Good Times

We've kept ourselves busy this week - just busy enough to enjoy it - but not so busy that we stress out. We had some of Dan's friends from work over for dinner on Thursday and had a really nice time - good food and good company!
Earlier today we invited some friends from church over for the crock pot stew we had waiting for us when we got home - had a great time eating and chatting and letting the kids play together.

Evie's favorite pass-time is the jumper - she could spend hours in this thing - she's even managed to fall asleep in it.... She has figured out how to jump forward and in the process - swing herself back and forth as well as bouncing up and down. And she just jumps and laughs and makes funny faces at all of us.
She also learned pat-a-cake this week. She just figured out how to clap her hands together and loves to do it - and as soon as I start singing pat-a-cake - she drops what she's doing and starts clapping!
We made a trip to the library this week - which is always a big hit with the kids. The found princess books, barbie books, train book and hours of entertainment. Yesterday I found them like this - that's right this isn't posed - they all wanted to read on this chair - the girls didn't even glance at me when i got the camera out - Aaron just glared at me for interrupting him! At least Aaron is reading Thomas the Tank Engine instead of Barbie... :) He comes to me with these and the Dora books many times each day, it's so cute to see him getting into books.

Countdown!!

Countdown to what? SUMMER!!!! Yey- school has just 2 weeks left and we are all looking forward to seeing a bit more of our WONDERFUL husband/dad. Monday was kind of an insane day and we spent most of the week recovering from it. We did the grocery shopping, laundry, went to the zoo, went to a primary activity, family home evening, and somewhere in there we tried to get the kids naps.... :) Here are a couple pictures from the zoo. Dan's birthday was this week as he likes to tell me - he is now OLD!!! LOL - he had a school thing he had to go to that night - so we got a sitter and I went with him.... not very exciting, but I did make him a cake and my parents chipped in to get him a PS3.
I got to go to a women's conference on Saturday and LOVED it - it was so uplifting and it was the pick-me-up that I needed. Hopefully I will be a better wife and mother because of it - I'm trying anyway! :)

(Credits: "Desmond and Molly" by Amy Sumrall)

Adding Insult to injury...

This has been a week filled with minor injuries. The week started off with some beautiful weather!! It was sunny - not too hot and perfect for playing out side. We were all out back - me picking weeds and the kids running around playings - barefoot as usual. Unfortunately for Anna she discovered the first fire ant hill of the season - with her bare feet. I heard her crying and screaming and looked over to see her poor feet covered with ants. I grabbed her as quickly as I could and started swiping the ants off her. Shortly after - her feet began swelling around the stings and my poor little girl was limping around for the next two days on this swollen foot while doing her best not to itch it. She has a few stings on the other foot - but they were mostly concentrated on the one. Evelyn has gotten very mobile and wants to pull up on EVERYTHING now. She had stood up near the girls door frame and the girls accidentally shut the door on her fingers - not realizing they were in the frame. Her poor little fingers swelled up and she screamed inconsolably for a good 20 minutes - and would break out crying after that anytime she touched anything with that hand. My poor baby girl!!

LOL - ok I did take pictures this week - of more than just injured body parts - we didn't do anything too exciting, but we had fun being together and enjoying the weather (at least until it turned rainy on Friday) Eileen LOVES doing puzzles and the kids have all done a LOT of puzzles this week. Eileen wanted to show off this 100 piece butterfly puzzle that she did all by her self.
Sweet cranky Aaron right after getting woken up at the end of nap time so he could eat dinner. Aaron has finally figured out how to climb out of the crib (where we still put him for naps) but he still wants to nap in there - so he gets his blanket and a toy and throws them in - then climbs in himself! LOL - yep he puts himself down for naps! Anna is now feeling much better after her ant ordeal - but she has shown a MUCH greater reluctance to go anywhere near any bugs since then - she now gives VERY wide berth to any bugs she sees - especially ants.

Evie is on the move. She crawls everywhere and gets into everything. She loves her jumper and loves try and climb up things (including me) she is a sweet happy baby (unless her fingers are squashed....) She could happily play in this thing all day - especially when her sisters load her up with toys like this!!

I survived!

Well - I did it - I survived a week with no Dan. My Dad is also out of town so we had lots of fun hanging out with my mom, and did our best to keep busy so that we didn't miss Dan so much. We also had lots of stuff planned this week. We made poodle skirts with some friends of ours for the Ward Sock Hop on Friday Night. The Sock Hop was tons of fun - I managed to enjoy only having my 4 very short dance partners and the kids LOVED the skits and ice cream and balloons. I'll post pictures once I get them! I know I promised to take more pictures this week - but I did really badly at it! However here is one of Evie showing off some of her new crawling skills. She is totally mobile now. Still no teeth - but that might be a good thing.... :) So after a week of sewing, library trips, dancing, baby showers, parks, and no daddy - we are all exhausted and so now I'm going to go spend time with my sweet hubby (who actually had a present waiting for me at the house on Mother's Day and woke up at 5 am his time to call me and wish me a happy Mothers Day) since he's finally home. Maybe tomorrow I'll get around to waxing sentimental about all the AMAZING mothers who inspire me.... but since I'm generally not that eloquent and I'm rather tired (after not getting more than 5 hours of sleep a night while Dan was gone courtesy of a cranky baby...) I wouldn't count on it - just know that I love you, think of you and hope to be more like you!

Bad Mommy... :P

So I guess I'm a bad mommy this week - because I didn't take any pictures! LOL The kids pretty much all look the same as last week. :P The main reason for this gross oversight is the fact that my camera spent the better part of the week on the charger (not because it needed that long to charge but because it got put there and just didn't leave.

We did however have a fun and busy week. We went and visited friends (and had so much fun doing it that the poor people are going to find them selves accosted much more often....) We went to the library and read lots of books, and we went on a long enough drive that mommy and daddy let the kids watch a movie in the car!

One of Dan's friends from work got married this weekend, and Dan was a groomsman, so we got to go to the rehearsal dinner Friday night and the wedding and reception on Saturday. The kids came Friday (hence the long drive....) and had lots of fun with a sitter on Saturday. We have started supplementing Evie with a bottle - so we left her with the sitter for the first time and had a night out together! We had fun with good company, good food and dancing! I'd forgotten just how much I enjoy dancing - I told Dan that when we (by that I really mean the kids) are older and we have some time that we should take dancing lessons for fun and he actually thought that it wasn't a half bad idea! :P Anyway - we had fun - exhausted ourselves (I'm more out of shape than I thought!) and even came home to 4 happily sleeping kids! YEY!

Today was our Stake Conference and there were some wonderful talks (wish I could remember more - but with 4 kids crawling on me - I figure I was doing good to remember this much...) Our Stake President talked about S.O.S for Sacrifice, Obedience, and another S that neither Dan nor I can remember.... shoulda taken notes....(and this talk happened while I was nursing Evie - so i actually heard it- but the last S came after...) and how when we remember these things we can be saved.

Ok - long wordy post - I promise I'll do better this week and have pictures.... :)

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.