. All of our FHE's have been focused on baptism. I want Tyler to really understand what it means, what he's promising, and that ultimately it's his choice. I was so proud of him to choose to be baptized. We had a wonderful day.
We waited until August so Derek's parents, who are on a mission in California, could be there. They got a 2 week vacation at the end of July and got to stay to see Tyler be baptized.
We had so much family come - it was wonderful and very supportive. We had all 4 grandparents, my 3 siblings and their families, 2 of Derek's siblings and their families, and one of Derek's aunts from Eastern Idaho. Surely Tyler felt very loved.
I had dinner at my house before and then we all headed to the church. They'd asked me to speak at the baptism - and I had no problem staying under my 5 minutes! I had worried that with a stake baptism we could be there all night waiting for Tyler's turn for the font. There were 7 kids being baptized that night and we lucked out that Tyler got to be second - we were all loving it when they called his name!
Derek baptized him and then afterwards he was confirmed at the church in our own room. Tyler had 10 men in the circle - such a showing of love and support.
Afterwards we had our family and friends come over for dessert. It was so fun to be celebrating Tyler's decision to be baptized.

Derek's Family Reunion

At the end of July we went to Derek's family reunion. This was so fun because we got to see Derek's parents (who got a 2 week vacation from their mission! YEAH!!), and also Derek's sister and her cute family who live in Dallas. It was fun to spend a weekend with lots of family we don't see often enough.
Derek's sister organized everything and she had so much planned: frisbee golf, tie dying shirts, pin trading, letter boxing, and games. She organized all the food for 24 people - what a job that must have been! We had a great time spending time with everyone.
My kids just loved spending all the time with Grandma, Grandpa, and cousins.

Redfish Lake

In January Derek and I (more Derek than I) decided we wanted to take the kids camping. We talked Derek's sister and her family into joining us and we booked a weekend at Refish Lake. In January it seemed like a great idea, in July it seemed like a lot of work! We spent 2 nights there and had a great time. I'm so glad Angey came - it was way more fun with cousins!
We left in the afternoon and had a long drive there. We were packed to the rafters! We took out one seat in our van for more room and I still had to have firewood at my feet for the whole drive (and having stuff at my feet in a car is a huge pet peeve of mine)! To add to our insanity we took Derek, Tyler, and Emmy's bikes - which started falling off the bike rack halfway there!
We got to the campground and set up our tent and had dinner. The kids just had a great time running around, picking up sticks, and throwing rocks in the lake. The next day we went to their Junior Rangers program which was excellent. They learned all about the native animals of the area. We hiked, played in the lake, geocached, cooked s'mores, and made ice cream. The kids loved every minute.
Everyone's favorite moment was when Derek was taking things out of our van and a chipmunk jumped in. The chipmunk would hop in and out, in and out, and I kept trying to get a picture of him in our van. He finally left and I never got my picture so I shut the van door. Then, here he comes again. He jumps right into the van - completly bodyslamming himself!
Taking the bikes was really fun - this is where Emmy mastered her 2 wheeler and now she's an expert at it. Tyler and Derek would go for rides and loved it.
The kids had such a great time - it was worth packing the food, cooking outside, outhouses, bugs, and putting up with all the dirt. We had a great trip.

Tyler's Birthday

Yes, Tyler's birthday was in June. Yes, his friend party was in July. Yes, his baptism was in August. Yes, I'm blogging about it now. Yes, his birthday has taken up my summer! Nevertheless, here it is:
Turning 8 is quite the big deal - so we tried to make it lots of fun. Since he was turning 8, it was time to jump into Scouts. So for his birthday we gave him the shirt, patches, and book that he needs. He opened it and said, "huh, a Scout suit", and promptly chucked it aside! That night we had tons of cousins over for his campfire birthday cake. The funniest part of the night was when he opened presents and 3 of his aunts gave him Bionicles. They were all different colors so it worked out perfectly (2 of his aunts also gave him Reese's Peanut Butter cups - how coincidental is that?!). We had a great time celebrating his birthday.
Three weeks later (yes, 3 weeks - I'm not proud of that!) we had his friend party. He had a Batman party and we had lots games and relays. I'd filled lots of water balloons and it turned into quite a water fight - I completely lost control when the 8 boys went for the hose! I sent home very wet, very happy boys. It was lots of fun.

