Happy Birthday Rachel!

It is hard to believe that my little girl is already four years old. She is such a sweetheart! As far as celebrations go, we are keeping it pretty simple with a trip to Chuck-E-Cheese's (my kids have never been & have been asking to go for years), a tea party brunch with mom, a ride on her new bike and a recital for the big girls.

We also got a new camera so hopefully I can get some pics up here again :)

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss

Rachel gets to watch "The Cat in the Hat" every morning after her sisters leave for school before she gets ready for the day and this morning was no exception. I turned on her show and told her that as soon as it was over she needed to get dressed. I got ready and started doing a few things and kept checking in on her and she was still watching. I did a few more things and checked on her again, but the show was still on. I thought I was being REALLY efficient today until I looked at the clock and realized that the show had been on for over an hour...Yep, today is Dr. Seuss' birthday and I guess they are celebrating on PBS with a "Cat in the Hat" marathon.
Nice! Now I'm not sure she'll ever get dressed :)

fleeting childhood

Today I was given a great reminder about how quickly time passes. For the last few weeks my mind has been bent toward my little sister & her baby. Haylee's baby has a brain cyst & has had to have one surgery already and is back at the hospital scheduled for another.

Well, this morning, I was getting Rachel some strawberry milk when the phone rang. My mom was calling to give me the update from Haylee and when I came back from the phone call to see how Rachel was enjoying her milk this was the scene in the kitchen.

It was such a visual reminder to me to enjoy the moment and be there for my kids. I love being around when my kids have flavored milk because they enjoy it so much and it is a sure way for me to get a compliment on being the "best mom ever!"

So, seeing the empty cup when I came back just reminded me how important it is to be there to enjoy my kids & to be there with them whenever I can.

Ellie's Baptism

Saturday Ellie turned 8 and was able to be baptized on her very birthday! She was so excited & we had a wonderful experience. When Becca got baptized, she wanted to follow up on the theme "Black-White-Choose the Right" that the primary started, so we had black and white decorations and black and white treats for dessert.
True to Ellie's personality, she decided that it would be much more fun to alter the theme a little bit and have a "Be BRIGHT Choose the Right" party. We had rainbow pinwheels in the flowerpots, and decorated the tables with Jelly Bellies, balloons, crayons, markers and all things BRIGHT.
The baptism itself was wonderful. We were so grateful for the support of our family, neighbors, friends, and teachers (both Ellie's primary teacher & 2nd grade teacher attended).
What a wonderful experience it was for her to be surrounded by so many people on such an important day.
We had her bear her testimony last night at family home evening, and she said that getting baptized and getting the Holy Ghost made her feel warm inside all through her body. She felt so happy and was all smiles that day (as evidenced by the lousy picture I tried to grab with my phone).

Sarah's Homework

I was helping Sarah sound out some words in her homework & she said, "Mom, I don't really need to do my homework. It's just reading & I like looking at the pictures more anyway."

Silly girl!

My friend Rabbit

To ease Rachel's sadness at being the only child who doesn't get to go to school every morning, we have a tradition that as soon as the older girls leave the two of us snuggle on the couch and watch the last 15-20 minutes of a show. Usually Rachel picks The Cat in the Hat but today she wanted to watch something different. So we checked to see what her options were and I found a show called My Friend Rabbit. I asked her if she wanted to watch My Friend Rabbit, and she said, "Yes! I love your friend Rabbit. . . but can he be my friend, too?"

The New Naughty

So, I guess it is in answer to my concern that I haven't had much about which to blog lately, but Sarah has proven herself completely capable of filling a post or two today.
Today was the first day back to school for the girls & I had a lovely morning getting the "Monday" checklist under my belt. I thought I was pretty much on top of things until miss Sarah arrived home from school.
She asked if she could play with a friend & since she hadn't had a friend over since Christmas, I said that sounded great. She had cleaned her room and there was nothing stopping her from having a wonderful time.
Sadly, while playing I gave her a little too much space & she decided to paint the couches with coconut oil (for the popcorn machine), color on her comforter with a permanent marker and hide her friend's coat so she couldn't leave when the time came.
I have already cleaned up the popcorn oil, and I fortunately found the missing coat shoved in the back of Sarah's closet, but despite my best efforts I was unable to clean the ink from the quilt, so I should be able to post pictures tomorrow (Sarah is currently in bed & I don't want to wake her).
But, if this keeps up, I will certainly have plenty of fuel for the writing fire...so Welcome 2011...BRING IT ON!

