June Showers Bring July Weddings

So, my little sister is getting married next month!  Yay!

We're big fans of her fiancee, Ben . . . "Uncle Benny" as Ellie enthusiastically calls him.

Actually, Annie took a bit to warm up to him -- she was a little miffed that Ellie was forgetting all about Uncle Cody (off in Uruguay until November) in favor of this new, fun sandbox playmate.  My Mom explained that she can have multiple fun Uncles who play in the sandbox with her, and it doesn't mean she loves Cody any less.  She's been cool with him ever since.

We had Lacy's family shower last week.

 Here's the happy couple with my four children.

They have probably decided to wait awhile to have kids after this photo shoot.

Two of my favorite guys . . . 

Great Grandma and my girls.

 Ellie eating a cupcake.

She's not my neatest eater.

 My sister Talina (my mini-me) and I with our freakishly cute offspring.

 My beautiful little niece, my Bailey Boo!

 A bunch of the party peoples . . .

 Ellie's reactions to the presents was priceless.  "A Slap Chop?!"

  Yay! Shower presents!!

 Awww, cute couple.  With my super practical gift. 

Who doesn't want lightbulbs?!

Not related to the shower -- just my cute baby, with his butt being aired out.  Stupid antibiotic-caused diaper rash.

Seriously, how cute are my little boys with their stuffed animals!?
And how much does Isaac look like a ginormous baby?!

Mr. Chatterbox

I can't believe my little boy is almost two years old.

He is just a sweet (and grumpy) little thing.  I can't get over how much I love this kid.

I know I've mentioned before that he's a talkative little kid.  I don't know how much of it is the fact he's following up Ellie (who was in speech therapy at two 'cause she only used 10 words), and how much of it is that he's a third kid just trying to get a word in edge-wise, but this kid endless cracks me up with his unique take on the world.

Tonight, Isaac, Owen and I headed out to get some Chick Fil A chicken nuggets and browse the racks at Target.  I don't know what was going on with him tonight, but Isaac decided he needed to do running commentary of each and everything we did, said and saw at Target.  Loudly.  Really loudly.  People were stopping and staring and laughing as my one year old son loudly mused about life.

Some of my favorite exchanges were these:
At first he was just pointing out everything and asking questions.
"What that, Mom?"
"What's what?"  I look to where he points up high on the wall.  "Oh, clothes?"
"No, not clothes."
"Oh. Lights?"
"Not lights, Mom.  There, the shirt."
"The shirt?  Yeah, that would be clothes, Bug."
"Oh, maybe."

He kept close track of everything we'd seen, and one woman was cracking up while listening in to him, "Look, Mom!  Superman!"
"That's Spiderman, Bug."
"Yeah, Spiderman.  Mom, we saw Spiderman AND Elmo!  Oh, and a cat.  AND a waterfall!"
"I remember Elmo and the cat," (Hello Kitty display), "but I don't remember a waterfall."
"Yeah Mom, Spiderman, Elmo, saw a cat, and I saw a waterfall."
"A waterfall?"
"Yeah, a waterfall. And Elmo.  And clothes."
"This is a cool place, huh?"
"Yeah, I love Elmo."

We picked up a bag of Jumbo marshmallows for s'mores making.  Isaac was very excited about the marshmallows, and was trying to rip open the bag.  "Sorry Bug, we have to buy them first."
"NO!  Open now, not buy first."
"Kiddo, we have to pay for them first."
"No, open!  Not buy."
"I'm not going to open them until after we buy them."
"No!  Open them!  Now!"
"Isaac, enough," he was starting to go from just loud to loud and angry, "we have to buy them first."
"NO!  Open!"
"No, we have to pay for them first."
Then, as sweetly as you can imagine, he sets the bag down next to him (he'd been trying to tear it open up 'til now, "Oh, oh-tay Mom.  We buy 'em."
Um, wow, that was a quick turnaround.
Five seconds later, he picks up the bag again, 'Mom. Give me some scissors."
Ha!  Seriously, my one year old just asked for scissors.  At that point, we put the marshmallows in the back of the cart where he couldn't see them anymore.

