3 Quarters of a Year

Lil' Miss turned 9 months old last Sunday. I took her to the doctor this past week and it turns out that she's 18 lbs. 9 oz. (45th%) and 29 in. (90th%) of absolute perfection. She'll clap, babble, lunge forward, and on a good day she'll even wave "bye bye." Mac took her for "Show-and-Tell" on Friday (after a year of begging me) and his class thought she was SUPER cool, not to mention that Mac thought he was pretty hot stuff showing everyone how he could hold her. I can't imagine that the novelty of having her around is going to wear off any time soon.

Happy Brother's Day

When Mother's Day came and went and then as talk of Father's Day has come up, Mac asked us when "Brother's Day" was. When we told him there was no such thing, he insisted that it wasn't fair and suggested that we start one. So from now on, every third week of May, we will be honoring brothers. Here's how we celebrated this year.
Brother's Day opening ceremonies were held outside in the rain. The boys rolled around, wrestled, played in the mud, and stomped in every puddle around.

What better way to celebrate brother's than to go to a sporting event. We headed to a college baseball game and even though the family only lasted 4 innings, we had a great time.

We had a great manly dinner of ribs, corn on the cob, mashed potatoes, salad, and rolls.

We finished off Brother's Day by singing the "Happy Brother's Day" song, making wishes, blowing out candles, and eating our Nutty Buddy Bars.

Until next year . . .

P.S. You're welcome to join in the celebration next year!

Ramblings on my "Realization"

My best friend Risa and I used to have "realizations." They were things we always knew, but on random days at random times we'd have these "realizations" on a particular topic where everything else around us went a bit hazy and we just totally GOT IT! Crazy? Maybe. (In Nate's words) "Something I shouldn't admit out loud?" Very possibly. But in my defense, my mind has been enlightened and I've really understood a lot from these experiences.
I don't have nearly as many "realizations" anymore. Possbily because my mind never stays idle long enough to think beyond dinner, or potty training, or cleaning up and I'd have to say I miss those experiences. Lately I've been thinking a lot about being a mother and while the room didn't go hazy, I did have a "mini-realization." Let me share.
I think it's so wonderful that each mother believes that her own children are the cutest, the most clever, the sweetest, the smartest, the funniest, the greatest things ever. I'm no exception. According to me, my children are nothing short of brilliant, gorgeous, and totally sweet (most of the time), yet if you ask the very next mom, I'm sure she'd be equally in love with her own children. I can't imagine there are many mom's who think, "Oh, I wish I had so and so's children. They're much cuter than mine." I just think it's amazing that as parents we think our own offspring are the best. I guess we wouldn't want it any other way.
Here are a few examples of why I'm pretty much head-over-heels in love with my clan of four.




I had an interesting conversation a couple weeks ago with Mac where he asked me how he had any of his dad in him. My lame answer was "because he's your dad." Mac's reply was, "I KNOW he's my dad, but how do I have any of him in me. Like I get that I have some of you in me because I was inside your belly, but I don't get how any of dad got into me." I won't tell you how I answered, because I totally blew it and ended up laughing and embarrassed and told him he'd have to ask his dad. I knew eventually we'd have to cover "the birds and the bees," but I had no idea that it would be this early! Talk about UNPREPARED!






You've got to admit, they are pretty great, right?

It's Good To Be MOM

In light of a recent experience, I tried to really think about Mother's Day and take in all the little things that make it good to be MOM.
Waking up to a sleeping house and getting a quiet start to the day made it good to be MOM. Hearing a chorus of "Happy Mother's Day's" and being the recipient of some lovely kisses (some more slobbery than others) made it good to be MOM. Feeding, dressing, and grooming four little ones with little protest from any of them made it good to be MOM. Snapping some family pics before heading out the door and having 3 out of 4 children cooperate made it good to be MOM. Attending church and hearing three wonderful speakers and two Primary music numbers made it good to MOM. Teaching my CTR 5's about Priesthood blessings and having the star student (my Jax) give answers that make his momma proud made it good to be MOM. Having Mac tell me that he was truly sorry that he'd only made me 2 presents instead of 6 because I've been his mom for that many years made it good to be MOM. Coming home from church to the smell of roast beef in the crock pot and knowing dinner and dessert were in dad's hands made it good to be MOM. A walk around the neighborhood, a game of checkers, two games of hide-and-seek, and 5 games of freeze tag made it good to be MOM.
I'm a lucky girl, I tell ya! It's good to be me and it's good to be MOM!

P.S. Below are the Mother's Day cards we sent out to a few special mom's in our lives.

A Week of Firsts

Jilli was invited to her first birthday party on Saturday. I couldn't help not dressing her up in a fluffy party skirt. She was so happy and content at the party. She sat in front of a toy and played with it the entire time, stopping only long enough to smile at any passerby. She's such a pleasant easy going little girl and one man said to me, "By looking at her face, I don't think that girl's had a bad day in her whole life." It's true -- who wouldn't be happy with so many people so madly in love wih you?

I ran my first race with my wonderful friend, Kristi, last Saturday. Besides the sudden urge to throw up on the last leg of the race, everything went fine and dandy. Kristi and I even finished faster than we had expected and were very proud of ourselves. We each now have in our possession neon yellow t-shirts to prove we participated. GO us!

My sweet Jilli is the first child that I know of who is growing not her top two middle teeth, but her incisors. Jilli can definitely pull off the look now, but I just hope there's middle teeth coming sometime soon. I joke with the boys that she is a vampire who "has come to suck our blood." I think it's totally funny, but I do have to wonder if it's going to have some effect on their mental well-being.

Jaxton played in his first season of soccer this Spring and today was his last game. Fortunately he scored his first goal of the season about 1 minute before the game ended, but unfortunately about 30 seconds after our video tape ran out on the camcorder. By the look on his face you would have thought he'd just won the world cup -- he was one proud little boy!

Today Mac had his first playdate with someone not from church or the neighborhood. He and his best school buddy, Carlo, have been trying to set something up for weeks and it finally went through today. Mac went over to his house and played and then Carlo's parents took them swimming and to a family bar-b-q. He had such a wonderful time -- so wonderful, in fact, that he cried the whole way home because he wanted to stay with Carlo's family. Now it's our turn to host the next playdate and I feel like the bar's been set . . .