Happy New Year!

With a new year I suppose I should renew my efforts to blog consistently about our lives. The past few months have been filled with the usual day to day chaos that goes with life, but it has been just great. Our Christmas was wonderful. The girls were sick early in the week of Christmas, but managed to get healthy by the time all the family parties started. It made for a rather uneventful Christmas break from school, but I am thrilled that they didn't need to do any make-up work either!
I have to laugh at our Christmas this year. I thought I was doing such an amazing thing, but Sarah's response turned out to be a little anticlimactic. For the last three years the girls have been ogling over the American Girl catalog that comes in the mail. They would always choose which doll they would pick if they could have one (knowing full-well it would probably never happen). Well, the doll that Becca has been looking at for the last few years was being retired, so I decided to take the plunge and get each of my older girls an American Girl doll.
It was the only "parent" gift they would receive & I thought it would be the hit of Christmas. On Christmas morning the girls opened their presents, including the dolls, and were thrilled with everything, but when asked what they received for Christmas, Sarah excitedly tells everyone about the Dollar-Tree harmonica and butterfly sticker earrings she received.
I guess it just goes to show that Christmas REALLY isn't about the expensive gifts at all!

On the upside, all the girls do seem to be enjoying their dolls & have carried them happily around the house.

As for the new year, today we spent the afternoon sledding in the FREEZING temperatures, but it was really fun to watch the girls get more and more daring as time went on. I have really enjoyed having the girls home from school, and I'm not quite ready to turn them back over to their teachers yet, but I'm sure that getting back into a routine will be beneficial for the whole family.

I guess the next goal I should have is to dust off the old camera & get some more pictures for this blog. I didn't even think about taking pictures of sledding but it would have been great!
Hopefully we'll be able to hit the snow again in the next few days & I'll remember the camera!

Happy New Year to all, and to all a great football game & cheese ball tonight!

SURPRISE!....Again!

I have come to the conclusion that it is impossible to surprise Greg at Christmas. A couple years ago I wrote a post about the fact that I tried unsuccessfully to surprise Greg with a popcorn machine for Christmas (you can read about it here).
Well, once again Greg has somehow managed to discover a surprise well before it was supposed to be revealed. Greg has been talking excitedly about the upcoming release of TRON, the Disney sequel to the movie from the early eighties. It is not a movie I would typically choose to see, so he wasn't convinced that we would ever see it in the theater, but has mentioned that it would be really neat to see it at the IMAX theater in 3D.
So, this morning, I decided that it would be the perfect stocking stuffer to grab a couple of tickets online and plan a date where we could go watch it.
Greg was at work, and I sat down at the computer to order the tickets. I got to the payment page and ran upstairs to get my wallet. By the time I got back the computer had timed out & I had to log back in. I thought it was surprising that it had locked me out so quickly since it took me less than a minute to grab my wallet, but I didn't give it much thought. I ordered the tickets, and started back upstairs to call my mom to make an excuse so Greg didn't make any plans for the date & time of the movie. As I walked up the stairs the phone started to ring & it was none other than Greg apologizing for logging in to a virtual desktop of the very computer I had been using to get tickets at the very moment I was on the purchase page.
We both burst out into laughter that he would choose that moment to log in because he hasn't logged in remotely from outside our house for a VERY long time.
Well, at least I don't have to worry about Greg double booking something for the same day now!

Romantic Mystery

We went out to dinner last night as the kids received their report cards and did very well. Sarah was incredibly pleased as she got "Straight Threes" - which for those unfamiliar with the grading scale is getting perfect marks in each area. One of the girls favorite places to go is a local Chinese restaurant. They love it for the wontons they serve as appetizers, their choice of soup, and of course the fortune cookies. The picture above is taken shortly after Ellie had finished her dinner and cracked open her fortune cookie. Words can't accurately express, well, the words on the paper so I had Greg snap a picture of it as well:

She exclaimed to Greg: "I think I got your fortune" and then proceeded to steal his unopened cookie. Becca then agreed with Ellie and stated that I was in fact the "Romantic Mystery" for her dad.

Kristy's Shower

I need to preface this post by saying that all these pictures were stolen from Haylee's blog...and I didn't even ask!

