April 13, 2014

Not a lot of pictures this week.  Tommy finally figured out Peek-a-Boo.  He loves to play it all the time and now it is a great distraction when he starts to get grumpy.  He smacks his hands to his face so hard, it sounds like it hurts.  But he always laughs.  He must be teething again because he has been grumpy this week and has been waking a night - which makes Mom grumpy.  Hopefully these teeth will come in faster than the first few.  It has been a long six months of teething!

Mommy has been doing a no sweets or treats challenge with some friends.  So the kids and I have been eating a lot of fruit this week.  We also started a clean eating challenge for six days.  We're trying to avoid overly processed foods.  The good news is, our family eats pretty clean already.  It's the little things like goldfish crackers and chocolate milk that we like to indulge in.  The clean eating challenge has not been too hard, but the no treats one really is a challenge.  Mommy is craving chocolate like a crazy person.  Only seven more days to go!

To help distract myself from wanting chocolate I took the kids to the nursery to choose some flowers for the yard.  All the brown grass doesn't do much to make it feel like spring where we live.  Annie wanted a rainbow of colors.  After Mommy spent Thursday and Friday weeding and cleaning out all the flower beds, we planted the flowers as a family Friday night.

The dandelions are blooming!  Every day the girls are sent out to make a bouquet for Mommy.  We even hired the neighborhood kids on Saturday to pick them for a penny a piece.   Hopefully we won't have so many this year.

Saturday morning we took the kids to an Easter egg hunt at our dentist's office.  They had three different hunts for different age groups.  The kids had fun.  It was great to hunt in grass rather than snow like the past two Easters.

Friday morning Jeremy gave a funny speech in his Toastmaster's club about all the annoying and loud toys our kids have.  He won best speech for the week and had everyone laughing.  Sunday morning Jeremy spoke in church.  The kids were rowdy so I didn't get to hear much of it, but our friends said he did a nice job.

April 06, 2014

The snow from last weekend was able to hang on through Tuesday.  On Monday morning the kids ventured out to play in it with the neighbors.  I think our area needs to schedule "Spring Break" in May rather than March.

Tommy is trying to feed himself more often.  He prefers forks - and he wants a real, grown up fork - not the baby ones.  We let him try pancakes.  He did a good job and he was so proud of himself.

Tommy is walking a lot now.  And the trouble has doubled!  Jeremy installed some cabinet locks for me after a scare we had last week.  I had to give Tommy the Heimlich because he was choking on a hair clip he found in the girls' bathroom.  He was gasping and vomitting with every whack and thrust from Mommy.  We just couldn't figure out what was in his throat until it came shooting out.  It was terrifying.  Thank goodness Mommy knows how to do the Heimlich Maneuver on infants!  
Tommy knows which drawers don't have locks and he goes right for them, quickly pulling everything out while Mommy is busy trying to do sister's hair.  He is a busy boy.

Dinnertime shenanigans......the girls love to make their cups stick to their faces with suction.

Tommy now has five teeth - two on the bottom and three on top.  It is hard to capture the top teeth in pictures but if you look closely you can see them in this one.

 On Saturday some neighbors invited us for a birthday party.  They had a bouncy house, horse rides, tons of food, and lots of friends.  The weather was not very cooperative.  We all kept running inside to dodge the freezing wind and spring rains.  Then we'd hurry back out when there was a sunshine break.  Lily and Annie loved the horses.

 

It was difficult to get much out of General Conference this weekend with our hooligans and their shenanigans.  It seemed like they would be totally calm and sweet during the breaks and just before or after every session, but as soon as each session began.....so did the shenanigans! They were fighting, crying, making messes, asking us a million questions, you name it.  We can't wait until they are teenagers and just want to sleep through conference.  Maybe then we'll get to hear some of it.

After a frustrating experience trying to get anything out of General Conference on Saturday.  Mommy was determined to keep the kiddos happy and busy on Sunday.  We tried watercolor painting and peanut butter playdough.  Those helped a lot.  Plus Annie and Tommy fell asleep during one of the sessions which made it a lot quieter.  In the afternoon we sent them out with sidewalk chalk and put them on the hunt for dandelions.  In October we will need to come up with more ideas to keep them reverently entertained.  Thank goodness for Pinterest!  Mommy found lots of ideas already.

Following the Sunday afternoon session, we took the kids to the Idaho Falls Temple.  We needed sunshine and exercise!  Last year the grounds were redone.  It was neat to see the new sitting areas and flower beds.  There are tons of tulip and daffodil bulbs just beginning to emerge.  There were so few flowers that it was an adventure just trying to find flowers.  We need to go back in a couple of weeks to see all the blooms. 

