Oops - I missed a week! :P

So I'm sure that we have been busy the last couple weeks... now if I can just remember what we did....

I had my spring season concerts with Evening Song which was a lot of fun. My dad came to both concerts and my mom came to the Saturday concert - I love seeing family there! Evie had to stay home with daddy while I went to sing and she has done a great job learning to eat peas and has even taken a bottle for Dan! (Now if only she would eat for me!)


We've had fun visiting the library, playing outside in the beautiful spring weather, going on walks, and riding bikes.

The kids had a fun day of dressing up - too bad we don't have much boy dress up... But Aaron does look pretty darn cute in his ballerina princess outfit.... Oh boy - this pic is going to come back to haunt him for MANY years!!!!


Evie is getting pretty mobile now - she doesn't actually crawl yet, but she scoots around pretty well and is already good at getting into things that she shouldn't get into!

Eileen had a dentist visit last week - her teeth are doing well and she has a couple teeth on the bottom that are starting to get a little wiggly! I can't believe that my little girl is already close to losing teeth!!! We also took her in to register her for Kindergarten. She's very excited - I'm excited/nervous/sad... What a big girl she is!

Tummy Trouble :(

Our family has been full of all those icky tummy troubles that you don't generally talk about in "polite society" It's run through the family and we are hoping that it has done with us!! Dan was miserable for one whole night then slept the better part of the next two days. I was miserable for an entire evening and very very tired and not hungry at all for the next two days. Aaron threw up in a couple not so great places....aka Walmart.... Eileen threw up but managed to get to the toilet (YEYYYYY THANK YOU EILEEN) And Anna threw up once and blew up once.... don't ask... Now we are just hoping for a return to normal. Thankfully, the night after I was sick a friend who had heard brought over dinner for us.

I can't believe my baby girl is almost 7 months old! I finally got her in for her 6 month old shots - she's SOOO cute!!

Happy Easter!!

We've had a busy week - between holidays and regular days and everything we've spent most of the week running around. Some of the ladies in the ward got together with our kids and did a little Easter egg hunt. I messed up and didn't bring their baskets so they used plastic baggies - which would have been fine except it was REALLY windy - anytime Anna put an egg in her bag the wind would over turn her bag and she would lose it. Eileen would walk around saying "Now I'm going to look for a red egg.... now I'm going to look for a blue egg..." Needless to say - my kids didn't find many eggs.... :) Anyway - we all had fun!

General Conference was this weekend and it was just AMAZING! The kids napped for much of it so I actually got to listen to most of it!! As usual I come out feeling like I want to be a little better and like I can do this. Life isn't so crazy - I can do it. The messages were uplifting and inspiring - now I just gotta keep it with me!

We spent the evening at my parents house and did a little Easter egg find (LOL - hardly a hunt since the eggs were all in plain sight....) and had a nice dinner. We met my sisters new tiny puppy (Eileen has been telling me all night how much she loves Griz and how sweet and snuggly he is.) And had a nice dinner. I forgot my camera though - so I'll have to wait until I get the pics from my dad to post any... :)

Evie is so funny - she loves to blog raspberries and grunt - and she makes the funniest faces! She screws up her face and sticks her tongue out and makes it sound and look like she's working really hard.... gotta try and catch this on video - ya gotta see it! Anyway - until next time!

Working out

Can you have a spiritual experience at the gym? Oddly enough - yes. This morning as the class I was in was stretching after our workout, I closed my eyes and relaxed and the words of the song got to me. (only in the bible belt would you hear this song at the gym...) "Jesus take the wheel...take it from my hands..'cuz I can't do this on my own" And it just hit me that I can turn my life over to him when I'm exhausted and frustrated and He can help me take up the slack and restore peace of mind.... now of course I'm typing this right after class and the kids are all still asleep - we'll see if this peace lasts through the morning! LOL

BUSY BUSY BUSY!!!!

Ohh my!! Dan's parents were in town for the first half of the week and managed to keep ourselves very busy! It's amazing how much can get done when you have 4 people instead of just one! That leaves one for the baby, one for the rest of the kids and two more to actually do something useful! By the end of Thursday we had cleaned house, made curtains, done the mending, bought a fish (which is already dead....) run lots of errands, played games, gone to the park, made bread, organized the kids closet, cleaned out the garage, mowed the lawn, weeded the flower bed and pruned the bushes, weeded the garden box, took family pictures, went on bike rides and walks and more! (makes me tired just typing it all!) The kids all got good and spoiled and we enjoyed wonderful weather for being outside and having fun! The kids LOVED playing with their grandparents and LOVED listening to Grandma's stories.