At the end of our trip, I was getting him loaded up into his carseat.
"Whoa Mom, it hot.  My seat is hot."
"Sorry Bug, is it too hot?"
"Um, a little hot.  Oh no!  Owen seat hot!"
"I think Owen's seat is fine," especially since he'd been in it the whole time we were in the store and it hadn't been left in the van.
"No, Owen seat is hot."
"It's fine, Bug."
"No, Owen hot."
"Owen's hot?  Maybe . . . "
"Not maybe.  Probably."

When we got home he sweetly asked if he could have one of his "white-mellows."  It was so cute, I let him eat a marshmallow afterall.

Kindergarten Graduation

Annie's End of Year / Kindergarten Graduation

She's learned a lot in Kindergarten this year.  She was very excited to tell me she's made it to a Level N in reading!  Whatever that means!



The most important thing she's learned though was from earlier today, and it wasn't in school.
Turns out, that when Mom tells you that if you don't stop whining and talking back, you're gonna lose privileges . . . she means it . . .

Random Updates

 Seriously, I can't believe this kid is almost two.  At the same time, I can't believe he's still one.  It's trippy.  I'm looking forward to him being two (not in small part so that I can say my kids are 6, 4, 2, and 5 months. 'Cause 6, 4, 1, and 5 months gets me funny looks.  Sure, they won't actually be more than 18 months apart still, but it just sounds better.) :-)

Good news: he no longer is the grumpiest toddler on earth.

Don't get me wrong, the kid still has the best grouch face of any child who's ever existed, it's just not a permanent grump face anymore.  He smiles at people when they show up to our house (sometimes) and not just after they've been there for over an hour.  He has a ridiculously adorably close relationship with his cousin Bailey (who we have over three mornings a week).  He's sweetly protective and makes sure nobody takes her toy (mainly Ellie -- I think he's willing to battle Ellie to the death over Bailey's honor.  Or over pretzels.  Those two just fight a lot.)  Watching the two of them grow up together is seriously gonna be one of the highlights of my entire life.

Other highlight: listening to this kid sing.  I don't know how he's learned all these songs, but he can sing along with anything.  We turned on some Primary songs in the car, and here was my sweet little one year old boy belting out, "I'm trying to be like Jesus . . . in his ways . . . love as He did . . . all I do . . . say."  (He tends to sing the last 2/3rds of any sentence.)  He also quotes along whole paragraphs worth of dialogue from books on CD that we listen to in the car.  Veggie Tales especially -- he'll speak both parts, 75% of the words, for minutes on end.  It's so freaking adorable and impressive.  He cracks me up.  He also can quote along with what every single one of our toys says or sings.  "Starsong loves you," "Good night Mommy," "I'm so tired," "I LOVE music" and the ABCs and the Dora theme song are all just a few of the things we says along with our various noise makers. 

What else about Isaac?  Oh, I blame the almost-turning-two thing, but MAN has this kid gotten argumentative.  Here are two, of what could've been 5 or 6 such conversations that I had yesterday with the kid:

While eating yogurt, Isaac happily held up a big blueberry and exclaimed, "Mmmm, strawberry!"

"That's a blueberry," I said.
"No," he grumped, "STRAW-BER-RY."
"It's a blueberry, Bug," I responded.
"STRAW-BER-RY," he said angrily.
"OK, strawberry," I sighed and went back to what I was doing.
Five seconds of silence, then he growls, "It a BLUEBERRY, Mom!"

"Hey Bug, here's your cereal."

