This is what I got to do today...

It's not everyday that your sister needs an Appendectomy. I was lucky enough to get Emily's littles for the day and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I snuggled Olivia for the first 4 hours to keep her in a sleep coma in case Emily ended up not needing surgery and came back and needed to nurse her. I was constantly flashing back to Gavin and probably everybody's baby #1 that gets held and adored all day long because--why not? What else was there to do!?



Emily is out of surgery and doing well. She is staying at the hospital until tomorrow. Brian came and picked up Tanner, but I get to keep Paige and Olivia for the night. You should have seen Olivia light up and smile and try to talk when Brian walked into the room--even a 5 week old knows her mom and dad! I wish I had caught that on video!--p.s. the purple mouth is thanks to the medication she is taking for...yeast infection? Can't remember exactly--but it is BRIGHT purple!

For Mom

Facebook won't let me load this cute video of the kids for some reason--probably me.

Anyway, we LOVE YOU and hope you had a WONDERFUL day!

Gavin turns 8!

EIGHT IS GREAT!

All Gavin wanted for his birthday was $25--all in ones. I should have listened to him on that one. Instead, I spent way more than that on stupid things I can't even remember now and all I can remember is the 8--one dollar bills that I hid around the living room and he played "hot & cold" to find. Live and learn. The other failure of the day was the cake you see above. It was supposed to be a Lego cake. It turned out to be a leaning tower of disgust. Tasted good though. Note to self: Stop trying to make theme cakes out of box cake mixes and goopy frosting--THEY NEVER WORK! Luckily, he is a sweet kid and didn't care.

He did end up getting quite a few dollars from other people on his big day and, true to form, lost half of them over the next couple of days. HOW does a kid like money so much and then not even notice or care when he is dropping and loosing bills all over the place? Makes me CRAZY--but has also saved the day and bought milk, bread and eggs on too many occasions...sshhh. We decided it was time for things to change.

Monday, for FHE, we took all the kids and their piggy banks to our bank to open bank accounts. Gavin & Kes were more than excited, but Jenna--she wasn't parting with her piggy bank money for anything--that is until she saw the welcome packages that Gavin and Kesley were handed on the way out of the bank--then she REALLY wanted to open her own account, but it was already 15 minutes past closing time. I promised her she and I would come back the next morning and open one for her. You would have thought it was Christmas Eve. She could not go to sleep because she was so excited. She woke me up at 2am, 3am with piggy bank in hand and then at 5am she was up for good. I got this lady to the bank by 9am and she is now the proud owner of an account with $3.27 in it! Yay for Beaner!

p.s. I know this is a horrible picture of Jenna--kinda like she's looking into a Christmas ornament, but she wouldn't hold still for anything...plus, it may possibly be a little subconscious payback for making me pull an all nighter the night before...

Jenna Bean turns 4!

My baby is 4!
Jenna is my sunshine. Two years ago she started waking me up saying, "It's a great day outside, Mom!" That really kinda sums her up. Positive. Happy. She loves to laugh. Love's people. I love this lady.

Jenna wanted a Mary Poppins cake her her birthday. About 5:00pm last night--when I realized I had no idea how to make a Mary Poppins cake, this castle cake idea was pretty easily transformed into her idea and the 'gotta have' cake for her big day...I know, I suck--but I have always said manipulation is the #1 parenting skill and I have mastered it.

Here's the party--nothing beats Pirate Island Pizza and endless tokens! (remind me to NEVER let Gavin get within 100 miles of Las Vegas--you haven't seen anything as scary as that kid and tokens) Thanks Bon & Jon for coming and thank you Aunt Amber for making Jenna's birthday so fun!
My Big 4 Year old girl!

To blog or not to blog...

Just got off the phone with my wonderful mother. Here's an update for you, Mom!

Do not fear! Gavin loves school! This kid has major ANXIETY issues that he has inherited from his dad. He's lucky I understand it and don't kill him out of FRUSTRATION! Saturday evenings (you know how church is always on Sunday...)is always pretty interesting. Big events like a birthday or, say, an upcoming BAPTISM can bring on a lot of outbursts. We are taking that one, one day at a time. He does fine once he gets somewhere (just like his dad) but the build up to the event is sometimes not worth the fight.

I wanted to make sure things were good at school, so I decided to be a recess duty lady--remember those? I wanted to see how he was interacting with other kids and thought I could possibly help him a little if he wasn't. Happy to say that he is doing great. I am having a great time teaching 1st & 2nd graders how to jump rope. I think they have all mastered "Keep the kettle boiling, be on TIME!" remember that?

