Dallin Quote and Mommy Stuff

Overheard:
To Eden:  "You, Tanner, Carter, and Lily, we are all friends that live together!"

We are still plugging away around here.  Life is highly structured, highly enforced, highly rewarded and highly consequenced.  I even have my own schedule that I am to follow.  I have to in order to make it all happen for everyone else and keep the house going.  We are seeing a lot of good things happening, but I am still waiting for things to get easier.  I would love to see things running like a well oiled machine, but I have no idea how long it all takes, if ever.  Dallin and Eden have both earned dates with us and had a great time.  We have also officially survived our first grounding. 

I am not a naturally structured person, I am just not.  Many of my 101 goals address those issues. I know I have my strengtts but structure is not one of them.When I pictured being a mom, I thought then it would come for sure out of necessity.  I have tried.  I am really good at making charts and schedules.   But the busier we get and the larger we get, fumbling through the best we can isn't working any more.  Necessity is here with big huge waving flags now.  Parenting is serious stuff and for sure not something I want to mess up.  So we are working more on teaching habits, work, obedience, and respect around here.  This is not the fun stuff I prefer, but I want these little people to turn out to be wonderful adults with all these qualities.  So, as I work with them, I am working on myself as well.  When your job is a mom, there is no one to report to really, no place to show up and work from 9-5.  It is not clear cut and it can be whatever you make it. It all has to come from internal motivation.

So heres hoping that I will start to feel these changes internally as well as externally soon.

The Post Holiday Blues

I know this is another post without pictures.  I haven't really taken many pictures lately, because my hard drive is completely full, I don't have access to PS and it has all become a big hassle.  But, hopefully, I will get things in order soon because I really miss that outlet in my life a lot! I am looking forward to that. 

Also, we have been so busy, I haven't had much time to think about it.  After the holidays, it has been almost like starting a new school year with getting the gets back in their routines.  Thank goodness for the Accountable Kids program. We had gotten out of the habit completely for a while, but it has helped so much for getting on track with the school aged kids. The kids are now expected to follow their morning, afternoon, and evening schedules. Dallin and Eden will both be earning their special dates today if all goes well.  I think I worked so hard to make the holidays fun and special this year that for 3 months I lost a bit of focus.

I think a good way to describe our house lately is, hyper color.  Peter and I both realized how slack we were getting with the kids and not following through nearly enough.  We were so busy with celebrating the holidays that things had slowly spiraled downward.  It is not easy to juggle so many kids and at times like these, I really see that. As parents, we have to stay focused and give 100%. We are going through a phase of a lot of disrespect and ignoring and talking back with most of the kids all at once and it just isn't working. On top of that there are some behavioral issues that we have had to address at school.  So, now that we are back into the swing of things, the kids have resisted more structure and we are still in the "it gets worse before it gets better" place.  I have to work with the kids every step of the way through their schedules which takes up a lot of my day right now.  It is good though, I just look forward to them flying on their own eventually. 

Because of all the focus on the littles, I haven't gotten as far as I was thinking with getting organized.  It will happen, just more slowly, which is fine because I feel good when I stay focused on what is most important.  I enjoy them more and feel like I am doing my job.  Man, parenting is hard work.  I never thought it would be so hard.  You can't just teach your children something and think they will perfectly follow that principle. It is amazingly hard to teach children obedience. You have to teach it every day, over and over, and hope that eventually they will get it. And it doesn't take long to lose those values, like only a matter of days if you don't have the right structure in place.  Being a mom is the hardest thing I have EVER done.  I hope in another week we will have things running more smoothly around here.  Please tell me I am not the only one that has these struggles.

I don't mean this post to be whiny, it is just what life is like right now.  I don't feel sorry for myself, I am so blessed and love life and all it's challenges.  I wouldn't change what I have for anything.  It is pretty much a whole lot of joy mixed with a whole lot of work and frustration right now, but I am up for the challenge. Sorry for all the jumbled thoughts, they just kinda came out that way.

A Project for Luke

Every time I read a letter from Luke(Peter's brother) who is on a mission in the Philippians, he talks about eating rice all the time.  Last week I woke up at 4:30am with a sick baby and started thinking about that.  Even after things settled down and I was back in bed, I couldn't stop thinking about how to help Luke eat a little better.  An hour later, I finally got up and went to Winco to work on a care package.  I found lots of sauce mixes and seasoning packets and spices that he wouldn't be able easily to get there. I want put together some very simple recipes with common ingredients to send him with it.  I also got a small measuring cup and spoons and a bread pan for his toaster oven to bake with.  This isn't just a care package with easy convenience foods that will only last one meal, I want to help him learn how to cook so he can have more variety. 