"I non't WANT cereal!"  Throws himself to ground.  I shrug and walk back to the counter with the cereal.  "NO!  Put my cereal on table!"  I walk over and set his cereal on the table.  "NOOOO!  Not on the table!  No cereal!"  I set it down on the chair, where he'd been pointing emphatically.  "NO! On the table Mom, not the chair!"  I walked away and ate the cereal myself.  I didn't feel too bad -- he'd already eaten some blueberry yogurt.

Here's Annie and Owen with me (if you look close you can see how terribly cluttered my room is -- over my shoulder is supposed to be the bassinet base -- instead it's a pile of baby blankets, toys and clothing.  And jackets that need to be put away 'cause they don't fit the kids anymore.  And the ads from the newspaper.  And some sheets I just washed.)

Owen is five months old.  He's freakishly adorable and he knows it.  He's super vocal and talks and 'sings' all the time (modeling after his big brother apparently).  But, the kid is the LAZIEST baby I have ever seen on the face of the planet.  He rolled over a couple months ago, a few times over the course of a week. And he has no interest whatsoever in attempting such a feat again.  You put him on his belly, and he'll perch up and look around for a bit, then deflated, lay his cheek down flat against the ground and just lie there until someone comes and gets him.  (He has actually finally rolled over a couple more times this week -- from his back to his stomach.  He won't even attempt anything else.) He'll sit on my lap and coo and babble with me for endless periods of time.  Try and sit him up on his own, even balanced in something like a Boppy, and he slumps over.  Defeated and grumpy.  The poor kid is also following closely on the heels of his older cousin Bailey, who was one of those wonder babies who was sitting up super early and crawling at 6 months (or was it earlier?!)  So, in comparison, he looks even all the more lazy.  Oh well.  I like my lazy baby -- he just wants to snuggle with Mom more often, and I'm happy to take what I can get!

Annie will finally finish up Kindergarten at the end of this month.  She just had Kindergarten testing this week, and came out squealing, "Mom, my reading has gone up FOUR levels!  To an 'N'!"  I don't actually know what that means, but she's pretty psyched.  After four weeks of summer vacation, she'll be back for first grade!  She starts the Dual Immersion (Spanish) program, which we're super excited for . . . and she'll go to school all day long, which I don't know how I feel about.  I'm gonna miss my sweet girl -- plus, she's so dang helpful.  She changes the laundry almost as much as I do!  If I could teach her to unload the dishwasher, my life would be complete.  :-)  Yesterday she came in and informed me that she shouldn't be disturbed, because she was going to be cleaning her room.  Over the next hour she completely reorganized it, even setting up what she called "a reading and homework center" in the corner with some rubbermaid drawers she'd asked if she could have.  She's also constantly asking for extra chores to help around the house, and especially to make extra money.  She's saved up over $8 over the last couple months and LOVES getting it out and counting it. 

 

My Ellie Belly.

What is there to say about Ellie?  She's four now.  She's as wild, funny, crazy and wired as she's ever been.  I love this little girl.  But she will be the one who drives me off my rocker.  :-)  She's just so dramatic -- the shrieking, screaming, squealing, spontaneous freaking out -- it all just baffles me.  I love her little (or, should I say BIG) personality, her spunk and her love of life.  I think this kid will teach me more about motherhood and life than the rest of 'em put together.  She's always on the go, she loves dance and tumbling, and she enjoys torturing her little brother.  I think they make each other cry no less than twelve billion times a day.  In some ways, she's my cuddliest kid -- she loves to snuggle up -- she just rarely stops moving long enough to cuddle.  She still has a harder time with a lot of her pronunciation -- I think most of it comes down to that whole 'never slowing down' thing -- it's funny to watch her and her little brother together (as he's more than two years younger) and trying to figure out which one is easier to understand.  (She's probably a little easier to understand in person, I've been told he's easier to understand on the phone, and he's proficient in several sounds she just can't be bothered to make regularly (hard c's and r's to be specific.))  She is such a people person -- she loves to perform and impress, and people just eat up her antics.  It's hard to take Ellie in public without people commenting about her effervescent personality and charm.  It's gonna serve her well in life.  :-)