I found this picture tonight as I was downloading pictures from Kesleys camera. In the chain of pictures before this one, it is obvious he somehow took this beauty of himself! I can't stop laughing!
He is also loving scouts. I am the Den Leader for the Wolves and he has been counting down the days until he can EARN MERIT BADGES!!! You know how this kid loves himself any kind of trophy, or ribbon, or bead, or ANYTHING! Here is at the bike rodeo right after he won his ribbon...along with every other scout or sibling there... I love my Gavin.
I recently found a bag of 12 UNDEVELOPED rolls of film. I have been DYING to see what was on them and also terrified I had ruined them by storing them in a hot storage room. It's too spendy to get them all developed at once, so I took my first 3 rolls in and crossed my fingers. TREASURE!! I did damage the rolls, which makes me sick, but still--check out some of the cuteness--I'll share more throughout the week. And p.s. Jenna's birthday on Tuesday!

First day of school! First day of school!

Gavin has been asking and asking if he could be home schooled. At first I would just LAUGH HYSTERICALLY, but after a while I realized he was kinda serious. I couldn't get any answers from him as to why the sudden interest in torture--I mean, time together-- but I'm pretty sure it is just nerves. I tried the excuse my parents gave Shannon when she asked why she couldn't have her own room as a kid, "Sorry, but in heaven, when they asked if you would rather have your own room or brothers and sisters, you chose brothers and sisters." My version, "Sorry, but in heaven, when you were choosing your mother, you chose a slightly crazy, very unorganized mother instead of a high energy, skinny, overachieving one." He has to learn early that CHOICES MATTER! :) Anyway, he's ok. Just nerves.

To help the situation, I thought I would make things really fun and have a big super party to get everyone excited for school--kinda like the Nie Nie Dialogues lady does every year. I had HUGE EXPECTATIONS, but like I said, I'm slightly crazy and very unorganized, so my version ended up being not so cool--and kinda anti-climactic, and not quite like I was imagining it would be.

First up: Fall harvest dinner! Grilled zucchini & squash, grilled chicken, corn on the cob and fresh, yummy bruschetta! In my dream world, everything would be from my own garden. Reality was the vegetable stand down the street. The beautiful decorations never made it past the planning stages. Aunt Amber came for dinner and to braid the girls hair so it would be CRILLY--not curly--it's crilly at our house. (Check out the nerves taking over Gavin--poor kid.)Next up: FASHION SHOW! Aunt Tiffy hooked these guys up with a BUNCH of new school clothes. I thought it would be fun for them to strut their stuff and put on a show for us....apparently, I was the only one who thought so. I did talk them into at least putting on their first day of school outfits, but I was too frustrated to take a picture.

Next up: FHE & back to school blessings. This actually turned out great. Nothing like the spirit to change a bad mood. Kesley did say that instead of helping her, her blessing actually made her more nervous!

This morning went pretty good. I ignored Gavins outbursts and knew he was just trying to let out a little of the tornado of nerves going on inside of him. He wouldn't let me get a picture of him until we were IN FRONT of the school...and even then...School is in. It's going to be a good year!

No excuses...the fact is--I'm just lazy

Summer is winding down fast. I keep thinking I will catch up with some posts, but who makes the time? I'm not busy-- just really, really lazy. So, here's my catch up report in pictures.

Aunt Tiffy came down for the day! We grabbed cute cousins McKay & Cy and headed up to Payson Lakes for the afternoon. Tiffy brought her raft--which took an hour to blow up and then had a hole in it so it started sinking fast! I did manage to get one picture before they unloaded from their .03 second ride.I tried to make Gavin & McKay jump off this fishing dock thing. It was about a 15ft jump and it didn't seem like it was a big deal--that is until you were in this position considering a jump. I will admit that after this picture was taken, I climbed back over the rail and never did make the plunge! I was extra proud when Gavin became the first one to brave the jump...I knew he was SCARED OUT OF HIS MIND and only trying to show off for bigger cousin McKay. :)Cy, Kesley & Jenna

Summer boredom is taking over--we've had an AWESOME summer, but we are kinda at the "been there, done that" phase. These cups occupied one whole morning--and Jenna, well, she apparently had a little itch right at the moment I took the picture...didn't catch that.

Jenna & Kesley enjoying an afternoon rainstorm in their super cute rain gear ala Aunt Amber!

School starts next week. I haven't felt this way until the last few days, but BRING ON SCHOOL DAYS!--minus the homework. :(