Our Super hero

One of the great things about our school is that the teachers have taught all over the world. Zeke's Kindergarten teacher is from Spain and most recently has taught in Nicaragua.

Zeke comes home every day asking if he can bring plastic pop bottles to school to recycle, and he's now asking everyone he knows to donate pencils because the kids in nicaragua don't have any. When he found out they don't have shoes either he started trying to find his old shoes we could send to them all though it took some convincing that his shoes were a bit too stinky at this point to send them on to someone else.



This little guy wants to save the world and knows he really can do it. If you have some new boxes of pencils, send them our way, he'd love to give them to the kids in Nicaragua.

Happy FALL

We took a trip to Black Island Farms last week during UEA and it couldn't have been a more perfect day!! The kids all had a great time trying to get lost in the corn maze, we all picked the biggest pumpkins our arms could carry and we had fun shooting corn cobs out into a corn field. We were thankful for "corn cops", who helped us find our way through the crazy maze. Sam went flying down the biggest slides, Zeke took extra special care of Kyra, and Emma was the best leader on the trails.

I could post 50+ pics of the fun we had but tried to keep it to our top 10 favs. . .

It snowed, it snowed, it SNOWED!!!!

It snowed today! What else can you possibly talk about on a day like this except for hot cocoa and a good book?

Happy Birthday nana

My mom turned 63 today. I can't believe she's 63, that's almost 70 and 70 is almost 80. You get the picture. I suddenly realized that my moms isn't going to always be here. I depend on her, love her and most days need her to help me get through. We get on each other's nerves I'm sure I remind her of all the qualities she doesn't like so much in my dad, but I know she loves me and wants what's best for me. I know she loves my children and that makes me love her even more.

My little sister came up and surprised her for her birthday and we had the most fun I have had in a while. We laughed almost non stop for the 5 hours she stayed. The kids all got along great, the adults all reminisced and told stories and the food was absolutely amazing. Thanks chez papa!

Happy Birthday, Nana.

why do Kings have servants?

Zeke:"Mom, do you know why King's have servants".

Mom:"Not really sure Zeke, let me think about it."

Zeke:"You don't have to think about it mom, I figured it out. King's have servants to pick stuff up for them."

Mom:"Aren't you lucky you learned to clean up after yourself? You have a great mom to teach you how to do things for yourself".

Zeke:"No, mom they CAN'T pick stuff up, if they did their crown would fall off of their head. It's all about the crown, mom, I figured it out."

Where's the ceiling?

A few days ago Kyra was taking a bath, and always when I have to wash the shampoo out of her hair I ask her to look up at the ceiling so the water won't run into her eyes and always she looks down and it doesn't work.

This time she put her hand up and yelled "STOP". I paused and asked her what's up. Her response? "What's a ceiling mom? I don't know where that is?!?".

Sunday best

We got all dressed up for our Primary Program on Sunday! Zeke kept running away from the camera but I did manage to get one darling little shot of the 3 with their tongues out. It was a great program that brought me to tears when all those darling little kids were singing that they knew they were children of God. Nothing seems to speak louder than the testimony of a child!

Lagoon!!

The kids have been waiting all summer long to go to Lagoon and we finally made it!! It was the perfect day. Even Kyra tried a few rides.

This is the first year I haven't been pregnant or with a new baby so I got to enjoy the roller coasters. The kids were up for most of it but a few were a little daunting for them. Maybe in a year or too and they'll be up to riding the biggest rides we can find in Utah.

we moved!!

Well after 4 weeks of packing and moving and unpacking again, the kids and I are living in a new house. Everyone is settled in nicely and school has started. Our adress is different but my phone and email are still the same if you need to get ahold of me.

I'll post pictures as soon as I find the box the camera is in . . .

Princesses

We LOVE princesses at our house, how can you not when you have a 2 year old little girl who's favorite color is pink?

I just discovered I'm like Aurora, who do you most resemble?

Moon Lake

My new favorite part of the world is Moon Lake up in the Uinta mountains. The 4 kids and I (oh yea, Buddy too) went camping up there with some family.





Highly recommend this as a new vacation spot. For anyone who doesn't love the idea of tents, you can rent a cabin with a full kitchen and bathroom. We decided to tent but weren't afraid to take up the offers of others with us to use their nice hot shower every day.





We canoed, hiked, played games and built fires. The kids ran around and got dirtier than any of them have ever been but all were complaining when we had to come home and we all survived!! It was definitely a much needed chance to unplug from our busy world and get away. I just wish we could have stayed longer.

Dirt

What do you get when you take 6 kids, 1 dog and a few adults into the mountains camping???

DIRT
One of our little cousins could not stay out of the dirt!! We don't have more than a few pics of him NOT dirty.My sweet little Kyra who loves to dress cute from head to toe enjoyed it all too. Her favorite was to add marshmallows and dirt and then smear it all in her clotehs and share what was left over.
The cleanest her hands were all week.
Even our big dog Buddy was dusty and dirty, needless to say he got dunked in the lake every.

A day at the zoo

Yesterday John took the day off and took all the kids to the zoo so I could get caught up on my work and on the way home he got really really sick. He called me saying he was stuck in traffic but going to try to get home. Within 15 minutes he went downhill and was getting off at the next exit to go to the ER. By the time he got there he could barely walk or talk and managed to stumble into the waiting room with all 4 of the kids to get some help. Kneeling in pain on the floor other patients started yelling for help and they still made him find his cards and check in with insurance information before they saw him (thanks Lakeview). They got him back to a room and had the kids sit in the waiting room unattended waiting for someone to hopefully come get them.

