M's Bad Day

M took forever getting off the bus yesterday. O was already up to the house when I noticed M wasn't off the bus yet. I walked down the lane and when I was just about there M got off the bus with huge alligator tears running down her face with a...pink slip in her hand. The poor kid just cannot sit still. She has had a permanent sit up front since the first week of school. The bus driver hoped she would get better (I guess most kindergarteners have a hard time sitting still). But she still can't keep her bottom in her seat on the bus and we have talked to her about it and the bus driver has talked to her about it but I don't think it really sunk in until today. I just held her hand and walked with her up the lane. I didn't say anything. She said its okay Mom you can be mad. I am in lots of trouble. (In between her sniffles and tears.) So yet again we talked to her about sitting on her pockets and wiggling around. (She apparantly does have a bit of her dad in her.) Hopefully this time it will work.

Happy Birthday Oak!!!

Oaklie turns 7 today. YAY!!! Happy Birthday Pumpkin!!! I cannot believe she is 7. It seemed like yesterday we had her. She has been a great influence on our family.

Things I love about my 7 year old:
- She has the most infectious laugh. She gets giggling and cannot stop. It is so cute. She makes us all smile.
- She LOVES school and playing with her friends. She is getting to be such a great little reader and she is soooo into chapter books. She loves playing school, too!
- She can be a great helper. She helps her friends at school if they are having a bad day. O plays with her sister and brother and loves them so much.
- She can be a fighter (I know....), but I love when she fights for the right things. She knows what is right and wrong and hopefully she will always choose to fight for the right.
- She LOVES bearing her testimony at church. She looks forward to fast and testimony meetings. She tries to be the first one up to bear her testimony. It makes me smile to see her shine.
- She wants to be a dress designer when we grows up. She has some great designs that she has drawn up and she wants to make them too! She also loves doing projects.
- She LOVES snuggling at night before bed. She likes to sit right next you on the couch before bed and to snuggle.
- She prays every night that she can have good dreams and not dream about rattlesnakes.
- She loves to do her hair and fixing herself up pretty. She wants high heels (don't know about that though). She always likes to look nice. Sometimes she tries so hard to be older than she is and I hope that she will learn to LOVE and enjoy being who she is today. I don't want her to miss being who she really is, because we LOVE that person soooo much!!!!

We LOVE and ADORE you Oak!

Love,
Mom and Dad

She has been really pumped for her birthday. She got a special blanket from the Primary on Sunday. She was excited to have them sing to her. We are celebrating her birthday with family tonight and with her friends tomorrow!!! For her main present, she wants to have a mommy day and go down to Build-A-Bear to get a special friend...so we'll be posting more pictures and fun from her special day!

Snow

You can blame the snow on me and the kids.... really, you can. See being worried that we didn't have enough for the year, we have been praying like crazy for some moisture and more snow. Of course when it is M's turn she is sure to add please bless we can get lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of snow. So Tuesday when she woke up and I said that it had looked like it had rained/snowed a little... she got a little ticked. She was half awake and looked at me with a disgusted looked and said, "Who prayed for rain? I prayed for snow, so who prayed for rain?" She kind of had that what the heck look on her face. It was pretty funny. She was okay later because it kept snowing on Tuesday and that made her happy. But boy howdy, we if ever need anything we'll let her pray. Yesterday (Thursday) we got about 11 inches of snow. Much needed!!!

Soooo.... I'm a little behind on updates

Soooo.... I'm a little behind on updates. Sorry. We have had a wonderful Thanksgiving and Christmas Season and have been enjoying the holidays spending time together as a little family, spending time with extended family, and remembering the whole reason for the season which is the Savior and taking time to reflect on what he has done in our behalf and how we can become a better example of him. We have had the opportunity to serve others and feel the warmth of the season. We are so grateful for all of our families and the love they share with us. We are thankful to live in the wonderful place that we do. We are very grateful for our friends. We are indeed grateful for Christ and his sacrifice and example. We are indebt to our loving Heavenly Father who blesses us more than one could imagine. And most of all we are so thankful for each other.

I wanted to try to do fun things with the kids to celebrate the holidays, but was only able to accomplish a few. We had a little Gingerbread House Competition for FHE. I bet you all can guess who M was pair with...
If you guess J, you are ABSOLUTELY right! Notice how "perfectly" decorated and organized their house is...needless to say....I am not sure M got to do much decorating. O's house on the other hand.... well, let's just say she did the majority of decorating and (don't tell J but she probably had more fun than M because I pretty much let her have her way on it). After all it is just a Gingerbread House.

