Letter to Uncle Cody

The girls helped me write an email to my little brother tonight.  Here's what I transcribed:

Ellie, "Adios amigos!  Adios amigos!"  I don't think she knows Spanish well. 

Annie giggles and corrects, "Hola!"  Ellie added, "Hola pato!"  Since we have taken to addressing ducks in Spanish around these parts.  "Hola pato!  Hola pato!  Hola paco!" she says.  Don't know why it suddenly switched to 'paco'.   Annie, "How are you doing?  In Uruguay?"  Now she's jumping up and down and giggling.  Isaac is in bed for the night, and Owen's lying on the bed getting fussy 'cause nobody's holding him.  I'm prodding Annie to talk about Conference.  Annie says, "Hola."  This is working well.  "Hola pato!" hijacks Ellie, "That's like hello or goodbye for ducks."

Annie finally stops giggling long enough to say, "I got Bingo on one of my Conference papers!"  She ROCKED Conference Bingo.  Jelly beans were consumed in mass quantities.  Annie had a friend call to play about an hour into the first session on Saturday, but she could not be torn away from all of her papers and Conference packet stuff for another half hour.  We have pages of decorated ties, tally marks for most popular words, and coloring pages of President Monson. 

Ellie is singing a song to Owen to try to calm him down on the bed.  It went, "You are stinky, stinky, stinky and you cry, cry, cry!"  It did not seem to help.

"He he he.  It did not seem to help," Annie giggles as she reads over my shoulder. She is now dissolved into a pile of giggles on the floor after reading the last sentence about her reading over my shoulder. 
"When is Cody gonna come home?" Ellie whines, "I want to go on a cruise already!"  Yeah Cody, way to hold up the cruise. :-)  Now she's singing you the "Months of the Year" song she learned at Preschool.  Now she's pointing out where she's finding the word 'Ellie' in the email, "Why did you spell Ellie?" she asks, but then is distracted and starts singing the months again.

Annie is still giggling.  "I'm reading along!" she laughs.  [Reads over my shoulder].  More giggling.  More giggling still.  [Reads over my shoulder].  Loud laughter.  But not the kind cautioned against in Conference.  :-)  Both girls are now in a pile on the floor, laughing.  I don't think Ellie knows what Annie's laughing about, but she's joined.  I told them they now have one last chance to say something to Uncle Cody before bedtime, "I love you Cody!" Ellie exclaims.  She's now singing the Months song again.

Annie giggles upon reading that, but had said a few seconds ago, "I watched half of both parts of Conference."  [Reads over my shoulder].  Giggles.  She really did love Conference, and would proudly show you the papers with the words she heard, and a couple notes from talks. ("Helping" was what she got from one talk.  Score . . . Family Home Evening tomorrow is now on Service!)

"Bye Cody!  Bye Cody!" Ellie exclaims while blowing kisses!  Then she looks at the computer screen and says, "Thanks that we can see you!"  Pause.  "Wait?"  Did she just figure out this wasn't Skype like on Christmas?!

"I love you Cody," says Ellie again while Annie's deciding what to say.  "YAY!  ELLIE! E-L-L-I-E!" she exclaims as she sees her name typed.

"Uncle Doh-doh," Annie giggles.

"I Love You, Doh doh!" Ellie loudly laughs.

"And now she's calling you Doh-dy," Annie laughs as Ellie dances around the room singing, "I love Doh-dy, I love Doh-dy." 

"Dad says I used to have imaginary friends called Doh-doo and Iah," Annie says incredulously.  Greg brought them up when they were calling you 'Doh-doh'.  I don't know if she believes him.  Remember Doh-doo?  He drove a car.  And was married to Iah.  I think Annie's my only kid who's had imaginary friends.  Oldest child thing, maybe? 

"Have fun," Annie finally settles on her parting words, "Have a good mission!"  She thinks for a second, "I love you Cody. Bye."

There you have it, a combined family letter. :-)  Enjoy the attached pictures of poor Isaac in his cast, and Owen on his third month birthday.

Annie reads the last sentence, "Does he even know we have an Owen?" Annie asks.  I assure her I've sent you letters and pictures about him, and you're aware of Owen's existence.

Love you Bug!

Conference Sunday

Conference Sunday, for us, typically means a lot of time with family.

And, as most Utahns have now recognized -- the gathering of large numbers of Mormons downtown also seems to have an odd affect on our weather.  (Seriously -- ALL THIS SNOW?!)  

I'm still wondering what all of those out of town visitors who come to Conference are thinking about it being 70 on Saturday, and the solid 6 inches of snow we had Sunday morning?

All of our large trees had branches hanging to the ground, and our poor trampoline looked more like a snow cave.

But, it's all good -- 'cause we were inside playing Conference games where the rewards are M&;Ms. 

Well, the theory was to play a game where the kids had to listen for a specific word to earn the M&M . . . but it basically just became us eating M&Ms.  Although, Annie did have a little check list of words she was listening for in Conference, and she was A-MAZING at listening for those words over the two days of Conference.  She could be coloring a paper, eating some snack and playing games, but if she heard the word 'temple' it was marked on her check list in two seconds flat.  At last count she had over 45 marks in the 'Jesus' column  (she only really listened to a few talks -- and it didn't matter if she heard Christ, Redeemer, Savior, Lord or Son, it was marked quickly under the Jesus header without so much as a question to us -- I was kinda surprised she knew so many different names for Jesus!)
Here's Ellie enjoying the candy.

The girls were distracting Grandma Ruth with several rounds of Uno.
I don't think she minded.  :-)  Someone sure loves her granddaughters!

 Then later that afternoon, we spent time with more family.

Here's Isaac with my Uncle Karl.

Isaac all, "Dude, Mom, we're fine . . . leave us alone . . . "

(I was a tad worried about one or the other injuring each other.  After Isaac's repeated attempts at standing using Karl's head to stand up against, and Isaac's trying to steal Karl's metal spoon (a comfort device), Karl kept raising his arm to shield himself from the advances of a curious 9 month old, all while laughing and referring to my son as a "turkey!")

Isaac in one of my FAVORITE outfits on him -- 'cause it matches his eyes perfectly.

Ellie, shockingly, showing some attitude.

 Great Grandpa, Ellie, Uncle Karl and Annie all hanging out on the floor together. 

Can't tell you how much I love this picture.

(And yes, I totally did dress my girls in new matching outfits for Conference Sunday.  Is that weird?)