Happy Birthday Luke - in Sept.

 Luke turned one on September 8th.  How has it already been a year??  He is such a cutie, and he's grown up so much through the year.  I guess that's an obvious statement, haha.  But really, he was our hardest baby by far.  Whether that was his personality or just the stage of life we are in, he was hard.  He barely learned to sleep this summer.  Before that he'd go to bed at around 11 pm, and be up a few times through the night, and wake at 7.  Then he'd take one, MAYBE 2 half hour naps.  Very hard.  He was also sick with a constant cough and congestion for about 4 months.  That just added stress to my life, and it made it harder for him to sleep too.  BUT - he's gotten so much easier.  He's still a busy boy, and still doesn't sleep as much as I'd like, but at least he goes to bed at a decent hour, and he takes a 2 hour- usually- nap each day. 
He really is so much fun.  He can be feisty when he doesn't get what he wants, or if his brother or sisters take something that he wants.  He loves to tease and laugh with them too.  He started walking around his birthday.  He'd been cruising for a while, but he really took off about a week or two before his birthday.
This boy has rhythm.  Whenever he hears music, even if it's just as we're driving in the car he starts bobbing his head to the beat.  He dances with the music too.  I just love it.  He and Rebecca play really well together.  She likes to take care of him.  Hayden also loves sharing a room with him, unless he's crying too much at night.  A lot of times Luke will wake up at the same time as Hayden, and Hayden just takes him out of his crib and they go play together in the living room for a bit, and let me rest a little longer.  Ah, such great boys.  He's kind of a picky eater.  He mainly just likes his milk, chicken nuggets, and macaroni and cheese.  We're trying to branch out(:  He's such a fun boy, and we just love him.  He's added so much to our family.  Happy Birthday Luke!!

Sydney starts preschool

Sydney has been looking forward to starting preschool since last year, when we'd take Rebecca every week.  She is going to the same preschool- Federated Preschool.  I absolutely love it there.  She has one of the same teachers that Rebecca had last year, even though she's just in the 3-4 class.  She has already learned so much and I love to catch her singing all the songs she learns as she's playing with her toys. 
Ah, love this girl!

Nov. 8

Today I am thankful for pistacios.  Yumm!!  Yeah, this is a really deep post tonight(:  But they sure are delicious!

Nov. 7

Today I am thankful for my family.  I was able to talk with my mom and a few sisters today and I am so thankful for my relationship with them.  Thankful for my mom and her selflessness.  Her joy is her family, and I'm thankful to be a part of that. 

Nov. 6

I'm getting a little behind on this...
For Nov. 6th I am thankful for seasons.  I really grew to love the weather in Las Vegas - except the summers.  I don't think you ever get used to 113* heat, but Christmas had it's own feel, even without the snow.  That being said, I do love seeing the seasons change again.  There are so many trees and the colors of October were absolutely beautiful!  Don't know that I'll ever get used to negative temps here in the winter, but I do like the seasons.

Day 5

Today I am thankful for exercise, and specifically my gym.  I WAY overate my Halloween candy this weekend and I didn't want to go to the gym, but went before I had time to talk myself out of it.  It felt so good to go, and I really love that there is free babysitting at the gym.  The gym membership was my Christmas present last year, and seriously, probably the best present.  It gave me a little break last year when Jerry was so, so busy at school and I was with the kids 24/7.  I knew I at least had a bit of time to myself.

Day 4

Today I am thankful for music.  I am the choir director in my ward...again.  As usual with ward choirs it is hard to get a good turn out, but today we actually had a full choir there and we practiced music for our Christmas program and I absolutely LOVED it!  Music makes me happy.

Day 3

Today I was able to VOTE!! YAY!!!  I had to wait in line for an hour to do the early voting, but I heard others say that when they waited till Tuesday last time they had to wait 4 hours in line.  Either way, I gladly waited in line for that hour so that I could cast my ballot. 
I am thankful to live in a free country where I have the right to vote and have my voice/opinion heard!!


GO MITT!!!

Day 2

I am thankful for my bed.  Oh, how I love sleep!! (:  I just don't get enough of it.

A month of Thanksgiving!

I did this a couple years ago, and I like seeing what others write on Facebook, so I'm going to try to keep up with it and write my list of 30 "Thankfulls" for the month of November. 

So... For November 1st I am so thankful for my WONDERFUL husband!  He's a great father and husband.  Jerry is so good to me and I am lucky to have him.  He has so many great qualities about him, but one of my favorite is how fun and funny he is.  I just have fun being with him, whether we're just hanging at home watching tv or out on a big date.  I just have fun with him.  And even now he's in the other room playing funny music for the kids and dancing with them.  Just FUN!  And he makes me laugh every day.  I think I'm funny, but I got nothing on him.  He is hilarious!  Thanks for keeping me happy hun!

First Day of School

Hayden's class at Open House

Rebecca's class at Open House

The kids started school the Tuesday after we got back to town.  They were so excited!  Hayden started second grade and Rebecca is in full day Kindergarten.  

Love, love, love this picture!  It is so her!

Isn't he just such a handsome boy?! 