Childhood Dreams

Many children dream of one day being something amazing . . .

. . . an astronaut

. . . a policeman

. . . the president

. . . a doctor

. . . something impressive.

Tyler and Emmy have their own dream . . . to have a video of them on America's Funniest Home Videos.

My kids . . . the dreamers.

And just to show their dedication to their dreams, they practice falling off of everything possible and begging me to get out the video camera. That would just be such a accomplishment, wouldn't it?

Dare to dream kids.

The Funny Side of Bay

Bailey is such a crack up -here are two of my favs.

The other day she was sitting at the barstool waiting for me to make her lunch. I handed it to her, and started to make my lunch. When I was finished I was headed for the table and she said, "Mom, sit by me" - I have the thought that it won't be long until she doesnt want me to sit by her so I should take advantage of this sweet moment . . . but I'm also thinking that barstools don't have backs . . .feeling torn . . . but sentiment wins out and I sit next to her. We're both on our barstools, lunch in front of us, and now she says, "Now rub my back." Sentiment met its match that day!

Last night we were having family prayers and it was Bay's turn to pray. In her hand was a set of those colored, plastic, keys babies play with. Here's her prayer: "Father bless the day (every prayer starts that way). Help us not to hit Tyler with the keys that I am holding in my hands above my head. Amen" I guess she must have been fighting off some pretty strong temptation and praying for strength to resist - at least that's what I'll tell myself!

Ironman Conquered!

WARNING: SERIOUS DEREK GUSHING!

This last weekend Derek completed the Ironman 70.3 triathalon. This is a major accomplishment - all in all, he swam 1.2 miles, rode his bike 56 miles, and ran 13.1 miles - for a total of 70.3 miles.
He has trained like crazy for months - he registered clear back in December and knew there was no turning back. He's done several tri's before but never anything this huge. But come race day, he was totally prepared.
What was so awesome about this race was the big time-ness of this. The current world champ of Ironman 70.3 was there defending his title - and Derek was in the race with him! It was just huge - and he wasn't a spectator, he was a participant. There are only 33 of these races in the world - and Derek did it. It was amazing to be part of.
The night before we took his bike to Lucky Peak to drop it off. They had security everywhere watching the bikes throughout the night, and rows and rows of bike racks. Reality started to set in on what he'd signed up for!
The race started at 2:00, quite unusal for a race, so Derek got to Lucky Peak about 11:30 to have enough time to get his swim and bike things all ready. We have a friend in our ward who also did the race, so his wife and I went to the swim together to watch. We got there early enough to see the 1500 athletes getting everything ready for this giant race. For the swim they had lots of different waves starting 5 minutes apart. The pros went first and then they went through by age groups. Each wave had a different color swim cap given to them. Derek was in the red wave. It was awesome to see the waves start and after swimming more than a mile see them come in all intermingled. We were able to see our husbands get out of the water, rip off their wetsuits and swim gear, put on all their bike gear, and take off for a 3 hour bike ride. After they left, Alison and I headed home to pick up our kids for the finish line.
My mom tended my kids so that I could be there to cheer on Derek - she's such a cheerleader she couldn't stand the thought of no one being there cheering for him. So she took over our typical Saturday schedule - which is baseball, baseball, and more baseball! She drug all the gear to Emmy's game, took kids to the park, McDonalds for dinner, and fit in a nap for Logan. Without her I wouldn't have been able to watch Derek swim. Thanks mom!
On the bike it sprinkled, but it rained through the entire run. Derek thought he would for sure walk some of the 13 miles - but he felt so good he ran the entire thing.
My parents came me with me and the kids to watch the finish line. This was so awesome to see these people finishing something so grueling. There were so many people finishing you would never look at and think they could do something like this. The announcer said, "Determination comes in all shapes and ages." - and he was right. These people were so inspiring!
Derek had hoped to come in around 7.5 hours - but after seeing how great he'd done on the swim I knew he would be ahead of his goal. We waited in the rain for him to come across the line and right after 6 hours - here he came! He looked so great as he finished this race - with his official time being 6 hours, 19 minutes.
He really deserves to have had such a great race - he's trained so hard and for so long - and in the process, he's lost 50 pounds (fifty!). It's just amazing how much his determination paid off. It was an awesome experience.