Also this week Dan got a 'new' old car (that doesn't run) so he can fix it up and have fun with it, and then spent most of Saturday on that. Mommy has been trying to keep the house in as good of order as Ann kept it - but struggling - at least the kitchen floor isn't buried under a half inch of food crumbs! :)
Then to end the week the temperature plummeted yesterday and we got 4 inches of snow dropped on us last night - mostly melted now - but it was rather icy this morning.
We went with my parents and Dan's parents to go get family pictures taken by a friend. Julie did a FABULOUS job!! I'm so excited!! Maybe I'll get around to posting a couple here later.... :) LOL she took over 400 pictures and they really came out beautiful!

So now spring break is over and it's back to the grind - but I'm much better off for a week with lots of family and lots to do and I'm looking forward to spring and all that comes with it!

Cleaning and Family

We've spent this week has been crazy busy it seems! We've had something going every night this week! Monday we did a special ward Family Home Evening on gardening in Texas - so I'm now very excited to get our garden started. Tuesday, some friends and I kidnapped a friend of ours and took her out to dinner and we all had a very fun ladies night out. Wednesday was Scouts for Dan and Thursday was choir for me.

We spent a lot of time this week trying to get the house ready for guests. Dan's parents arrived safely (if a bit late due to bad weather in SLC) on Saturday night. Grandparents are LOVING seeing their grandkids and the grandkids are LOVING getting to play with Grandma and Grandpa.

Angels watching over me

Friday night the kids and I went down to Fort Worth to meet Dan (who was there for State BPA competition) We had a nice dinner, then headed home. About a half hour from home, I noticed that the gas light was on and I had no idea how long it had been on.... Thankfully - I was just coming to an exit - so I decided to turn off and fortunately there was a gas station on the exit. As I pulled in, I pushed the little button that gives an estimate of how much further you can go on that tank of gas.... it had passed the numbers and was now just on an asterisk.... So basically if there hadn't been an exit right there, with a gas station right on the exit, I would have been stranded on the toll way, late at night with no gas.... I am very grateful that someone was watching out for me that night!

Unfortunately they were not watching out for the bathroom floor. When I sent the kids in to brush their teeth, we discovered that the kids extravagant use of toilet paper had caused a back up - the floor was a huge puddle! EWWWWW!!!!!

The girls had a birthday party that they went to Saturday morning - they had a blast! The mother (a wonderfully talented friend of mine) had made matching skirts for all the girls to wear at the "Fancy Nancy" birthday party! So cute!! Grandpa and Grandma came over for dinner that night - I was so nice to have people entertaining my kids and keeping then from fussing/climbing all over me while I made dinner, ate dinner and cleaned up dinner. It was especially nice to have great company over since I'd been deprived of much adult company for the last 3 days.

Highlights this week....

Going to the park and letting the kids go crazy!

Aaron getting him self dressed and putting on one shirt on top and one shirt on the bottom....
Evelyn's new favorite thing to do... in fact I woke up to this coming through the monitor Saturday. :)

Bookworms

My kids are bookworms.

They come by it honestly - their parents are bookworms, their grandparents are bookworms and many of their great grandparents were also bookworms.

At the end of the day, when we try and clean up - we pick up at least as many books as toys.

This love of books has become a love of reading for Eileen - she could easily spend most of the day reading - and at 5 years old - she is already reading the scriptures (with very little help) She loves to sit and read and then talk with us about what she is reading. It is so fun to watch her love of books and reading and especially the scriptures grow as she grows.

Anna of course wants to be just like her big sister and wants to read a lot too - so she will have mommy read a line to her, then she repeats it.

Aaron is just recently starting to love books - any excuse for sitting in mommy's lap is a good one - and I find that any time I sit down (anywhere - computer, to eat lunch, couch, floor) he is right there with a book and asking to get up.

Evie hasn't quite found a love of books (besides eating them) but she did discover her toes this week. It started by just grabbing her toes while I changed her diaper - yesterday it became full blown toe - chewing. (she also decided that shoes were no barrier to using her feet as chew toys and chewed on then all through church)

One of THOSE days

I think every parent knows what I'm talking about.... the days when every kid is demandinf full attention - and if you don't give it you end up with....