So over the next week or so, I will be collecting very basic recipes to send him.  Here are a few ideas so far:

spaghetti, biscuits, taco soup, banana bread, rice casserole, gravy, white sauce, chocolate sauce, hot chocolate, stir fry, spanish rice, fried rice, meat loaf. 

I could really use some help with this, so please, please send me some recipes, however simple.  It should be scaled to about a 2 person serving though.

cillaeatscheese@yahoo.com

101 Goals Update

I updated my progress on my goals!  I'm not as far as I was hoping to be, but hey, we took the holidays to a whole new level this year so we have been BUSY.  There are several in progress:

3. have whole house organized for at least one day.
6. be 10 minutes early to church for 3 months.
11. Complete "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" (with Eden)
26. Frame and hang kids pictures (they are ready, I just need to hang them.
28. No fast food for 3 months
34. 30 minute scripture study for a month
39. Sing 3 solos (one down 2 to go)
80. Follow Body for Life exercise for 3 months
83. Study D&C with manual

And a few less completed:
25. Get and mp3 player.  I got an Ipod Touch on black friday for my Christmas.  I love it so much, how did I ever live without it?
64. Decorate for Christmas. I wrote about this already.
66. Finish Christmas advent calendar and plan activities.  We had so much fun with this and I even helped 12 ladies at church make their own calendar.

I hope to start getting through these a lot faster now that we are back to the grind around here.

A New Year

For the first time we had not just one but three kids stay up until midnight!  We enjoyed our night hanging out playing games with Peter's family and then we snuck over to my Uncle's house a couple of minutes away to say hi to my parents and relatives.  We left the younger ones asleep and the older kids watching a movie.

We got back a couple of minutes after midnight and everyone was out in the yard making noise.  When we walked up they re-did their countdown and Dallin jumped off the trampoline into my arms and gave me the biggest hug.  It was so stinkin cute.

With a new year ahead I have been reflecting on the last year and getting excited about whats ahead.  The last year has been quite a roller coaster, but overall full of joy. Even if I haven't reached all my goals in life yet, I did make some considerable improvements in my life, which is the most important thing.

This next year I hope to continue my early morning exercising for sure.  I plan to keep working on my 100 goals that I have made for myself.  I have been working on several of them.  Some have been successful and some I have to start over.  We have been without fast food for 2 months now (well, maybe a couple of minor slip ups, but that's life).  It has required more planning ahead so that we don't have a hungry family when we are out, but the benefits are great.  I especially like how it has plugged a leaky hole in the money bucket for sure.  We didn't eat it all the time, but enough that I wanted to quit the habit.  I missed it a bit at first, but now the thought of it kinda grosses me out.  My only exception is Taco Bell.  I really like that gross stuff. Overall, it is no big deal though.

It was weird not to sit down and create a new years resolution.  It is already all there, just need to chip away at it.  I want to just do them all at once, but it doesn't work that way.  So I am going to attack a big one in the month of January. Goal #3: Have every space in the house, attic and garage organized for at least a day.  I am pretty much going to be noncommittal about everything until it is all done. Saturday we took down all of our Christmas decorations so I started off by organizing all of that stuff.  Then I was on a roll so I did the TV room downstairs and attacked the kids art/school room with a label maker.  It felt so nice to get that done, I can't wait to get more done. 

I am dreading the office and ESPECIALLY the garage.  Yikes.  I have many tubs of outgrown kids clothing to sort and label.  A few months ago, I had just had it with toys all over the house and took literally 90% of them out to the garage in unsorted laundry baskets.  5 different ages and different genders makes for an overabundance.  Most of the toys were not being played with anyway and I just cracked one day. The kids have begged me to bring them back, but I resisted and then it seemed like Christmas would bring a lot of replacements anyway so I held out other than a few here things here and there.   So out in the garage, other than the laundry area, you can't even walk through it.  I am most excited about my kitchen though.  Every cupboard needs an overhaul. I really do like organizing, it is cleaning that I could do without (hey, I can dream).  With all the daily maintenance around here I just don't seem to get deep enough to organize very often. So this goal makes it top priority, yay! I have got my label maker and I not afraid to use it!