In the chaos of the mess someone handed Sam all the cards they had used to check John in and given the kids all coloring books and crayons but still left them all just sitting in a corner of the waiting room!! Emma's only 9!

I got a ride down to Lakeview with my mom and we took the wrong door in and found John first without the kids. He said he'd left them and no one knew where they were. Talk about absolute sick frightening feeling!!

We did track them down in the waiting room, not even 5 minutes later and I have to say that was a very very long 5 minutes.

John ended up with a kidney stone and was treated and sent home, all the kids were sent home with nana and we all met up again later that night. Pieces of the story started coming out and apparently some blond lady decided to try to kind of take care of the kids, she was with another patient in the waiting room while 2 different sets of other patients had to yell at the nurses to pick John up off the floor and get him back to get help!

The scary part is that this blond lady got the kids to trust her more than I would like them to. She gave them gifts and went to her car, trying to convince them to go out there with her to find "stuff to play with". She got them treats, and sat with them, hugging a crying Sam and talking to all of them. Thank goodness the kids had listened and Emma wouldn't let anyone leave the waiting room to go with her. I'm sure she was well intentioned, but it scares me to think of what she could have been like. The interesting thing is that when we all got home and settled we discovered that John's credit card was missing from that stack. I'd like to think she was just being nice and trying to help out, but another warning to watch out and not trust anyone I guess.

John is finally on the mend with the kidney stone passed. Kids are all in bed tucked in safely for the night and I am thoroughly exhausted from another challenge of a weekend!!

Now I'm off to start packing for a 5 day trip to the Uintah's. Wish us luck up there, somehow I don't feel as scared of bears and racoons as I do of strange blond women in ER waiting rooms.

The roof

A few weeks back I went into the kitchen one morning and noticed a big hunk of my ceiling falling to the floor. No one around to help and the water kept coming so I waited for a break in the storm and climbed up there to fix it myself!!

Amazingly I figured it all out and stopped the leak!!! So proud of myself that I took care of the problem!!! Poor Kyra stood at the bottom of the ladder crying and Emma grabbed the camera to document it all just in case I fell off. She did call me my mom to tell her what we were doing and while I tried to assure her (while screaming from the roof to Emma to PLEASE TELLE NANA WE'RE OK) amazingly she showed up within 5 minutes "just to check and see if we needed anything".

Granted I can't compare to the coolness of Tanya's fort for Jack, but now I'm working on siding my house, I'll post before and after pictures when I can get the house done. I think my kids would vote for a fort over new siding anyday! Any chance we can convince Aunt Tanya to come build one for us now???

BFF's

We have some absolutely favorite friends that we've started spending all of our time with. It's an interesting combination since the moms are best friends, you always want your kids to be the best of friends! She has 3 boys and I'm blessed with 2 girls and 2 boys, but interestingly enough it's the perfect combination.

We find the kids sneaking off to play all sorts of intricate imagination games, the boys planting in front of the play station and all of them working together. We love our friends! (and maybe just maybe the moms are hoping for some future relationship between our youngest two . . .)

Emma's Pics

Sorry to double post, I decided tonigh to sort my pictures on my computer into better files so I can remember what happened when and found this slew of about 300 pictures that Emma had taken! First post is from the boys, but this one is all emma's. So interesting to view the world through their eyes! Try it sometimes, give your kids the camera to take pictures of whatever is most important to them, I have to say I was surprised and impressed.

Future photographers

What do you get when your kids steal the camera for an hour or two?

Bragging

To anyone who's still reading when I lament about Kyra's sleep, I have to brag for just a second.

3 nights in a row we do our bedtime routine, and as soon as she says her prayers, she covers herself up and lays down. It's taken up to 20 minutes for her to fall asleep, but she's doing it all by herself!!!!!!

So proud of us.

So much fun!

So I realize all of 6 people read my blog now, but honestly this is a lot of fun!! The kids are loving reading "their blog" and want to post things constantly. Thanks to all who got me hooked on this fun new world.

Un-Casting call

Sam got his cast off last week! For anyone who doesn't know, he broke it during one of our family home evening activities about 7 weeks ago! Both bones, all the way through. OUCH!

He was pretty brave when they took this big loud saw to it, and no one else liked the sound very much either!

Check out the big bump on the bottom of his arm. It's technically broken but he got invited to a swimming party with a friend and we convinced the Dr. that he could go for 2 more weeks without so much as moving beyond walking (ie, no bikes, trampoline, scooter . . .) and they let him keep it off so he could swim.

What a trooper!

We did it!

So tonight I'm dreading bedtime because I know I need to put my foot down with Kyra again. I'm kind of avoiding it a bit and I let the kids stay up watching movies thinking I'll make sure she's REALLY tired before we try it again.

Kyra's sitting with me reading books and she hops down from my lap, goes to her bed and takes off her shoes, gets her favorite doll, and she climbs into bed!! No less than 2 minutes later and she falls totally sound asleep.

She did it all by herself. I didn't even kiss her goodnight! Now I'm torn because she no longer needs me but man was that ever nice to have her just go to bed on her own. No bedtime prayers, no cuddly kisses. When did my baby get so big?

Emma's hair

Emma decided to cut her hair and donate it to locks of love. This was about a month ago but still definitely noteworthy!! It was down to her waist and was causing more fights between the two of us when it came time to brush it than it was worth. The shorter cut is still so cute and still long enough to do but we definitely love the ease around here.