Last Saturday I got to throw a shower for my sweet sister-in-law, Kristy... who is due in less than two weeks (and I just can't wait!)
We kept the shower small so we could invite the little girls, who are all waiting on pins and needles to meet their new cousin.

I had so much fun with the decorations for this shower...Kristy's nursery is so darling I thought it would be a fun way to decorate. Her nursery is bright pink damask & polka-dots, with accents of chartreuse green. SO CUTE! I also knew (after seeing them hanging at our fav. book store "All Tucked In") that Kristy was a fan of the giant pom poms, so I decided to try my hand at making a few:On the counter, I put pink polka-dot cupcake candles in a row because Kristy is our cupcake favorite! For lunch, we had Lemon-Tarragon-Chicken-Pasta Salad, sourdough rolls, watermelon & kiwi, and fruit tarts (with the optional pb&j homemade uncrustable for the little ones).
The centerpiece was a diaper cake complete with a wrist-rattle topper (which ended up looking surprisingly similar to Haylee's wedding cake), and I was pleasantly surprised with how it turned out & how easy it was...I won't mention the fact that I cheated & used cake forms in the middle!

Since our family isn't big on shower games, I tried to keep it pretty simple (or at least simple for me). I asked Haylee to gather baby pictures of everyone who was coming to the shower & then I copied & reduced them to fit in some white frames. I tried to take a picture, but my lighting wasn't very good & I had a terrible glare...so I'll just have to describe it. I went to D.I. and picked up all of their fifty cent frames. Then I took out the glass & spray painted all of them antique white, put the pictures back in the frames, backed them with green striped, pink damask, and pink polka-dot scrapbook paper, then inserted all the little baby pictures and arranged them on my fireplace. Everyone had darling baby pictures, although Aunt Kathy's picture was by far the most memorable! :) (she told me that she would bring a cute picture next time she comes).

If only you could see that picture up close!
Kim, Jenna and Maddie guessing Who's Who!
Haylee, Sarah & Becca as the shower was starting.
Mom, Kristy & Haylee with the left-over diapers from the diaper cake.

Welcome Back!

Well, the summer has officially come to an end. Our summer was packed with fun...boating, swimming, hiking, playing, celebrating birthdays and holidays, reading, relaxing and watching the squirrels in our backyard. It was also filled with a fair share of naughtiness...Rachel cutting her hair (to the scalp in back), someone putting a baby outfit on my nightstand lamp & burning it just before I was supposed to go to a baby shower, a honey slip & slide (or should I say Stick-Not-Slide) and a waterfall/pool from the faucet being left on in the kitchen as well.
But, we are now back on track for a full school-year of fun. Sarah started kindergarten yesterday, and she was in seventh heaven. Her report after a full two hours (it was early out) lasted very nearly two hours, and was filled with exclamations of "and there's more!...and that's not all!"
Becca and Ellie both had a great first day as well, and were thrilled to be back in school.

Greg's Birthday

The girls were very excited for Greg's birthday this year, so we decided to make him a banner. I had a roll of BIG paper in the basement and so we made the poster about 5 feet by 25 feet. I was very smart and didn't put it up until two minutes before Greg got home because it only lasted about five minutes before it was blown up on the roof & torn to pieces.

Greg got himself a couple of fun gifts including a new back-lit keyboard, and I surprised him with the game "Life" (which he had seen at my sister's house & was reminiscing about how much he enjoyed playing it as a kid).

All I know is that I am sure grateful for him & think the world of him!

Happy Birthday Becca & Happy 4th of July

Becca turned nine last week. We had a perfect "summer day" birthday. She started the morning going to grandma's house for a sewing lesson with her cousins, played with her birthday presents (that she opened at breakfast) then we had the grandparents over for dinner before going swimming.
Becca wanted Hawaiian Haystacks for dinner & decorated her own birthday cake (flip flops) after watching an hour of cake decorating videos. She received a cake decorating kit from her grandparents & used it for two hours the next morning practicing everything from star tip to basket weave. She also got a Zhu Zhu pet which has been a hit around our house this last week (it's a hamster that runs around its house and makes little squeaky noises).

Yesterday we started our Independence Day celebrations with the annual trip to Aunt Charlene's breakfast. It was great to see the extended family, as always. We then went swimming at Grandpa's house, and had lunch back at our house where Lego Guitar Hero played a prominent role in our entertainment. We ended the day by watching fireworks at the park and as Greg said, "Maybe we should keep our kids up late every night just so they will go to bed this well every day!"