Wonder of Wonder . . .

. . . Miracles of Miracles!

You won't believe it, but I'm here to tell you it's true: Logan walks! I know, I know, it's truly unbelievable - but true nonetheless. The kid walks!

All of my kids have been super slow walkers, so the bar for Logan was already set really low - but he hit a new record. Tyler was my fastest walker at 15 months (yes, fastest!), Emmy was 17 months, Bay was 18 months (started walking the week she started nursery - I think it was because she was scared of going in there as a crawler), but Logan felt no pressure and felt no fear about going into nursery crawling - he just crawled right in.

So we didn't know when that kid would start walking, 2, maybe 3 years old . . . he'd already let us know this was going to be his decision. Then a few weeks ago he finally started showing some intrest in walking, and would go between people. A week later he would walk between furniture without being prompted, then last week he realized walking is better than crawling! Now he wants to walk all the time. He certainly struggles in grass or bark, and he's still mastering standing up without holding onto something - but he is now convinced all of the people around him walking are onto something!

I'd forgotten how fun it is to have a new walker in the house. It is so fun to see him just walk around as his entertainment - he just walks around because he can. He doesn't want to be held nearly as much either. It is so cute to see him walk a little unbalanced, but stay upright. It's so fun to hear him coming around the corner and expect to see him crawling and he surprises me by walking.

I don't know what finally convinced him about walking - it wasn't social pressure or fear from nursery! Maybe it was my threats that crawlers can't go to the water park or camping! Whatever it was - it's a wonder of wonder, miracle of miracles at our house!

Phillies in the House!

Tyler and Emmy have both started baseball - Tyler is playing U9 and Emmy is playing U7 and coincidentally they both got put on the Phillies team. Makes it easy for us to remember who to cheer for. Tyler's level is now playing where they both get 6 coach pitches and if they don't hit it, they're out. They also play that 3 outs or the entire batting order ends the inning. Emmy gets 3 coach pitches and then they hit off the tee if they need to. Emmy doesn't have outs - just once through the batting order. They both play 3 innings or an hour - whichever comes first.
My friend, Kim, and I signed up our girls to play and we decided that if we volunteered to coach we'd get to pick when and where practice is. Deciding that control was worth it, (and having Kim talk me into it!) we agreed to coach - the first time for both of us. So Kim and I are the Phillies coaches. We don't know much about coaching - but we got a few things figured out fast: one of the dads offered to haul their equipment to every practice and game - yep, we'll take that; another dad offered to pitch at the games and practices - yep, we'll take that too. So as coaches, we're really good at delegating, and isn't that what makes good leaders anyways? :)

Go Phillies!

Our First Piano Recital

We had our first piano recital a few weeks ago. Tyler just started piano lessons in March so I was surprised we had a recital so quickly. His teacher picked the theme Movie Music Mania so all of the kids played songs from movies or TV shows. For the program she had the kids listed in the order they would play but not the songs they would play. All of the songs were listed on the other side in random order and the parents had to match the kid to the songs they played. I thought it was an ardoable idea. There were cute songs played - High School Musical, Star Wars, and lots of Disney songs.
Tyler played 2 songs - Mickey Mouse March and Winnie the Pooh. He did a great job and had both memorized. For Winnie his teacher asked me to play the duet part with him. I thought other parents or his teacher would be playing duets to other songs, but nope, we were the only duet. It was my first piano recital in 15 years! It was fun to play with Tyler, even though he was disappointed that I didn't have my part memorized.
Tate and Angey were in town so they came to hear him, along with my dad. It was great to have such a fun night celebrating Tyler's new interest.

