Terrible Two?

I am actually hoping Pearl will mellow out a bit when she turns two. I don't have great hopes, mind you, but one can dream.

She isn't two yet, but I don't feel bad posting a little early about her, because let's face it...she isn't getting much for her birthday. We have too many toys, too many clothes, too many movies. What could she possibly need? Yes, we will still celebrate, but I may just put bubblewrap in a box, let her open it and pop it to her heart's content. Who knows? But it will be pretty low-key.

Pearl had her well check-up today and amazingly did not cry at all when they gave her a shot. She had a surprised look, but then I distracted her and I guess she decided it wasn't worth the effort. (Wish she would decide that more often.) The only other child who made it out without crying was Robyn once. I had her all prepared with a sucker that I was going to give her after the shots. They gave her the shots and she didn't even seem to notice. (Must have been watching that sucker pretty hard.) It was very anticlimactic to give her the treat.

Here's some Pearly lovin' just to get ready for the big 2!

Quite the sass, but I still love to snuggle her.

p.s. Happy leap-year day. What did you do with an extra day that normally isn't there? Me...not much actually.

Baby Boy

I had the opportunity to take some pictures of a fresh from heaven little one. He is only a couple weeks old. Here are some of my favorites.

I am friends with his Grandma. She sure loves him.

He was such a perfect newborn. He never cried and went in and out of sleep. What a special stage of life.

Mustaches, Bad Dogs, and Smiles that Kill Me

Not sure why silly mustaches on my children (or anyone) makes me laugh. Robyn sported this one:

In other not so funny news, my nephew Hinckley was attacked by a dog. It was not a good encounter and he had his mouth torn apart pretty well resulting in 40 stitches inside and 30 more outside. The dog was a Labrador (surprising, I know) and no, I don't know what has happened to the dog. The owner was still out of town last I heard.

The children and I made some pictures and cards for Hinckley and sent them back with Grandma. We hope he heals quickly. But he sure is a tough kid. Word is that he NEVER cried. Which is pretty amazing since I almost cried looking at the pictures of him. Ouch!

I made a hidden picture thing for him. They aren't hidden per se so much as part of the art work. I really enjoy making them. And the kids like to find the things dispersed inside. Would you like to try? You might click on it to make it bigger.

Then see if you can find:
Bike
Eyes
Santa
Fish eating each other
Gun w/bullet
turtle
Darth Vader
house
apple
mailbox
ladybug
planet
tree
piano
music note
footprint
star
heart
crown
umbrella

There might be more...

Lastly, and back on a happier note, this smile gets me every time.

Daisy and her blanket. She would take that thing everywhere if I would let her.

In fact, I got scowled at when I took it away from her at dinner. I didn't bother to move it this morning at breakfast. I knew better.

If you are wondering, Daisy is much better in many regards. She does not get into trouble daily. She helps all the time with Pearl and she is still just as tender hearted as always. She does have problems when parents leave. She tends to be pretty shy. Her Sunbeam teachers are still wondering why she is so sad in class. I hope she can become a bit more outgoing before she starts Pre-school in the Fall.

But at home, she is almost all smiles and silliness.

Cheese de la Chuck

We don't go to places like Chuck E. Cheese very often, but the kids do seem to have a lot of fun. Ivory requested that we go since she was allowed to pick an activity to do together as a family. It just so happened that one of her friends was there so that was an added bonus for her. She grabbed Cedric and they played together the whole evening.

*These pictures are courtesy of Susan who brought her phone and not me (who did NOT bring my camera). Thanks Susan for capturing the evening.

Daisy was happy to play with Katelyn.

June and Robyn got into the games and actually spent a lot of time playing Air Hockey together.

I stood by my man and fed him coins.

And we got some cheesy pictures.

You may have noticed Pearl missing. Grandma took her out for her birthday as well, even though it is a couple weeks early. Grandma does a great job getting down here, but we try to save her some time if we can and getting two children done in one day was a bonus. Plus, I admit it was easier to watch the children at Chuck E. Cheese without Pearl escaping to who knows where.

So that was the end of the festivities. Ivory is still trying to use the 'birthday girl' card, but I have been pretty explicit that her day is over. But don't worry Ivory. Good things come to un-birthday people too.

Sweet Six

Does this look like the face of a girl who got to get up and open presents first thing in the morning?

Ivory was born on a holiday and her birthday fell on the holiday again. So, since she had no prior obligations, she started the day in style. (For the record, we asked if she wanted pancakes, but that would have slowed down the present opening.) I really should buy some birthday paper and stop using Christmas paper for everything.

I let the older girls pick things out for her and I liked their choices.

Ivory only asked for one specific thing, and I was very happy to find a HelloKitty Backpack suitcase at Target. Ivory has finally told me that she would settle for any backpack suitcase but I was glad I found exactly what she wanted. (This is probably the last year I will be able to afford her birthday requests. Next year she'll probably want an iPad.)