Today Becca and Sarah are both giving talks in Primary & I'm doing Sharing Time, so I had better make sure everything is ready, but I hope everyone is having a wonderful Fourth of July weekend.

Mount Rushmore and Martin's Cove

We just got back from a wonderful vacation to Martin's Cove and then Mount Rushmore. I have to start by thanking Emily for the FABULOUS pioneer clothes my girls wore. The missionaries up at the Visitor's Center were snapping pictures as fast as they could & we thought they looked pretty cute, too!
We felt extremely lucky to have beautiful weather up there. It rained only when we were in the tent or in the car & it was not even very windy for the better part of our trip.
We left our house Sunday afternoon, and drove to Rawlins where we stayed in a hotel that happily had a suite big enough to fit our family. We were very pleased that we didn't have to wake up at 4:00 on Monday morning to pack the car and get on the road...not to mention the fact that our girls love to sleep in hotels.
Monday we slept in, had breakfast at the hotel, got cleaned up and picked up some Subway sandwiches before heading up to Martin's cove. I had thought that it would be fun to play travel bingo on the way up, but there was really NOTHING to see (other than an old school bus and a few cows) so the girls just watched a movie.
After setting up camp and eating lunch, we drove back to the visitor's center where we went on a tour, watched a video and had an orientation and picked up our handcarts. I was glad that we had taken our equipment to the campground earlier because it enabled us to pull our girls along instead. The walk back to camp made me grateful that Ellie was not born a pioneer...I don't think I've ever heard her say "I'm tired" so many times :) but she was a trooper & walked most of the way back to camp.
The trail was far enough from the road that it felt very authentic walking along with nothing in sight but the mountains, Sweet Water River, antelope, bunnies and snakes.
I think my girls especially realized exactly what it meant to be a pioneer (Rachel couldn't believe there wasn't a potty anywhere).
The next morning, after a noisy night of wind and rain (but being extremely grateful for a warm, waterproof tent) we walked up to Dan Jones & Martin's coves. The feeling in the coves was very special, and again, we felt grateful to have the chance to be there. We had a wonderful lunch provided by the ward, and then felt fortunate to be able to reenact the "Valley-Boys Rescue" crossing the Sweet water (the river was 18 inches higher the previous day & they didn't think we would be able to do it) and then we had the women's pull. By the time we finally walked into camp that afternoon, Rachel and Sarah considered it home & ran to play in the sand by the campfire.
That night the weather was a little more quiet & we were able to sleep a little bit better. We packed up camp the next morning and then drove half way to Mt. Rushmore after breakfast. We found a hotel & showered and cleaned up before driving the rest of the way to the monument. The girls enjoyed seeing both Mt. Rushmore & Crazy Horse & Greg indulged my "car game addiction" by driving around the parking lot to find as many license plates as we could (we found more than 40 states plus Washington D.C. and Ontario).

We then spent a little time in the tourist town Keystone before driving back to the hotel. On the drive home we experienced a rainstorm like I never have in my life. There was constant lightning (not 2 seconds went by that the sky was dark) and we very nearly had to just pull over and wait it out a few times because of our lack of visibility.
Thursday morning, we checked out of the hotel & made the long drive home. The girls did really well in the car for so long, but we are all very excited to be home.

All is Well

Our next door neighbor passed away last Friday, so we have had a rather emotional week. He was like another grandpa to my girls...he let them help plant and harvest his garden, came over regularly for pizza and movies with Greg and the girls when I was at Mutual, took us to the Church Museum, had us over for barbecues, let the girls not just see, but run his amazing model train setup in his basement, let the girls feed the fish in his aquarium, had combined family home evenings with our family, helped us with our yard (and pulled countless loads to the dump in his truck and trailer, which always included a trip to Paces for rainbows on the way home), attended Becca's Baptism, and just loved us like family.
We were so fortunate to be able to have some of the grandkids come to our house to play when the kids came to visit/help, and it was a real blessing for us to be able to be of service to their family in some small way.
Yesterday was the funeral and we let our kids come with us. There are few funerals outside of family that I would take the girls to see, but this was one exception.
The funeral was very nice. All of the children spoke & the oldest grandchild from each of his children briefly told their favorite memories of their grandpa. I think my favorite quote from one of the granddaughters was, "even though my grandpa only had one arm, that didn't stop him from giving great hugs."