School's Out for Summer!

Today was our last day of school! I love summer: I love having my kids home, I love slow paced mornings, I love not worrying about bedtimes, I love being outside - I love it all. It just seems right to have my kids home - call it a control issue, but I like knowing where they are, and what they're doing. It just feels like my world is right when my kids are home.
For the last day of school our school always has a family picnic the last 2 hours and then you can take your kids home whenever you're ready. I didn't drag the picnic this year - dragging kids was enough dragging for me. So I just went, we said good-bye to teachers, and we came home.
This afternoon we went to an End of the Year party at my friend's house who has a pool. She invited everyone to come and and swim. It was so fun - kids swam and moms chatted. Yes, I only had 2 swimmers with Bay in a cast and Logan but 2 in the water is enough to worry about! I bet there were 40 kids there and the pool wasn't crowded at all. It was so fun to end the school year. (In fact, Emmy is still there because she wasn't ready to come home and Logan was!)
Tyler and Emmy have both had good years and done great. Tyler's teacher sent him home with the cutest thing - she gave all the kids a postcard with her address on the front. On the back is a place to write the title and author's name of 8 books. When they've filled this all out for books they read over the summer, they can mail it to her and then sometime in the summer she's going to have an ice cream party at the school for all the kids who've sent in their postcards. Isn't that the cutest? I love our school - they do so many extra things like this.

Winning the Kindergarten Lottery

Emmy just won the kindergarten lottery. We're talking so excited we've talked about it for a week. The big prize won . . . dinner at McDonald's with her teacher. Funny eh? Her teacher told her kids that the first person to pass off 40 books would get to go to McDonald's with her for dinner. And get to bring a friend. Could it get any better?!
So the day Emmy passed off her last book her teacher told her that she would get to go to McDonald's with her. Emmy looked up at her and asked with all the sincerity a 6 year old can have and asked "Will you take care of me there?" (The teacher thought it was so funny she called to tell me!). So we booked a night where Emmy and friend would meet the teacher, and the other kindergarten teacher at the school was also meeting 2 students, at McDonald's.
When I first asked Emmy who she wanted to take with her she said she wanted Logan to go with her. Sorry babe, Logan can't go to McDonald's with you teacher. Then she wanted Bailey, again sorry.
So the anticipated day came last Tuesday and Derek dropped them off - all smiles. Then an hour later I picked them up - Happy Meals and ice cream cones in hand. I picked them up in the Play Land part and I was holding 2 unfinished Happy Meals, trying to get the girls to follow me, and was backing out the exit door . . . or so I think. All of the sudden the alarm goes off, nearly deafening everyone in the restaurant ( . . . cringe . . . ). I totally missed the giant STOP sign on the door warning you that this is an emergency exit door only. The manager had to come over and use his little key to turn it off - all the while Emmy's teacher trying to explain to him why I missed the giant sign.
Then on the way home I told Emmy how nice it was of her teacher to buy her an ice cream cone, to which Emmy says, "Well I asked her for it" ( . . . big cringe . . . ), "Emmy," I say, "you can't ask your teacher for dessert!" "I said 'please'" was all the explanation needed for her. Despite my embarrassing moments, Emmy had a fab time!

Gratitude Attitude

This weekend for Memorial Day we went to my parent's cabin. We had a great time with my parents, and Robb and Catherine. We rode 4-wheelers, had a campfire and made s'mores and played outside enjoying a beautiful long weekend. As we were leaving I said to Tyler, "Go tell Grandma and Grandpa thank you and then get in the car." He obediently went up to my mom and said, "My mom said I'm supposed to thank you but I don't know what for." There's a gratitude attitude for you!