Today we switched from 9am church to 1pm.  That is drastic.  I usually don't like late church, but that was before we were getting 7 of us out the door.  Usually by the time we have all the kids dressed and fed and diaper bags packed, I end up throwing on an outfit and some lip stick and running out the door.  That is kinda sad because it is usually the one day of the week that I really want to look nice.  So now I can have time to get ready too! I even had time to comb all the boys hair today AND we were plenty early. 

I spent a lot of time taking kids out as usual.  Today was one of those days that I didn't mind though.  I have to remind myself that it is not about my right now, it is about them.  Being patient comes easy when I do that.  I just take them out and help them learn how to sit still or walk with them. If I get upset because they are not meeting my expectations it is much worse.  I love these guys and I am pretty sure that everyone learns how to sit through a meeting eventually.  Just one week at a time ought to do it...some day.

Christmas 2010

We have been partying nonstop since Thanskgiving!  Much funner than real life I must say.  Here is how our Christmas went:  Christmas Eve: We hosted my family for a party together.  My mom gave the kids their Christmas pajamas which were a huge hit and then we did a gift exchange from our name drawing.  We ate until we were completely stuffed and played games, read a christmas story, and enjoyed our gifts.  It was very "merry and bright". 








All the grandkids except Carter ran out of the picture.


Love this hat she got from a cousin.  Not so much the messy face though.


Tanner really wanted a potato head like the one in Toy Story, so he was very happy.





That night Santa Came to our house!  Peter Santa spread all the gifts out througout the room so that it would look more full.  I think having 5 kids worth of gifts makes it look full. While we were working Dallin woke up and started coming downstairs.  Peter ran up and put him back to bed.  Dallin said he dreamed that there were so many presents that the whole house was full to the ceiling and that he kept looking out the window for Santa, but didn't see him.  It was cute. 





The next morning everyone came down and looked around in awe.  Dallin spotted his telescope that he desperately hoped for right away!


Annual stair picture.


Tanner and Carter got a duplo table stuffed with duplos.  All the kids just loved it and played with it all day.  A huge hit (and one of the cheapest second hand gifts).





Tanner got so excited every time he opened a Toy Story character.  He kept wondering about Woody though.  After a while, I slyly stuck that package behind the couch so that his anticipation would build until the end.


We tried to just open one gift at a time in turn and enjoy each one for a while so that we could savor everything.  This worked for a couple of hours, but toward the end Dallin just couldn't wait anymore.  One of his many space toys.





Carter also got Toy Story toys, but they are soft, which I thought he would like.  Wrong! He likes Tanner's way better.  I wished I had gotten them both the same ones.


Eden really wanted a snow globe music box thing.  This one is very girly and she loves it.

She also loves these ultra colorful, sparkly light up shoes.


After it was all over, Tanner was starting to panick that he had not gotten Woody, and then I "found" his last package.  It was worth the wait!





Eden's big gift was an art easel.  It is so perfect for her right now, but the other kids like it too.  They all got their own toys, but all really kind of share with everyone too.  I really like that about them (except when they are fighting over them.)













Seeing these pictures makes me miss it already.  It went too fast.  It is so fun to shower children with gifts once a year. 
Christmas Gift Themes-Dallin: SpaceEden: ArtTanner: Toy StoryCarter: Toy StoryLily: Happy to be there


After all of our festivities, we went to Peter's parents and played around all day.  This is their new video game that doesn't use a controller.





Bananagrams, one of our very favorites.





A couple of days later we went to Fort Stevens near the beach and stayed in this HUGE 100 year old 6000 square foot house.  It was very well preserved and felt like an old hotel.  It was almost creepy feeling, but gorgeous.  We played lots more games and enjoyed ourselves.


At the jette. This is my niece Clare.

Family, family and more family.  What a perfect Christmas.

Full Circle

For a couple of weeks there, I was beginning to think that this year was going to end as crazy as it began.  Last year, at the end of the year, we moved sooner than expected with a new baby, had all kinds of sicknesses, our fridge burned, up and oh lets not forget the HUGE FLOOD in January among other things. 

So things were going fine and dandy around here until I went to get our oil changed and then a week later, the oil light came on.  Bone dry.  I went back to Jiffy Lube and they said it looked bad.  After taking the car to a couple of places for repairs, being car less at home, and quite a bit poorer, we were up and running again. 

Then we had a day of record rain.  It was pouring all day!  In the afternoon I was looking out the window contemplating how much water had come out of the sky, when suddenly I had a dreadful thought.  Our basement does tend to flood when it rains hard. Nothing like a sump pump failure, but enough to have to pull back the carpet and put fans down there.  I ran downstairs to check it out.  Sure enough there was water coming in all along the edge of one side.  I thought it was a good thing I caught it so early.  I went upstairs and called Peter to let him know there was a problem.  He said he was at least an hour and a half away, but he would pack up and start heading home.  I wasn't too panicked at that point.