Robyn knew precisely what Ivory likes. This coloring book was right up her alley.

Grandma came and whisked her off for shopping, which gave me just enough time to make her 'cake.' Ivory had some requests for the cake too. I think we covered all her desires. And then we put it all into the shape of a '6' for kicks.

I love this picture here. That's my Ives.

And here she is blowing out those candles. You can't see it here, but she is eying the last lit candle.

We also got her balloons. She looks like a little Indian in this picture.

I think that is the third outfit for the day and I know she changed at least two more times. No wonder there is so much laundry around here.

But the important thing is that she felt beautiful and had a great birthday.

She didn't get a friend party this year, but we took her to Chuck E. Cheese (as per request) with the family. I need to get those pictures from a friend, but you'll have to trust me that she had a good time.

Happy Birthday Ivory. I love being your mother.

Did You Ever Wonder?

Robyn has a creative bug in her. She makes things up. She draws awesome pictures. And she makes me laugh. A. LOT.

I need to show you some of her latest pieces.

The first she brought home from school. Apparently the kids were supposed to do a project describing how to do something. I love Robyn's interpretation of How to Play the Piano:

You can probably read most of those, but I need to document it as well since the pictures in my blog book are not that big and it would be a shame to miss all the funny details.

How to Play the Piano
1. Get a piano.
2. Know the alphabet to at least G.
3. Start with beginner books.
4. C position is where you will start in beginers.
5. C position is where you see to black keys.
6. Have any person that can play piano for a teacher.
7. Start playing.
8. When you get to G position it is where you put your hands in betwen the three black keys.
9. Get new piano books when you finish level one (level two books should be green).
10. Be good for your piano teacher.

(I think my favorite is number 2.)

She also did this fabulous artwork on the other page of the book.

Things she labeled:
*gtar
*violin
*bow for violin
*piano
*weird drum
*case
*drumset
*Aallstralia yellow after the rain thing
*malets that play the Allstralia thing
*drum sticks

And finally she wrote this story just a while ago. It was on a scrap piece of paper. But it made me laugh and it had to be documented:

The Swirl Story

Once there was a swerl. The swerl was diffrent from the rest. It liked that! Alone came a SNAIL and grabed the swerl for a HOME and the swerl dindnt like that. The swerl was sad for the rest of his life.

THE END.

Love can be a strain

This Valentine's Day wasn't my favorite, although I did manage to have a great time in many regards. The bad news is that I pulled a muscle in my back the day before. The good news is that I finally took ibuprofen and when it kicked in, life was much better. Oddly, the same person told me that I shouldn't take it because I didn't want to strain the muscle even more while the pain was masked, but then told me the next day that I should just go ahead and take some. (In the future, remind me to go with the second suggestion earlier.)

Valentine's day was busy but really fun. In the morning, I took the younger girls to a neighborhood get-together. I was very impressed that Susan put everything together and the mom's chipped in and brought some supplies. Even down to the silly details like having balloons on the floor that the children could play with. My kids sure liked them.

This is Daisy throwing one in the air. I like how she is on tiptoe in her boots.

There were several stations the littles could go around to. Daisy helped make a bag.

Pearl was digging the cupcakes, although she wanted to touch the frosting more than actually eat it.

They had a really great time and I am glad I have such motivated neighbors. Daisy was so happy to tell Ivory, when she got home, that she had Valentines TOO. It's a big deal people.

In case you were wondering since I have been rather vocal in the past, I made homemade Valentines, but some of them had (ahem) candy. Three swedish fish to be exact.

So, we didn't overdo it, but I figured since most of the children at the small party can't read sentimental notes, I caved a tad, and went with sugar. (I know, you may all frown at me and call me a hypocrite.) BUT, all the older girls made paper airplanes and wrote personal messages in them. Robyn even wrote on one (to a particular boy) 'Kiss kiss. I love you. I LOVE YOU. (As in CRUSH.)' That made me smile because I remember the good 'ole days.

I was able to attend June's class party and organize a game for the kids. It was really fun to go to her class because since she is farther away I haven't been able to volunteer as much over there. I already knew many of the kids (from birthday parties) and it was fun to be there during a party. One mom busted out the crockpot and made dipped Marshmallows. Yum.

No one ever mentioned that June should bring a box, but I noticed that some people really got into it.

A Valentine Gingerbread house? Are you kidding? I admit that my first thought was that some Mom has too much time on her hands, but really, I bet that kid was pretty proud of her creation. Regardless, we will NEVER be doing that. I don't even like Christmas Gingerbread houses. (Possibly because I can't seem to build them. Add that to snowmen.)

I tried to do June's hair that morning. Can you see the heart? I think this style needs a little practice.