I know . . . it's amazing!

It's amazing I'm posting pictures! I haven't done it since Christmas. Perfectly understandable reason: for Christmas we got a new camera and I didn't know how upload my pictures. So I've just been taking pictures like crazy, never knowing if they're ever going to be seen again. But today is the day - the pictures are off the camera!
These are just a bunch of random pictures that I've taken over the last 5 months: Emmy's birthday - her first friend birthday party, Easter, Derek and my last couple of races - he did the Robie Creek half marathon and I did the 5K Race for the Cure and the 10K Great Potato, Emmy's kindergarten program, including one with her saying in the microphone her part, "We are definitely ready for first grade!", and of course Bay's broken arm. Enjoy our last 5 months in a minute or less!

20 Questions

Today Derek and his friend went on a long bike ride (Derek's doing a half-Ironman triathlon in a few weeks so he logs lots of miles!) - they rode for 30 miles and ended at a nice park, where my friend and I met them, with kids and a picnic. It was a beautiful day and we all had a great time. Since I was in the car with the kids for a long time (I can't complain because I was driving, not riding a bike!) we played 20 Questions the whole way there. Here was my favorite dialogue:

Me: Ok, I'm thinking of a person.
Tyler: Is it someone we're related to?
Me: Yes
Emmy: Is it Savannah? (our next door neighbor)
Me: No
Bay: Are we going on a picnic?
Me: Yes
Tyler: Is it a girl?
Me: Yes
Emmy: Is it a horse?
Me: No
Bay: Did we bring lawn chairs?
Me: Yes
Tyler: Do they live in Idaho?
Me: Yes
Emmy: speaking gibberish
Me: No
Bay: Do we live in the temple?
Me: No
Tyler: Do they live close to us?
Me: No
Emmy: -silence- she's quit at this point
Bay: Do we walk on the sidewalk?
Me: Yes
Tyler: Is it Paisley?
Me: No
Emmy: -silence-
Bay: -silence- also quit
Tyler: Is it Johnna?
Me: Yes

Envision that going on for 40 minutes and you've got our trip!

(are you secretely glad this post had nothing to do with casts?!)

Cast Recap

Bailey got her cast last Thursday. It goes from her wrist to her shoulder and is really purple. The doctor asked her if she was going to pick pink or pink, assuming that's what she'd go with, and all she could say is, "purple". For the first few days it seemed to hurt because it was so heavy and she'd ask me to put her sling on her. We're mostly done with her sling now as she's more used lugging it around. She only has to be in it for 4 weeks -amazing how fast little bones heal.
Usually the only upside to a broken bone is how much attention the kid gets - unfortunately Bay hates all of this extra attention. Any time someone asks her about her arm or tells her how cute her cast is, she buries herself into me as much as possible. She hates it so much that when I dropped her off in Primary Sunday I told her teacher to not mention her arm because it makes her so uncomfortable.
This morning she accidentally bumped herself in the forehead with her cast - which obviously hurt. She told me it hurt when she hit her head with her cast, I agreed with her, and then she whacked me in the head with it and said, "see, it hurts." So far we haven't had to have the "your cast is not a weapon" talk, but I sense it coming soon.

Sticks & Stones may break Bay's bones . . .

. . . and so will trampolines!

I'm sad to post our first broken bone story, but here goes.