The girls (if you ask them the poor girls) have learned the fine art of helping around the house. They wear so much clothes and a lot that doesn't get worn end up in the wash too, I decided it was time they started helping fold. (Well it has actually be going on for a while.) But their sweet innocent little helper of a brother has found it is fun to help too!

During December our sweet little buddy decided that he had learned to do stairs. And man can he cruise now. Today is was pretty much raising me down the stairs to find his dad. He pretty much pushes off and slides on his belly the whole way down.

In the midst of all the Christmas parties and Christmas shopping, the girls, I, my sister-in-laws and mother-in-law had the opportunity to throw a bridal shower for J's brother's bride to be. We are so thankful to everyone who supported it and welcomed her into the family and neighborhood.

We were able to take the kids sledding down the hill at the church and the kids including C have had an absolute ball do it.

Please ignore my poor little boy's PINK sweat pants. We didn't have a snow suit and these were the only sweat pants big enough to add layers to under. J about died when C walked out with them.

Poor little M had a hard grumpy December. She was pretty ticked off after about 10 minutes of sledding because her hat wouldn't stay on and she just was having a bad month.

Like O's cheezy little smile. Oh my.

We were able to have a fun company Christmas Party with all of the wonderful people that J has the opportunity to work with. We went to Layton and raced go-karts. It was a lot of fun and I am terrible at it. We then went and enjoyed a lovely evening at Maddox with them.

I had the opportunity to go to The Forgotten Carols with my best friend Anne Marie and some friends. I am so grateful she invited me to go and it was just what I needed. A night out with some great friends.

With all of the weddings and family members going to the temple for the first time, I was able to attend the temple a lot in December which was wonderful. We are so grateful for all the family members who helped take care of our little family so that we were able to go and support family.

Next up... Christmas

Just so I don't forget....

1/11/10

Since this is kind of like a journal, I wanted to write down what happened in FHE so I don't forget. Tonight we were talking about where we come from and the pre-mortal existence and stuff. I also read an article from this month's issue of the Friend about Jehovah and our Heavenly Father's Plan. So I told the girls that Jehovah is another name for Jesus Christ. So I was reading along and to see if they were listening I asked M who Jehovah is (this is after we told them about 15 who it is)... she said Jehovah is Heavenly Father's grandpa.... I guess we need to have FHE a little more often. J about busted a gut. It was pretty funny!

The New Member of Our Family...

He really isn't that new....we got him in September. But I haven't gotten around to post about him. He is 14 yrs old and we have been enjoying him. His name is Bubba, but sometimes we call C that so it gets kind of confusing. Bubba is not his registered name so we keep think we are going to call him something different, but end up calling him Bubba anyways. J wants to call him Radar since when they go up on the mountain his ears are straight forward and on alert. Bubba doesn't really like me riding him cause I make him do what I want him to. J is learning a lot and is actually enjoying riding. I am always nervous he is going to fall off. It is nice because now we can ride and one of the girls can ride Black Beauty.

It has been nice having a horse around that I can ride. It has been so long since I had gotten on one. After I got on, I started to remember how much I enjoy riding. I had kind of got busy with family life and work and we had not been in a place where I could have a horse. So needless to say, we are enjoying him.

Halloween 2009

Happy Halloween! The kiddos had so much fun this October getting ready for Halloween. While J was out having a good time hunting, we decided to have a little fun ourselves. We went to Gardner Village one weekend, then the American West Heritage Center the next. They also had fun choosing their costumes. They had a Halloween Carnival at school that they participated in and they had a Halloween Costume Parade at school on Friday. They then attended a Halloween Party at a friend's house. They can home all smiles and exhausted.

Which leads us up to Halloween, M started saying she was really cold and she started running a fever. Saturday she could kick the chills or the fever so we choose to take her in to the doctor. She ended up having what I have been dreading...the swine flu. After getting the medicine in her she started to perk up and so wanted to go trick or treating, but she had to stay home. She did get her costume on for pictures. It was sad, because for the whole month she had been looking forward to it. My parents came out on Halloween night and watched M while J and I took O and C to the ward trunk or treat. It wasn't the same without M. J's mom wanted them to come in to her house to show her and grandma great their costumes. So she did get to trick or treat at grandma's.