The Babies, and Joyschool

 

Can I tell you how much fun it is to have a toddler and a baby together?  Yes, it can be very demanding on my time and energy and sometimes discouraging when things don’t go the way I would like them to, but those little moments where the two of them connect together or where they are just SO CUTE make it so worth it.

 

Conner is getting to be quite a big boy—rolling all over, sitting up pretty well, and trying SO HARD to get from rocking to crawling.  He has the sweetest disposition and makes the most adorable smiles and little babbling sounds ever. 

 

He still is not much of a champion napper, but thank goodness for the moby wrap!  He is getting better at his naps and will now typically have at least one really good nap and then cat naps the rest of the time.  However, he sleeps great at night so I really can’t complain too much. 

 

 

Then there is the other baby Ella—she is also growing up SO FAST and just such a fun little lady.  She talks very well with complete sentences most of the time.  “Mom, can you get my drink?  It’s on the counter.”  “I need to take that doll to bed” and so forth. 

She has become very interested lately in where people are, and where they are going, and what they are doing.  She always notices if someone in the family is gone and asks me about it.  It’s like she is starting to realize that there is a world that is going on when she isn’t there.  It is the best to get a greeting from her when I come home from something and she is there.

“Mom!  You’re home!!” followed by a huge bear hug.  Of course, Dad gets this every day—such the celebrity!

 

And Conner did this tonight—he can’t even crawl yet but he’s ready to take off!

 

I hope these two little monkeys will stay close forever.  We were worried about little Ella not having a playmate close to her age because Logan is 6 years older than her—what a blessing Conner is to her, and what a blessing she is to him.  Thank goodness he tolerates most of what she puts him through—so far:)

 

These are some pictures from the little joyschool we are doing in our neighborhood.  We have eight children and the school is only once a week for 1 1/2 hours.  Each mom takes a month to have the school at her house and we rotate.  This was my month and it was really fun, but I’m not going to beg the next mom to let me do it again or anything like that;)  I think that by the last week I had finally gotten the schedule down really well and knew what I was doing, but the kids still had a great time no matter what and that’s what matters. 

 

We made flags for President’s Day.

 

 

 

We did free play, a little lesson with books, fingerplays and usually a visual math concept(This was also where we had our snack time—sneaky way to get them to sit still I know), and then a craft.  By that time it was almost parent pick up so we would head out back to jump on the tramp till they got there.  

 

Some physical time activities:  dancing!

 

Making a tunnel—this was the most fun to watch them do!  Each kids took a turn crawling under. 

 

Congrats for reading this whole post—believe it not, I wanted to post more but decided against it for now.  I will just leave with one picture of the rest of our children so as not to neglect them too much: we are so proud of them as well!

Hiking

We’ve been out enjoying this nice weather that is sure to fade quicker than we would like it to.  These are some pics from two hikes we recently did—one at San Tan Regional Park with Kari and Corey and their boys, and another at Papago Park with Logan’s cubscout troupe.  

Sunny at the “top o’ the woods now baby!” (or the desert)

It was windy day with the cubs, but we braved it.

 

Do you think we should contact Boy’s Life and make an offer for this pic?  Me too.

 

 

Helping backs and arms for the little ones

Conner has really enjoyed being outside for these hikes—he even rises to the occasion and puts on the hiking shoes. 

Peace out.

Twelve

 

Yes, little Angie is twelve. (insert gasp here)  Yeah, it’s a hard concept for me to grasp sometimes.  She is now officially in Young Women’s at church, she has pierced ears, and she is only four years away from driving a car—maybe even my car! (insert another gasp here)

It is amazing to see the transformation from little girl to young lady—in so many ways she is very grown up, but luckily she is still retaining many little girl qualities.  For example, Angie now cooks dinner for our family once a week (with some help from Mom of course), but she also enjoys playing kitchen with Sunny, Logan and Ella.  She loves to do her hair and accessorize her outfits, but she is still very willing to run around in a rain storm and not care a bit about her appearance.  She can sometimes give off a bit of a teenager attitude when it comes to getting up in the morning or performing other equally unpleasant tasks, but she still loves for me to tuck her in at night and sing her a lullaby. 

 

This is Angie’s AWESOME new leader at church Sister Ramos—she baked her a cake for her birthday and brought it over—what a wonderful teacher and example she is to our daughter—Angie LOVES her and felt so special when she brought over the cake.