Sunday night we had a big dinner for Mother's Day. We had my parents, Jen's family, and Robb's family over. It was such a fun night with cousins all over the place, celebrating Moms. Now keep in mind, we have a rule about no jumping on the tramp on Sundays. But . . . the cousins were there, it was a beautiful day, and it was Mother's Day (nice to send those kiddos out on Mother's Day right?) . . . and keep in mind, we've only had our tramp for a month, so it's still new and exciting . . . combine all those, and you get rules thrown out the window!!
The kids had jumped and had a great time with each other and the party was just about over . . . oh so close . . .
Then I see my dad bring Bailey in from the backyard. She wasn't wailing and screaming, but she was definitely hurt. Her arm hurt and she kept it really close to her and guarded. She didn't want anyone to touch it, or look at it. It was obvious something was really wrong, how wrong I didn't know. Afer 10 minutes and a lot of diagnosis on our part, we decided she definitely needed to go to the ER. Luckily my parents were there and offered to put the other kids to bed while Derek and I ran her in.
We got to the ER a little after 8:00 and got in a room pretty quickly. The nurse who came in first gave us a lot of hope - "It's probably just dislocated and we can pop it back in. She'll imediately feel better" he said. Perfect . . . that's what we want. Then the doctor came in, equally pessimistic as the nurse was optimistic. "She might need surgery. These kind of injuries need surgery all the time." he said. "No, we don't want that option." we said.
After nurses, waiting, doctor, waiting, x-rays, waiting, doctor, waiting, follow up, and waiting we got the news - she'd fractured her elbow. Luckily it wasn't near her growth plates and luckily we didn't need surgery. He put her in a splint and a sling and sent us home. We finally got home at 11:00.
She looks pretty sad in her sling - she's just too little to have her arm in a sling! She's been feeling pretty good, as long as pain medicine is on hand! It's so sad because it's her right arm - that means she needs help eating, going to the bathroom, getting on the barstool, getting off the barstool, getting off the couch, getting in bed, getting out of bed and coloring (I have to hold down the paper while she colors with her left hand).
She goes in tomorrow for her cast. She says she wants purple. She'll probably be in it for 6 weeks. I'm hoping she gets it off before swimming lessons start!
She has been pretty spoiled - Jen brought over DVDs, coloring books, crayons, cookies, and candy, Allyson mailed her stickers, nail polish, make-up, and candy, and she's had friends bring over treats. Maybe a broken arm's not so bad after all!

Happy Tag

I got tagged to do 8 things that make me happy (besides the obvious), so here goes:

SPRING: I absolutely love spring. I love the budding trees, the flowers everywhere, and the warm weather. I love that you can just walk outside and you don't need all the outside gear: coats, gloves, hats, or sunblock! It's the one time of year I'm not yelling at my kids to shut the door to the backyard. I love that my kids come home from school now and play outside. Everything is turning green, after looking at brown for a long time. Spring has sprung!

Miralax: Now this might be too much information for a lot of people, but I found Miralax a few weeks ago and Logan is loving it! He has had consitpation issues since he went to full time table food - and I have tried all I can think of. I've put things in his diet, I've taken things out of his diet, but no success. Enter Miralax - and we are loving it!

Couponing: I am not a serious couponer by a long ways, but I am getting into this world of craziness. To show my committment - I've just gotten my first newspaper subscription. Also, today I made $2.50 from getting an ink cartridge filled (want the details: refill is usually $10, I had a 50% off coupon, making it $5, and then they had a rebate for any refill for $7.50 - paying me $2.50 to fill my cartridge!). I have my favorite sites I follow that give me all deals and usually I'm willing to run out and get them! I can totally see how this can be addictive.

Swimming lessons: I have the perfect swimming lessons situation and I love it every year. I take my kids to a city pool where this year I'll have my oldest 3 in lessons. All 3 can be at the same time - see the wonderfulness of this? I'm there for 30 minutes and get all my kids done at once. To sweeten the deal - my sister puts her daughter in Emmy's class every year - so 4 kids in lessons at the same time, and my sister and I get 30 minutes every day to chat. To sweeten the deal even more - this pool charges half the price of any other lessons I've found. The couponer in me loves that!

Matching clothes for my kids: I love it when my kids match, and luckily for me I have a very generous sister-in-law who also loves her girls to match, and her girls are 2 years older than my girls! They get the cutest matching hand-me-downs and I love it. Tyler and Logan got their first matching item this week - I found them matching sandals and Tyler was so happy that he gets to match Logan.