Ivory had a great day. She came home loaded down with sugar and she and Daisy compared goodies. I took this picture because I keep forgetting to get a photo of her poster.

Each child has made a hundred-day poster and every year I forget to take a picture. June made her's with little beads. Robyn's had little hand stickers that formed a larger hand, and Ivory chose pennies. She even started to take them off before I remembered to snap a picture. So if you counted and didn't come up with 100, that is why.

And just because I love her and didn't get any pictures of her that day, here is Robyn and me reading today.

Tyler took this picture because he was home sick. Oh, and he was sick last night too. Let's just say, we didn't have a very exciting Valentine's Day. With one sickie and one hurt back, we just watched a movie and called it a night. You don't have to say anything...I know...we are on FIRE!

Hip Hop at Music Night

We had a ward music night in January. It was our second annual one and it was such a blast. We always try to get our kids involved because it seems like an easy way to make them feel special. (There is nothing like getting up on a stage in front of an audience to make kids feel like they a star.) Last year we did Little White Duck, and this year we opted for another easy option, Five Little Ducks. Seriously, it doesn't get much easier than that. The kids had a blast. The only problem is that we have been cleaning up feathers for weeks at the church.

I mean half the fun of performing is dressing up. I thought yellow boas were just the ticket. And then I painted their noses because face paint makes everything more official. Cute ducks huh?

Here is the video of the performance. Tyler is harder to hear because his mic was not on.

Then I was also in a hip hop number that was choreographed by a dancer in our ward. She did one last year and it was so fun, I had to try again. Granted I dance like a white girl, but I still had a blast. I am on the far right in front. And later on the left in back. And yes, I do a round-off right off the stage. (I am awesome like that. And I won't talk about how much it hurt the first time because I am old and stiff. Definitely stretch before trying that one.) 

It was a great experience. Here I am in my costume. 

And here are most of us together. Yes, Chelsea has a green face because she did a Wicked number afterward. (That girl has pipes.)

Tricia, Jamie, Chelsea, Maleen, Aubry, and Camille

Love you ladies. It was such a blast.

Behold the Random

I've been meaning to post something for a couple of days, but I didn't have anything solid and now I just have a whole bunch of random things that should probably be documented. So here goes...

June bought these weird Perler Bead things. At first she wanted to keep making things and just have me take pictures. (So she could save the beads.)

But if you bump them in the slightest, beads go flying everywhere, so she eventually conceded to letting me iron them. (That is how they are supposed to be used.) She has made some pretty cute lizards.

June also had a space-related project for school. Most of the kids picked a planet to research, but June did her's on a constellation: Orion. The coolest part (and of course her Dad helped her with this) was that she built a model to miniature scale of the constellation. Of course stars are different distances away, but when you see them in the sky, they all look relatively equidistant. (Although some are brighter than others.) I like how in June's model, the beads are different distances away, but if you look closely, you can see the constellation Orion.

Pretty cool huh? Sorry about the bad picture quality. We snapped a couple photos before school this morning. In this picture, you can see the model from the side and it doesn't look like Orion at all. That is because it is from a different perspective. (Probably ET's.)

I had a celebrity spotting this week. Ivory had a pretty bad ear infection and I took her in to confirm and get antibiotics and who should come into the waiting room after a bit...Mindy Gledhill. I actually didn't see her come in, but since I sat there waiting 40!! minutes, I had plenty of time to look around. And there she was. I wasn't certain at first and I asked Ivory if she thought that lady looked like the gal from this video. Ivory thought so and told me that I should ask. So I called out "Mindy" and sure enough, she looked up. I apologized, because I am sure the doctor's office is the last place she wants to be annoyed by fans, but I had to say 'hi'. If not I would just think forever that it could have been Mindy Gledhill at the doctor's but I would never know.

When talking with her, I asked how old her baby was, and she said six months. After checking her website, her baby was six months and one day old. Talk about being prompt on your check-ups. Go Mindy. (And before you phone in and get a restraining order for me, my brain will not hold this random information. If you ask me two months from now when Mindy Gledhill's baby's birthday is, I might not even remember that she HAS children, let alone an actual date. That's the way my brain rolls.) Okay, enough stalking for one day.

I should also really post about Music Night on here, but I keep thinking that I might get motivated enough to actually get a video with it. Or at least corner my husband long enough to have him put it on somehow. So maybe that will be my Saturday goal tomorrow.

Speaking of goals, I should also check in on my good intentions and let you know how I'm doing. (Not as well as I would like.) It isn't March 15th yet, so I can't give up yet...

I'll leave you with one last photo. There is something about organizing a space that has been messy for so long, that makes my heart sing. Seriously, I get deliriously happy about it. I don't have before pictures, but I am pretty content with this after shot.

Yes, that picture was purely for my pleasure, but some of you organization nuts out there might have let out a sigh of contentment as well.