 

Ang also gave her first talk in sacrament meeting on her birthday—I guess that is what happens when you live with the Bishop!  I actually totally forgot about it until Sunday morning when she comes up to me and is like, “Mom, I have my talk all ready.”  So, I had her practice it for me while I am running around the house getting all the last minute stuff ready for church—so, she wrote  it all alone and it was great! 

 

Here she is with some friends at her birthday slumber party.  Jack and I felt like spies sitting around and listening to them talk—it is so fun/funny to hear what these pre-teen girls all say to each other!

  

 

What a lovely young lady she is turning into!  She is such a help to me in so many ways, and I am enjoying watching this transformation happen—she is our oldest, and hence the first to venture into “grownupland,” and I think she is doing it very well!

Here’s a few more pics from the party—those giggly girls had a great time together—and when I went out in the middle of the night to get a bottle for Conner I found Angie and her friend Gracie still going at it-giggling and eating pizza till all hours of the night.  Fun times!

 

Notice our friend Carli in the background with Conner—you can see her like that in pretty much every pic we have of Conner that night—she LOVES babies and wanted to hold him LOTS. 

 

 

 

Alien masquerade?

Carli in heaven—and Jack looking kind of cute in the background there.  (Conner also looks cute, but that goes without saying of course.)

Whatd’ja get?

Here’s one more pic of Ang with her cute Aunt Kirsten—who obviously just got ENGAGED—woo hoo!  (And Ang is very interested in that by the way---hmmmmmm).

Well, Angie, I guess I will allow you to keep on growing up since you are doing it so well.

Just as long as you always want me to sing you a lullaby.:)

Uncle John’s Funeral

Funerals really do create wonderful family reunions.  I so enjoyed visiting with family members before, during, and after my Uncle John’s funeral—some of whom I hadn’t seen for many years.  These are just a few photos in no particular order and mostly meant for the people that were there, but you can also look if you want to.:) (Unless you were there, then you can..look too….yeah.)

 

This picture turned out fuzzy:( but I still like it.

Ella and Etienne bonding

 

This was after the beautiful service of our whole family—except for my brother Steve and Mel’s husband.  What a great service it was—Silly me, I thought since Jack was actually able to sit with our family during a church service (he’s normally up on the stand when we go to church and I am wrestling with the kiddos in the pew below—well, mostly with Ella actually) that we would all be able to sit and enjoy it together.  Well, I didn’t take into account that the service started at 4:00PM and that is a bit late in the day for both Conner and Ella to be in their very best “sit still on a wooden bench for an hour and a half” moods.  So, we both took turns going out with the babies, but this wonderful church actually had a baby room that could see right into the chapel, so I didn’t miss anything at all.  I was also very impressed with the fellowship and all the food provided—great people!

 

Conner and Etienne bonding—Conner wasn’t about to let his older sister outdo him.

 

 

Some beautiful women!

More beautiful people who I all love dearly—yes, I am in there too and I love myself also. (Cause I’m good enough, I’m smart enough…oh, I hope someone gets this joke…)

Fuzzy again—learning our new camera

Just relaxing together

Thanks for the great memories and special time everyone!

Thanks for the reminder.

 

                       Ella loves clothes experimentation.

This morning when Jack went to wake up the girls, he checked in Ella’s crib.  We get up  at  6:00 AM around here, so generally we let the babies sleep in—and sleeping away she was. 

Naked. 

Without so much as a diaper. 

Jack comes out and tells me. 

“Should I put a diaper on her at least?”

“Definitely.  But let’s hope she stays asleep for a little while.”

Needless to say, Ella was up with us early that morning, happy and chipper as can be.  The moment Jack started to put on her diaper, she stirred and said, “Good morning Dad!  Want some yogurt?” 

Well, family prayer and scripture study started a bit rushed and  not quite as happy as it should have this morning.  I know that we always hear in church the old line of, “It’s okay if family prayer and scripture study aren’t that spiritual as long as you do them” but I still feel like we should TRY to make them meaningful. :) However, a tiff in the bathroom between our lovely older daughters had caused some friction that was still unresolved. 