I went back downstairs and pulled out the handy dandy shop vac.  Then I noticed that there were wet spots on the carpet where the kids had been sitting.  That meant water was getting under the rug pretty far.  I started pulling the carpet back in the spot where the water usually comes in.  I couldn't believe it. Just in those 5 minutes or so a LOT of water had come in and it was still coming fast.  I quickly plugged in the shop vac and started sucking up as much as I could get into the 12 gallon tank.  about 30 seconds later it stopped....it was full!  Okay, I was starting to panic now.

I told the kids that we were having a flood and to go upstairs.  Instead of doing that, they got super excited, like they had heard they were going to Disneyland or something.  They ran around screaming and playing in the water.

 I called Peter back and relayed the urgency of the situation.  He said he would try to call someone in the ward to come help right away until he could get home.  I hung up the phone and looked at the water rising before my eyes.  The vacuum bucket was way to heavy to even lift, let alone carry upstairs to dump.  I knew things were going to get really ugly if I sat around and waited for help, but I had no idea what to do.  I grabbed my phone again and called my brother in law who has helped us with flood situations before.  Now I was in a full panic.  I burst into tears while explaining the situation and told him I just didn't know what to do. 

Luckily I called the right person.  He calmly told me that I needed to dump the water into the sump pump hole and that the pump would get the water out.  I was so grateful for the advice, it felt like a miracle.  I wheeled the vacuum into the next room pulled the wooden box cover off of the pump area and found a 100lb slab of concrete with handles covering the hole.  Thankfully I had adrenaline on my side, and I was able to heft the thing off so that I could have access to the hole.  I was also glad that I have been lifting weights for the last couple of months. 


I dumped the water down the hole and rushed back into the next room to start over.  I vacuumed again until it was full, taking less than a minute and dumped it again.  I could see the water coming in like a little river, it had never come in like that before.  I could barely stay on top of it as I worked as fast as I could to keep sucking water out.  After about 20 times, I was exhausted.  Mostly from trying to lift the heavy bucket over the carpet every time so that I could wheel it over to the sump pump hole. 

Meanwhile the boys had gotten their clothes so wet that they took off their pants, and shirts while they were at it.  And when one boy strips around here, they all do.  One was even naked. But I had no time to deal with it.  I tried to stay calm so that they would, but all the running around and yelling was making me freak out even more.  Eden was good and stayed upstairs and (hopefully) watched Lily. 

Then finally a nice guy from the ward showed up to help.  He started a little pump that sucked the water straight through a hose out the window and I kept vacuuming.  He decided to go outside to see if he could see anything weird going on.  A couple of minutes later, the water stopped coming in!  Or at least the river was gone.  The man came back in and said the dirt there was slanting right towards the house and he had dug a small trench to redirect the water.  Finally I was able to sit down for a minute and catch my breathe.

A couple more people came to help and then Peter finally mad it home.  They all went outside and improved on the trench to redirect the water for about an hour.  Eventually everyone left and the kids went to bed and we still had a wet basement to deal with.  We extracted as much water out of the carpet and padding that we could with the vacuum and pulled pretty much the whole room up so air could circulate. 

The next day we rented a dehumidifier and got more fans going.  Peter and a friend spent hours on the trench making it go all the way out through the front yard.  So much for bulbs I planted last spring! Now it needs to be filled with rocks and covered back up. I hope this is a permanent solution to our flooding woes.  Within a few days everything was dry and put back together.  I guess these things just go with the territory when you have a basement in Oregon.  I would still say it is worth it.  We have 2 huge bonus rooms down there that get used every single day and we love it.  It is why we picked our house.  So a few ugly moments with it are worth it I guess.

Then once we were recovered from that our little Carter started acting strange.  For 2 or 3 days he just layed around doing nothing, not eating much and sleeping quite a bit.  I was baffled because he didn't have a fever, runny nose, diarrhea or anything else that would make me think he was sick.  No one else was acting that way either.  Then about the 4th day, I started to notice that he was having stomach pain.  Every few minutes he would start thrashing around and arch his back and pull on his pajamas.  Oh, that's the other thing, he refused to wear pants so he was living in footsie PJs.  It seemed worse when he would eat or drink so he preferred not to.  By the next day I was giving him water through a syringe because he wouldn't take it any other way.  I was getting really worried because, if he was sick he wasn't getting better yet. 