 

 We took this picture of my sisters and I at my Mom's house last week -- I can't even tell you how lucky I am to have the sisters I do.  I feel guilty about the idea of not having any more daughters, 'cause I've only provided my girls with one best friend each, whereas I was lucky enough to have three!  I am LOVING having Talina live so close by now -- I'm really enjoying getting to be a hands-on Aunt, with my niece Bailey here at least three days a week.  Nothing beats having someone to go shopping with at the drop of a hat, or having an on-call emergency babysitter up the street.  Star is trying to sell her condo now so she can move down to our neck of the woods -- which would be so freaking cool.  Pretty much my dream come true would be for all of my family to end up on a little cul de sac together -- I'll have to settle for half of us being within a mile for now :-)  Lacy has big stuff coming up in her life -- she's getting married to "Uncle Benny" (one of Ellie's FAVORITE PEOPLE) next month, finishing her Master's, and she's just been offered a job with the Royal Bank of Scotland . . . so they'll be relocating!  Well, from Logan to Salt Lake County.  Turns out the Royal Bank of Scotland has a location in the Salt Lake Valley.  :-)  (All part of my master plan -- she may not be on my cul de sac yet, but it's a heck of a lot closer than Logan!) 

 And speaking of family -- my cousin Marissa and her three kids were in town, and we all went (along with Talina and Bailey) to Thanksgiving Point's Childrens Gardens this week.  (The picture above was with all kids over one -- the three babies under one were in their strollers -- mine was even asleep!  Huzzah!)  My kids had SO much fun being with their 'cousins' and if we could get Marissa to move from Idaho down to our little cul de sac (or compound, if I keep imaginary growing it to include all my family), how great would life be?!

Annie and Ellie -- this is indicative of their personalities or anything ;-)

And there it is -- an actual written account of some stuff we've done.  Not just an entire post of pictures and copied and pasted Facebook statuses.  I feel like I've really accomplished something here today . . .

Birthday Extravaganza and Stylin' Eclipse Glasses

I'm so far behind on this whole blogging thing!  I just realized I had a whole folder of pictures from the Annie & Ellie's family birthday party from a couple weeks ago that I hadn't posted yet.  It was also the day of the eclipse, and my Dad had brought handfuls of welder's lens for us to look through, which was very cool. 

Annie and Ellie got a karaoke machine for their birthdays. (Birthdays one day apart = shared birthday presents.  I'll probably have to pay for counseling later.)  Isaac was possibly the biggest fan.  The kids sang for awhile before everyone showed up for the party.

 Man, this kid is cute!

 The girls opening their gifts.

 My niece, Miss Bailey Boo

 The girls jumping on top of Dad on the trampoline.

 Owen and Aunt Star.

  A couple family pictures (minus Isaac, I have no idea where he was when we took these.)  On the second one we all tried to be as crazy as Ellie.  She still wins.

 Still winning the crazy-faced award.

Grandma Ruth and Owen checking out the eclipse.

 David and Talina sharing a lens.

 My cute husband and me during the eclipse viewing.

 Ellie and Isaac would rather jump on the trampoline than worry about what the sun was doing.  Isaac is such a big fan of Grandpa KC!

 Aunt Star, Annie and Aunt Talina.

 Not approved for checking out the sun, but the girls were still super excited for their new swimming goggles!

Five Months Old & May Randomness

It's been a crazy last few weeks.  My little sister Lacy got engaged to Ben (or "Uncle Ben" as the girls are excitedly squealing from time to time.)  The girls birthdays.  Greg worked a ton.  A TON.  Then he worked out of town.  My friend Rachel had twins.  Then ended up with a postpartum infection that nearly killed her.  Literally.  The one surgeon (from her second emergency surgery, the hysterectomy) told us they lost her on the table for a minute.  I spent almost all day at the hospital with her for days, and Greg would bring me the baby to nurse every 2-3 hours.  She's home now, and moving forward with a long, difficult recovery.  Greg's Grandma Verla was also in the hospital, and was getting progressively weaker during this same time, and she peacefully passed away at home on Memorial Day.  My birthday was yesterday (Greg's is Sunday), and then we think life will mellow out for awhile . . . right?