Our former Stake President (under whom he served) also spoke. He read the section of President Eyring's talk that spoke about my neighbor, prefacing it with "I know if President Eyring could be here, he would."

I don't think I can express any better than President Eyring what a great man he was, so to close this post, here is the quote from General Conference that had to do with my neighbor:

This is the Lord’s Church. He called us and trusted us even in the weaknesses He knew we had. He knew the trials we would face. By faithful service and through His Atonement, we can come to want what He wants and be what we must be to bless those we serve for Him. As we serve Him long enough and with diligence, we will be changed. We can become ever more like Him.

I have seen evidence of that miracle in the lives of His servants. I saw it a few weeks ago in the living room of a faithful priesthood holder.

I had known him as a deacon, a father, a bishop, and a member of a stake presidency. I had observed for decades his diligence in serving God’s children with his priesthood.

His family was gathered around him in his living room. He was smiling, dressed in a white shirt, suit, and tie. I was surprised, since I was there because I had been told that he was in the midst of painful medical treatments that had not yet cured him.

Yet he had greeted me as he must have greeted hundreds of other visitors over a lifetime of priesthood service, smiling. I had come to help him in the trials he faced, but as so often happens in priesthood service, I was helped and I learned.

We sat and chatted pleasantly. He told me how his father had tended to my mother as she approached death. I had not known that. I realized then that he had learned as a boy from his diligent priesthood father how to give succor. That thought made me grateful for the times I had taken my little boys with me on priesthood visits to comfort and bless.

After a few minutes, he asked quietly, “Would it be appropriate to ask if you could give me a blessing?” His former stake president, with whom he had served for years, anointed his head with oil consecrated by the power of the Melchizedek Priesthood.

As I sealed the blessing, I was taught by the Holy Ghost at least part of what the Lord had already done for this faithful priesthood holder. He was clean, his sins washed away. His nature had been changed to want what the Savior wanted. He had no fear of death. The desire of his heart was to live to give service to his family and to others of Heavenly Father’s children who needed him.

I walked out into the night grateful to have witnessed the Lord’s kindness to His unfailingly diligent priesthood servants. He changes their hearts to want what He wants and to act as He would act.

Mother's Day Review

On Thursday, Ellie had a Mother's Day program at the school. Me being the slow-thinking person I am didn't register the fact that all the videos I was taking were "portrait" instead of "landscape" (Oops!) until half way through the last song. So here is a glimpse of the program with the camera being rotated half way through. Oh well!



On Sunday I told Greg I felt like I had had an entire "Mother's Weekend" rather than just one day. Greg had Friday off, and we were able to get my mom some flowers, and run errands together. Saturday, Greg spent the entire day in the yard getting it ready for spring. It was a great gift!

Sunday morning I woke up early & decided to take a leisurely bath & read a book. When I was finished, Greg made breakfast & helped me get all the girls ready for church. We were able to visit all the mothers and grandmothers and had a yummy dinner (and I didn't have to cook anything!) and I couldn't be more pleased with the wonderful day!

Dance Recital

Ellie and Sarah had their first dance recital last night. It was SO cute. Sarah was a cute cowgirl and Ellie was a darling dutch girl. I took video of the dress rehearsal since I was on the front row. Sarah did even better on the night of the performance (and her cute teacher was back stage instead of right in front of the camera) but this gives a good idea of what we watched.


Sarah's dance:

My Future Chef

This morning I decided to make myself some split pea soup for lunch. It is one of my favorite meals and the only reason I don't have it more often is that I don't usually plan my lunches far enough in advance to start the peas simmering. But this morning I did. I checked on the peas about 30 minutes ago and decided to check my email & let them soften a tiny bit longer before eating them, but when I came upstairs I discovered an odd smell.
I opened the lid to the soup and saw flecks in it and asked Sarah if she had put something in the soup.
"Yep. I added marshmallows and a bunch of stuff from the cupboards."
Sadly, it wasn't salvageable, but I am happy to see that another generation of creative cooking has already begun.

A little Catching Up

I mentioned earlier that I had some pictures of Easter and the "Met-i-tay-shun" Sarah and her friend did, and so here are the pictures. the meditation pictures crack me up because we were all riding bikes when the neighbors' granddaughter came to play. I was watching everyone ride bikes and the next thing I knew she had climbed up on our mailbox and was saying "ah-omm." Sarah thought it was pretty cool and joined suit, and I had to take some pictures.