This continued for another day and we were able to coax him into eating and drinking just enough to keep him going.  After another sleepless night of sleeping with him near me, him waking up every few minutes in pain and me getting up to comfort him and crying with him, I had had it.  He wasn't getting better and I had no idea what was wrong.  At one point he even asked for medicine for his owie.  Okay, this kid must have really been hurting because he absolutely hates medicine.

First thing the next morning we headed to to the ER.  As we walked through the sliding glass doors, and got in line behind someone else, Carter started hurting and thrashing around.  One of the receptionists quickly came out and asked what was going on.  I said he was having stomach pain.  The other receptionist got on the phone and said they were sending a pediatric patient back right now without checking in.  That really got me worrying more. 

They put us in an ER room and immediately got Carter into a gown and on a bed.  They checked all his vitals and started examining him.  They hooked him up to about 4 cords to monitor things. Then they decided that he needed and IV right away.  It was so hard to watch because they had a hard time getting it in.  Poor guy was not happy.  They took blood as well.  Then the Dr. came in and did a few other uncomfortably invasive things to him.  When he wasn't being poked Carter would just lie there until his tummy started hurting again.  It was not at all like a healthy 2 year old would act.  They took us to have an X-Ray which didn't show too much and the testing continued on....and on....and on. All day, they tested him and poked and prodded him in every place imaginable.  They ended up doing a second IV sight on his other hand because they were taking so many blood tests. 

A picture I snapped with my Ipod:

Carter's heart rate was abnormally low as well so that induced a ton of more testing as well.  Luckily Carter had one of his favorite blankies with him that day which became a major comfort mechanism.The Dr. decided to consult with the hospital's pediatrician that was on site because he couldn't figure out what was going on, but obviously something was very wrong.  They did a ultrasound on his heart which came back normal, just a slow heart rate.

Finally after being there all day, the Dr. and the Pediatrician looked more closely at the x-rays of Carters intestines and thought there was a chance that he had something called Intussusception.  That's a mouthful.  It means that his intestines were folding in on themselves like a telescope and causing a lot of pain.  The test for it is a huge enema with liquid that shows up while they simultaneously x-ray his belly.  Interestingly enough, the test is also the cure.

I will just say that after being picked on all day, this was not fun for him.  He had had it. After it was done we went back to the ER room to wait for the results.  With so many feet of intestines, it is really hard to find sometimes and this was such a case.  The Dr. came back and said it was inconclusive.  It had been an hour and I let him know that it was not inconclusive.  Carter was better.  I mean really better.  He was perking up and hadn't had any pain since the test. 

Peter got there right around that time and we waited a while for observation.  Then the Pediatrician came in and said she was going to check us into a hospital room for the night.  No surprises there, we knew they would need to watch him longer.  It was just nice to finally leave the ER after 9 hours.  The pediatric unit was really nice and the nurses were great.  They even let me order food for myself through room service the whole time we were there. 

Carter was tired, super grouchy and also very wiggly now that he was not in pain.  All the chords were very cumbersome to him now and he was really mad about having to stay in his bed.  He was also begging for food, but was only allowed to have jello, juice and Popsicles.  Poor guy finally wanted to eat after almost a week and he couldn't.  Peter left to go home to the other kids and I settled in with Carter.  He was so grouchy about his cords that they finally unhooked him he unhooked himself.  He was over stimulated and over tired which resulted in a lot of tantruming until I finally got him to go to sleep at 10pm.  I went and told the nurses they could hook him back up now that he was asleep.  They said they wanted to wait a half hour to make sure he was really out.  I did not like hearing that, because I was so tired that all I could think about was going to sleep myself.  I went back in the room to lie down and wait for them.  I never heard them come in.

I slept the whole night with only brief moments of consciousness to sounds from the heart rate monitor.  Carter slept in until about 8am.  We both actually got a better night sleep than we had in a couple of days. He was so much better, but a little grouchy still.  He ate a hardy breakfast and started to perk up even more.  He must have had some frustration to take out on someone because he kept taking his arm with the IV taped to a board and whacking me with it.  I felt so bad for everything that he had been through so I didn't fight it too much.  After breakfast we went to a great little playroom they have for patients.  Thank goodness for that!  He was stir crazy and needed to just play.  We spent a lot of the day in there and back in the room watching cartoons.  He eventually started getting over everything and having fun.  He played and played.  By the evening the pediatrician came in and said we could go home.  She had consulted a cardiologist about his heart rate, and confirmed that although it was strangely slow, there was nothing wrong and it could just be him.  We got ready and Carter didn't want to leave.  He felt great and wanted to keep playing with all the toys.