Notice Annie in the above picture lifting her dress to show off her boots?  She LOVES these boots.  She wears them every day.  One night when it was her turn to say the family prayer these were her exact words: "I thank Thee for my new pink boots that zip up. I thank Thee for Mommy helping me zip my boots".  It will be a sad day when she is too big for the boots.

The weather was beautiful.  Sunny and warm enough to go without heavy coats.  Lily was really interested in the crocus flowers.  Tommy had fun walking on his own, but we couldn't trust him for long.  His heart's desire was to eat or pull up every pansy he found.  Lily kept spinning and running through the grounds singing "Let It Go".  Every day is a "Frozen" fantasy in our family.

March 30, 2014

 We had to say goodbye to Puna and Papa Monday morning.  The kids handled it very well.  After a week of grandparent visits I was worried how the kids would handle just being with mom again.  Thankfully they were happy to get back to our routine and we had a wonderfully normal week.

Lily drew this picture of our family with chalk on the driveway.  I thought it was a picture of Papa, Lily, Puna, and Annie.  After I asked Lily to tell me more about the picture she explained that it is (from left to right) Daddy, Mommy, Puna, and Lily. I love the big brown eyes and beautiful curls she gave Puna.

I decided we needed a project on Monday to help us get into Spring.  The girls planted some seeds.  Annie had basil and Lily had cilantro.  They can't wait to see the seeds sprout.  Every day they want to water and look at their seeds.  Just this Sunday morning we are seeing some tiny green sprouts.

Lily wanted to be the gymnastics photographer again this week.  I love the running shot on the left.  Annie's teacher set up a big obstacle course for the kids.  Annie had a great time.

Ahhh!  Sunshine and temps above 50 degrees meant lots of outside playing time.  The grass is even starting to turn green.  It felt so good to get outside and play.

Our sweet little bumblebee in another dance performance.  There was a last minute cancellation in a program at the local high school.  Lily's dance class was called in to fill the spot just the day before the performance.  The girls did a great job.  Lily had fun performing and getting to watch the high school dance team perform too.

Tommy can't live without this mesh teether.  I've been filling it with frozen fruits all week to give him something cold to chew and help his top teeth break through.

I think the kids are so cute first thing in the morning with their tired eyes and messy hair.  This picture is from Friday.  It was so great to spend my birthday with these cuties!  Ten years ago I thought we might never be blessed with children of our own creation.  And now we have these little ones.  Turning 35 isn't so bad when I have these faces to love every day.

On my birthday, Jeremy and I went out to dinner and then watched "The Savior of the World" at BYU-Idaho.  We were so impressed with the performance, but we had a couple of loud talkers sitting behind us.  Finally during Act II, Jeremy and I had had enough.  We turned around at exactly the same time and told them to pipe down.  After the show everyone around us thanked us for saying something.  I felt bad having to say something, but they were truly ruining the reverence of the show for everyone around them.

I always love the last week of March because it is filled with memories of when Jeremy and I started dating.  The night of the show we walked around a little and reminisced.  The past 15 years have gone by so quickly.  I feel so blessed with how my life has turned out and I am thankful for all my family and friends.  

My favorite gifts were: new running shoes from Jeremy, an immersion blender from the Halls, three free babysitting coupons from Brady so Jeremy and I can go to the temple, and curtains for my two kitchen windows from the Wanners.  The pictures don't do the curtains justice.  They are very cute in person and help coordinate my kitchen and living room so well.  I was totally spoiled!

Just when we had started to hope Spring had arrived, we were hit with a blizzard!  Sunday morning we woke up to four inches of snow.  Then another two inches fell before we left for church at 10:00.  The girls were excited.  Tommy.......not so much!  If you look closely you can see him crying in the background of all the pictures. He was mostly mad that I set him down in the cold to help the girls make a snowman.  Usually our snow is powdery and dry which makes it nearly impossible to build a snowman.  This snow was heavy and wet and packed easily. I didn't want to miss out on the chance to help make a snowman.  Once he was built, I took Tommy inside.  Lily and Annie played for a long time.  When they came in, they were soaked through and very cold.  Dry clothes and hot cocoa warmed them up right away.

I couldn't end this week's post with Tommy crying.  So here's one I snapped after church today.  He looked so dapper in his sweater vest from Puna.  Daddy is not a fan of the pink shirt.  But I think it looks great.  It is size 12-18 months and fits him perfectly.  He was so interested in his slice of cucumber that I couldn't get him to look at the camera. I love our handsome little boy!