...tantrums in the middle of a Relief Society Activity
...lotion all over brothers head... and the floor
...hand soap all over the bathroom counter
...tantrums during dinner...and FHE...and baths...and.... well you get the idea....

I think the best that can be said of today is that it's over and tomorrow will be a new day. And thankfully a better one (I mean hey - odds are it HAS to be!)

What happened to the rest of the week!!?!

Dan got home and we got SOO MUCH snow that he couldn't leave the house again for 2 days!!! YEY!!!! LOL - well something like that. It started snowing on Thursday and Dan managed to get home before the roads became impassable. Then it kept snowing and freezing and school and wrestling tournaments were cancelled - so we got Dan all to our selves for 3 days! WOOHOOO!!!

The kids LOVED playing in the snow - but soon realized that Mommy isn't much fun because all she does is take pictures - but look at how cute they are!! With kids this cute - how can I help myself!
I did however manage to build a small snowman with them - but I'm not much good at snow men - so he wasn't that impressive.
obviously Dan's was more impressive.... but neither one lasted long - Dan's fell victim to the neighborhood kids snowball battle.

Day Three

Aaron is still awake....it's 10 o'clock at night and I just got back from putting him in bed after I found him crying behind the door surrounded by toys he was not supposed to have out and having just bonked his head on the bed. So now the question is... how cranky will he be tomorrow....

Anna is now complaining again of her ear hurting...again, so we're going to call the doctors office again tomorrow and see if her ear infection has returned....

We spent the morning at a friends house and had fun chatting and playing! Now I'm going to see if I can get a half decent night of sleep and stay sane for one more day! Countdown until Dan arrives...approx 19 hours! Hurry home Baby! We miss you!

Day Two

Hmmm.... my super powers haven't arrived yet... still waiting... :) After only getting about 4 1/2 hours of sleep last night, my day was saved by the thoughtfulness of two friends.

Our good friends came over to play with us and this WONDERFUL lady came and made lunch while I fed Evie and then cleaned up my kitchen while I tried to comfort a fussy teething baby.

I got a phone call in the morning from our Relief Society President who had arranged a baby sitter for me so I could come to our Relief Society Activity tonight. She picked up the sitter - dropped her off here - then took me to the activity - took me home and took home the baby sitter.

We also got to have some friends come over and visit for a bit this evening - friends that we don't get to see as often as we would like.

These events combine together to mean that as I approach the end of Day two - I'm still sane. :) (haha - I think!)

Day One....

So I woke up this morning at 5am to go to a spin class, then came home and took Dan to school to go to his conference. Then we went to spend the morning at a friends house. I also managed to finish 10 loads of laundry, feed the kids and stay (mostly) sane! So now my real question is....

Since I'm officially Super Mom - when do I get my super powers?!?!?!?!? :)

Approaching Healthy

We are finally starting to feel like we are back to our normal selves - all except poor Evie who is so congested!! We've been nebulizer-ing her and we are now trying to put her to sleep in her car seat so she is upright - we are hoping this will get her to sleep through the night... my poor baby!!!!

Eileen has been rather accident prone this week (well her whole life - but more visibly this week) she comes by it honestly... This week her face managed to get into a position where it earned a rug burn TWICE!!! Once earlier this week - I woke up to her crying her eyes out and with scratches all over her nose. The second time during singing time in Primary - earned her a scratch on her forehead.... Leaving my beautiful little girl looking like this.....


So after a couple weeks of being cooped up in the house we are all stir crazy and ready to face the world again! Look out - here we come.

Also check in next week for an update of my slow slide into insanity as my SWEET HUSBAND leaves for a conference that my BRILLIANT HUSBAND is presenting at (yes those are both the same man - no I'm not a polygamist!)

Until then - I leave you with this adorable picture that came out of my attempt to get a picture of her adorable smile. Next week I'll try to get you a recording of the CRAZY sounds she makes.... you gotta hear it to believe it... trust me.... :)

Aaron and bugs

A while back I was sweeping up the kitchen floor and found a small bug - I grabbed a kleenex, picked it up and dumped it out side. Aaron had watched the whole thing. Just a few minutes ago, Aaron comes in while I'm feeding Evie and is very desperately trying to get a kleenex from the box on my desk. At the time I'd just figured that he wanted to be a big boy and blow his nose. After he gets his kleenex, he disappears for a minute or two - then comes back in with a bug in the kleenex (but no boogers!) and saying "side side!" He had found a bug - gotten the kleenex, picked the bug up and wanted to put it outside just like mommy. LOL - what a sweetie!