Getting on the bus

 They both had a great first day.  Hayden kept commenting for several days how good his class is, and how quiet the class is.  Hayden knew a few kids from his class last year.  His class seems to earn parties every couple weeks.  Just little reward parties.  They are a very good class. 
I get the impression that Rebecca has a rowdy class.  She gives me the list every day of who had to flip a card - the behavior system.  She has been a little angel.  She loves school, and gets excited to go every day.  I actually heard from a friend of mine that saw her at lunch and she wondered if Rebecca was liking school because she didn't say a word at all during lunch.  I got a little concerned that she maybe didn't have friends, or if she was liking it ok.  Rebecca acted like nothing was wrong.  The more I've talked with her I'm realizing maybe she's a bit like me in that in new situations she can be very quiet.  Rebecca really wants to be on her best behavior.  It did take her about 2 weeks to adjust to the full day schedule.  She was very tired and emotional about little things at first, but now she's fully in the groove.

Luke's Birthday Book

Click here to view this photo book larger

Shutterfly photo books are the new way to preserve your memories. Create your own today.

This is a book I made on Shutterfly for Luke's 1st year of life!

PARTY TIME!!!

One of the best things about going to UT is all the parties!  If I lived in UT no one would throw a big party just because I'm around, but when they haven't seen me for a long time, it's a great excuse for a party!  It also helps that I coordinated my visit along with a couple other siblings that were visiting from out of town. 

The night of the opening ceremonies for the Olympics we had a huge family party.  All my siblings except Mary and John were there.  We missed them:(  But it was great seeing everyone.

The next day we had our annual Sisters' Favorite Things party.  I look forward to this every summer - even though it is getting very hard trying to find something new each year, that is my favorite.  I just love learning all the new things about my sisters and getting lots of fun goodies.  It's better than Christmas - well, almost:) 

All of us hanging out and visiting before the sister party.

I was also able to get together with my girlfriends.  We have been friends since 7th grade.  So fun to get together.  I love these girls!!

I went up to Logan one day to go to the Opera at the Capitol theater.  It was My Fair Lady.  We had total nosebleed seats- very last row.  But it was still so much fun.

Afterwards you could go see the cast.  Look who happened to be there.  Elder L. Tom Perry.  Kinda cool seeing him.

Elder L. Tom Perry

We are family friends with the Ballams.  It was fun seeing Michael and Vanessa - his daughter in the musical. 

We had several other parties with the family.  I was also able to spend some one on one time with each of my siblings and their families.  It was a great vacation.
We stayed at my brother, Joseph's house.  We had to get a picture of the 6 oldest before we left.  It will be fun to line them up like this again next time and see the changes:) 



Hayden was so, so sad to leave.  He cried and cried:(

 We left Tuesday morning (7th)  We were going to leave Monday but had car problems.  Love spending lots of unexpected $$ on an already expensive trip right/?  On the Tuesday we drove to Colorado and stayed with my brother, Dave and his family.  Wed. we drove to Kansas and stayed with my sister, Mary.  We stayed up so late visiting, but it was so worth it.  Great talking with my sister!  Thursday we drove to Springfield, Ill. then home on Friday.  It was a long drive, and a long time to be away from home.  Everyone was happy to sleep in their own beds - or at least in mom's bed:)

Lagoon

One of our favorite places to go when we're in Utah is Lagoon.  Nostalgia for both me and Jerry, and we're determined to make it a wonderful "memory" place for our kids.  The kids were very sad that Jerry couldn't be there with us.  We were actually able to go twice because of Stake Lagoon day for family, which meant I could get in for free and just do a walk around pass, which you normally have to pay to go in, even if you don't ride anything.  And the next week we "bounced back" for cheap.  What made it even more fun was being able to go with cousins because they have season passes. 

Sydney and Hayden on the dragon fly

Hayden was so sweet and wanted to ride with his little cousin, Tanner for the ride.

Ah, what a sweet boy!

I love this picture of Hayden and his cousins walking

The kids got completely soaked, then rode it 2 more times - dripping wet!!

Love, love, love this picture of all the cousins at Lagoon

Treehouse Children's Museum

 While we were in UT we went to the Treehouse Children's Museum in Ogden.  I went with Angela and kids, and met my friend, Sunni and her kids.  It was so much fun.  I was amazed at what a HUGE museum it was, and the kids just loved it.  My kids, like most, LOVE dressing up.  They were in new costumes every few minutes.  We spent several hours there.  They probably would have even loved staying a few more, but Luke was beyond tired, and everyone was starting to get hungry.  I guess every day at 1 there is a children's theater.  The kids go to the theater room and they can be in the play.  They have costumes and go up onto stage to act out the play.  Hayden, Rebecca, Ethan, Alex, and Sunni's son, Cael all got to be in the play.  Whew.  Huge relief that they got to be in it.  They would have been so sad.  Sydney was a little sad, but she dealt ok with it.  Hayden got to be the main rancher of the play.  I never realized what a little ham he is till he was up there.  Improvising a bit and adding his own silliness.

 

Future president in the oval office??

Hayden, Mr. Rancher

The cast!

Sydney thought she'd died and gone to heaven.  She played "mombaby" for the longest time. 

Sydney and Luke