But, we pressed forward, kneeling down and ready to go.  Ella was lying on the couch and not budging to join us at the time.  Then, suddenly, she got up.  We were very happy to see that she had decided to be a big girl and kneel down to pray.  But, that wasn’t her plan at all.  She boldly marched over to the corner of the room, looked us all squarely in the faces, and began to wave her arms like she was leading a song.  Then she said, “Child God.  Child God!”  What else could we do?  We all sang the song “I am a Child of God” together and it seemed as if the Spirit decide it would join us this morning after all.  Afterwards, Ella knelt down beautifully for prayer with our family and we had a much better time worshipping together. 

What a blessing she woke up naked after all!  Thanks sweetie!

I Love Massachusetts

and I love Scott Brown.  and I love the people that voted for him.  and I love that he drives a truck and said it was “the people’s seat” and not Ted Kennedy’s.  and I love Martha Coakley.  because she ran a really bad campaign and lost.  and I thought it was funny that Obama tried to make fun of Scott Brown’s truck and then Scott Brown used it to his own advantage. 

But mostly I love that Americans are AWESOME people who know what is important, who can be trusted to make decisions on their own, and who won’t let sneaky politicians push them around.  Now on to November!

It Was Time—Again

 

After over a two year absence from that happiest place on earth, we were planning on doing another trip there in the Spring.  However, some circumstances came about that put Disneyland in our path sooner, and we decided the time was right to go again—this time around with five kids instead of three.  :)

My wonderful Uncle John passed away around Christmas time this year—he was a great man with two beautiful children who have wonderful families of their own and a loving wife.  He left a great legacy of faith in Christ and love for family and you can see the evidence of his life in the ones that have come after him.  Really, his family are all such wonderful caring people—he will be missed very much, but we know he is in heaven and what a comfort that is! 

When we heard of passing, we of course planned on going to the funeral after New Years.  His family all live in California and we had a lovely visit with everyone—when we started to plan the trip we realized how close we would be to Disneyland, and that the kids were still out of school.  So, we decided to extend our trip and spend three more days in our favorite amusement park as well. 

 

Here are a few highlights in a very random order:

 

Our three princess in front of the castle with an attacking knight or something I guess.:)

 

Here we are at the Alladin show in California Adventure—they do a super job with this show!  This was actually the only time that Conner got really fussy—probably because we were just sitting for a while.  However, I was able to catch most of the show while standing with him in the back.  He really did well overall—took naps either in the stroller or in his wrap while I “wore” him—he even slept through the Pirates of the Carrebean ride!  He really enjoyed all the stimulation and being outside a lot.

Yes, all three big kids got to take this picture in front of the Tower of Terror because this time they all went on it—although Logan was definitely not the most willing of riders—I got him on though and he sure bragged about going on it afterwards!

 

LOVE this picture!  This was for the 3D bug movie—pretty scary for little Ella at some parts, but she just sort of wiggled around on my lap until she felt better.

 

Both Ella and Conner were napping here in their strollers so all us non-nappers took this shot together—we were sure ready to sleep each night though! 

This is a new part of Disneyland called Pixie Hollow for the fairies—so cute!

  Here we are inside Pixie Hollow:

I love fantasy land in Disneyland—this is where I really feel like we are in the park—and dreams will come true—when we wish upon a star—and all that goofy stuff that I just love about Disneyland.  Oh, and the castle is so pretty!

 

And you have to go to the Tiki Room!  Both Ella and Conner really loved this one! 

 

I think the greatest part for Ella was meeting Micky Mouse—she really hasn’t seen that much Disney stuff, but she sure knows Micky Mouse and LOVED going to his house and meeting him—that was really fun for all of us to see.  I remember when little Logan met him for the first time!

 

Okay, we all loved meeting Micky Mouse! Well, I’m sure that Conner was dreaming about Micky Mouse at the time.:)

It was a really nice part of our trip to get to go to Disneyland—it was definitely different going with a toddler and a baby, but with a great husband and three great big kids to help out, we did it!  It was pretty funny when we got on our shuttle each morning from our hotel to go to the park—five kids, two strollers, four bags of stuff—everyone just sort of looked at us and smiled.  We wouldn’t have it any other way though—how wonderful that we have such beautiful children to take places like this and make these special memories! 

I counted my blessings a lot this trip—and the funeral afterwards really made me think as well.  I love to attend funerals for wonderful people like my uncle who have lived a great life, because it always makes me think what mine will be like.  I only hope that I can affect some people for good the way my Uncle John did—I have pictures of family from that as well, but I will have to post those later.  Hope everyone out there is having a great new year and decade!