I asked the Dr if this was something that could have been fatal.  She said absolutely and it would not have gotten better on its own. Thank goodness for modern medicine! I was sure a grateful mommy that day.  Grateful that the solution was so simple too. And glad to have Carter back to his normal busy self.

Thankfully, life's challenges seemed to fade away and we thoroughly enjoyed the holidays together. Just the normal craziness of everyday life now.

Guilty!

He's guilty.  I can see it on his face!

The Horse

I got an email from my Aunt recently with this picture in it.  She said that I had gotten this horse for Christmas and was so in love with it while at a family party at Grandma and Grandpa's house.  I begged her to take a picture of me with it and give me the picture.  Well, sure enough 25 years later, here ya go! I didn't remember any of this, but I do look pretty happy about the horse, even though I don't remember him either.  Thanks for making good on your promise Helen, it made my day!

Singalong

One important event for us each year is our annual sing along with my relatives.  We have been doing it for over 20 years now.  My family is VERY musical, to put it mildly.  Everyone brings their song books and there is a program with a que of songs, some for the whole group and some solos.  It is wonderful and warm and always a great time. This is my teenage cousin who is an a-maz-ingly talented piano player.  I was moved to tears as he played.


My peeps.

The music is beautiful and we always finish by standing to sing the Halleluja Chorus.  This year was funny though because one family with very powerful bass voices was missing.  We all laughed at how bad we sounded without the extra power.  It was still a great night.

Another Party

After Mark's Wedding last week we had our Christmas party gift exchage.  It was a little early because so many people were in town for the wedding.   Everyone had a great time.  Family  is the best. The newest additions to the family over the last few months. It is fun to see the family growing like crazy. If you count Lily and Brigham, there were 5 new grandchildren in one year.




Eden loved this build a bear and put it together right away with the help of her cousin Miranda.











Then Grandma read her favorite Christmas story to everyone "The Best Loved Bear". I just noticed how cute Larry is with Lily in this picture.  There was a lot of love in this room.  After a family circle meeting, Lori said we are the "best loved" family.  True.

Just the Girls

Last year my 3 sisters and my mom and I started a new tradition.  We had a pre-Christmas get together with just us girls.  We do a cookie exchange to put together lots of neighbor treats and give eachother thoughtful homemade gifts. This is separate from the family name drawing that we do on Christmas eve. It is so much fun with just us and we laugh the whole time .  This year I gave out Menu boards that I had made at RS last month.  My mom made beautiful hand made jewelry with glass beads. My sister Laurel made these cute pins for hanging the kids important school papers that you need to keep track of.  She put each childs initial on a pin.  I can't wait to put these up(I do have 2 more, they just didn't make it in the picture). 


My sister Elizabeth made these awesome framed scripture tracking boards for those "growing" little testimonies.  Sure enough there are 31 letters, just enough to fill in with a dry erase marker each month.  How cool is that?

Dallin's Balderdash Definitions

I am not sure what the words were, but his definitions were really funny.

-a waterside without water.

-a flying stupid horse.

-the earth is so awesome,the air explodes.

Acronym for ISDS- inside diaper smells.

Mark's Wedding

Last week Peter's Brother got married.  Most of Peter's siblings were able to come so it was fun to see everyone and hang out.  Here is Larry and Lori's little family!


Mark and Dani were very cute.  Lucy, Heidi and I all sang songs for them.  Now I can take 1 solo off my list of goals.

Variety Show

Many of Peter's siblings came into town before Christmas for one of the brother's wedding so we got to do extra parties!  The night before the wedding we had a nice dinner in honor of the happy couple with Honey Baked Ham and a variety show.  Everyone did a 30 second to 2 minute talent or skit. It was very fun and entertaining.  I was surprised at how well the kids performed without becoming shy. Everyone did a great job.

A lot of this kind of stuff was going on.  Good times.

Here is Mr. Tanner's act. He was a hit singing "You've Got a Friend in Me".


Dallin wowed everyone with his knowledge about space. He had drawn his own pictures and everything, but we left them at home, woops! He still did great and what he said was all him, I had nothing to do with it.



Eden did was a sweatheart singing "I Am a Child of God".



Lily was supposed to walk for her talent, but she wasw napping. Carter did a frog song that he knows from nursury, but it was pretty much Peter singing it for him. It was a fun night. I hope this will be something we do every year.