Anyway, today I realized that Owen is now 5 months old.  (As of yesterday).  So some picture taking was in order . . . (he's in the middle two pictures, Annie's the outside ones -- they remind me the most of each other out of all my kids.)

We still have another month of school left, but Annie got her Kindergarten Graduation pictures.  Which crack me up, 'cause it looks like the photoshopped her head on to an adult (with childish hands) body.

Ellie and Isaac

Ellie and Owen -- she is starting to warm up this whole 'big sister' gig a bit more.

My smiley five month old!  (Who is NO where near sitting up on his own, and seems to have COMPLETELY forgotten how to roll over, despite once being fairly proficient.  He is the LAZIEST baby ever and pretty much is just held, cuddled, nursed or sleeping all day) :-)

My girls at their birthday party -- Ellie's four and Annie's six now!

 At six years old Annie is over 43 inches, at 16% on the charts.  Her weight is 46 and a half pounds, at 62% on the charts.  Ellie is still pretty tiny, at 3% for height (36.42 inches), they had her weight at 33 pounds (37%), but they weighed her in shoes and everything, and at home she's only around 31.5 pounds, so that seemed high.  (Isaac is now 30 -- they're almost tied.  And he's not two yet!) Annie's reading blew away the doctor, and Ellie's bubbly enthusiasm and energy cracked the doctor up.  She commented that both girls are really solid, with incredible muscle mass for their ages, and they're obviously pretty active.  Said as Ellie bounced around the room like an energizer bunny on a trampoline.  I proudly told her Annie's been going on 1 mile and longer bike rides up and down some pretty intense hills lately.  They both play outside and play hard ALL DAY LONG.  It's hard to get dinner served before 6:30 or 7:00 now 'cause they're having so much fun playing.

Cousin Bailey making out with Isaac's head -- these two have SUCH a cute relationship.  He's kinda protective of her, constantly fetching toys and getting mad at anyone who upsets her, and he sits there mildly amused or at least passive while she mauls his head.

The girls with the kids we invited to their party -- i.e., the people who's houses we can see from ours!  At one point there were an extra four or five of the neighbor boys hanging out on the bouncy house too -- all these kids come from two streets!

My chunky monkey.

Bailey and Owen are so freaking cute.

Smiley baby!

Mother's Day!  Sandbox flooding is a must at our Mother's Day celebrations!

Mother's Day is extra important when you have a missionary out of country who gets to Skype -- they girls were so giggly when they saw Uncle Cody!  Isaac didn't really get what was up, and obviously doesn't recognize Cody 'in person', but as soon as we had Cody say the same message that's recorded in to Isaac's teddy bear, Isaac's eyes bugged out and he broke in to a huge grin and whispered, "Cody Bear?"  SO CUTE!

May Facebook Updates:

May 31st - Yesterday, around 12:30 in the afternoon, I said to Isaac, "OK Bug, it's probably time to get out of your pajamas!" To which pouted, "No Mom! It not time for pants yet. No pants. Not yet! It not time for pants yet!" Dude, it's after noon. It's totally time for pants.

May 23rd - Annie was telling me about how she's conquered her nail biting habit, then she added, "And I NEVER bite my toenails . . . it's disgusting. And it takes a lot of hard work to get your feet up to your mouth."

"I don't think that spider will come back now," declared Annie after ushering a spider outside, "I keep defeating him!" Possibly had to be here, but her proudly stating that she kept 'defeating' him was hilarious.