Eating out: I don't know how much I love eating out or how much I hate cooking and cleaning up dinner. Either way, it makes me look forward to a restuarant!

Halloween: I love this holiday with kids. I think it's so cute that they get to dress up as whatever they want. It's so telling of their personalities and leads to so many endless conversations about what they can be that magical night. My kids talk about Halloween year round.

Bookmobile: Our city Bookmobile comes to the park by our house every week. My family is religious about going to the 'library bus' (as my kids call it). We go every week and fill up on books and movies. It's so nice to be able to walk to the library. And whenever we want something specific I just go online and have it sent to the bus. Thank heavens for the library bus!

Science Day

Our school had a school wide Science Day on Monday. They asked for volunteers to teach different lessons that the classes rotated through throughout the day (fyi, they got these awesome lessons plans and all the materials through Utah State's Jr. Engineering program and a parent in our school wrote a grant to Micron and they agreed to pay all of the $1400 for the materials! So yea us!). On with the story . . .
I volunteered to teach 2 rotations to 2 2nd grade classes. The rotations lasted 40 minutes each and I got assigned the topic of 'color'. I read the lesson plan and it seemed simple enough so I didn't put much effort into it. Tyler's class was first and we went through the lesson plan. Then I repeated the same thing for the second class. All in all I thought it went fine - certainly not a homerun of a lesson, but not a train wreck either.
That afternoon Tyler came home and we were talking about Science Day. He was telling me about the different classes they went to and then he told me that at the end of the day his teacher let each kid vote for their two favorite classes. He told me that he voted for mine with his first vote, and he was pretty proud that he'd used his voting power to vote for mine. So then I asked, and I shouldn't have, who else voted for mine. "No one". "No one else voted for me with their first vote?!" "No Mom, and no one voted for you with their second vote either. But I did Mom. I voted for you because you're my Mom." So many funny things: funny that Tyler voted for me because I was his mom; funny that no one else voted for me; and funny that it was a train wreck and I didn't even know it!
To my defense, they had some really cool lessons - including small 4-wheelers that the kids got to drive on a track in the gym! How's 'color' ever going to compete with that?!

Jokes with Tyler

Convo with Tyler today:


Tyler: Mom, do you want to hear a joke?
Me: Sure
Tyler: ok, the bus driver told us this. Why is the clock in the cafeteria always slow?
Me: I don't know. Why?
Tyler: Because it's always 4 seconds slow.
Me: I don't get it.
Tyler: Me either.

We did ultimately figure it out:
Why is the cafeteria always slow?
Because it goes back 4 seconds

As a side note, Tyler and Emmy have the best bus driver. She gives them a riddle every morning on the way to school and then on the way home she asks them if anyone solved it. If someone knows the answer they get a piece of candy. I think it's cute. During the winter though she couldn't do riddles because she had to concentrate on the road - safety first!

Follow-Up

I've had a few ask what Emmy will name her resurrected cat - so I literally said the words, "Hey Emmy, what are you going to name your resurrected cat?". The answer, "cutie". So when you see Emmy with her new cat, it's Cutie now, not Shanni.

Millennial Promises

I hope it's not bad to promise things that will take place in the Millennium. If it is bad, I'm in trouble because I've done that with Emmy. Emmy, my daughter who would love a pet more than anything, and who has parents who dread a pet more than anything. Because she doesn't have a pet she has to live vicariously through others. One day while I was doing her hair she was asking me all about my cat I had as a kid (yes, my parents were nicer than me and let me have lots of pets). I was telling her about my cat Shanni - what color she was, how I got her, the fact that she's dead now, and all the rest. Then she says, "When Shanni is resurrected could I have her?" Now here's a question I can say yes to! Of course she can my resurrected cat! The girl thinks she's won the lottery and is totally thrilled with her great luck - I've made her day. Then later she says to Derek, "Guess what! Mom said I could have Shanni when she's resurrected! But I'm going to change her name." Like I said, I hope it's not bad to make millennial promises.