May 21st - Annie during prayer tonight, "And please bless that Ellie will start saying her R's right, instead of saying them like W's."
This child is REALLY concerned about her sister's speech problems . . . she's started doing 'speech school' with Ellie, rewarding her with little bits of candy or cereal every time she pronounces an 'R' correctly. I have NO idea where she came upon this idea, or how she's latched onto the idea of 'curing' Ellie's problem, but it's kinda funny, and disturbing :-)

May 19th - I bought two dozen cupcakes for the girls' birthday parties this weekend. Isaac found them this morning and threw them to the floor. Deep breaths . . .

 May 18th - I left Isaac with my sister Talina while I ran to the store -- when I came home, he ran to the door, threw his arms around my leg tightly (and didn't let go for a minute or two) and said, "Mom! You home! Mom! I am SO happy!" It was the sweetest thing in the world.
And I now suspect Talina beats him while I'm gone. :-P
(Later he was pointing at baby Bailey and teasing, "You barely napped Bay! You barely napped!" He speaks so weird for a one year old.)

May 17th - Annie talking to a friend: "Ya know, I really love being five. Everything about it." Sighs deeply, then adds, "I'm gonna miss this when we're six . . ."

May 16th - I left my sister with my kids for an hour or so while I went to the school to finish up something for Annie's teacher . . . between my four kids, her one, and the neighbors, at one point she had fourteen kids at my house. Good thing we're not a daycare, or that would've been illegal :-)

May 11th - Earlier while I was changing a blow out diaper, Annie was whining about something I'd asked her to do. "Do YOU want to come change this diaper while I do your chores?" I asked. Sheepishly she replied, "No, I don't want to clean up diapers."
Ellie helpfully called out from her room, "Mom, not nobody wants to do what you do!"
That does seem to be the consensus.

May 6th - Grandma Karine was dropping off the girls after a sleepover, and as they were walking inside I said, "Hurry Ellie, we are going to Grandma Ruth's house." Ellie cheers, " Yay that's my favorite grandma!" BWAH HA HA HA! Poor grandma Karine!

May 5th - Worst words in the English language "Look Mom! I got basaleen!" (Vaseline). He had it alright -- in his hair, on his head, face, hands, legs, the couch, the carpet . . . I think I'm going to cry.  (After four different attempts to wash the Vaseline out of Isaac's hair (four different kind of soaps), I just shaved his head . . .)

May 4th - Annie is officially a huge fan of "Choose Your Own Adventure" books . . . in particular the historical ones. She's fascinated with the Underground Railroad right now, and they have "Choose Your Own Adventure" one where you get to pick whether you're the runaway slave, the abolitionist or the slave catcher. We'd exhausted the first two options, when she finally chose to do one of the 'slave catcher' adventures -- her response, "Mom, what is WRONG with these people?!"

May 1st - Apparently I have not done enough puzzles with Isaac -- I just got one out, and I was taking apart the puzzle, so we can put it back together, and he started screaming, "NOOOO! No Mom! Don't break it! Don't break it apart! Don't break Elmo apart!"

How do you know Annie's off track? 'Cause it's 7:40AM and she's already come up with FOUR DIFFERENT CHARTS she wants us to make (a chore chart, a reading chart, a prayer chart and a teeth brushing chart . . . I should start charging her for all my graphic design services!) :-)

Karaoke-okie

My girls just celebrated their birthdays -- and like Mother's Day, I need to catch up on the blogging of such things.  But for now, here's videos taken of the kids playing with the girls' main present, a karaoke machine.  Isaac FELL IN LOVE (I should've known, he sings more than the rest of my toddlers ever did, he totally belts out songs in the car, and he can sing several a'capella, and several dozen more along with CDs in the car.)  He kept asking to 'karaokie-okie', and asking for the 'microphone' anytime he hadn't had one in his hand in the last 30 seconds.  So, here's videos of my little performers . . . one of these days I'll post actual stories and pictures!