You Gotta Love It!

Remember when they were babies and you just adored their toothless grins? I'm thinking there's a reason that they lose their teeth again when they are nearly seven -- it takes you back a few years to when their every move was adorable. You know, before they started talking back!

While the Cat's Away ....

Have you ever wondered what your kids do when you leave the oldest one in charge? Thanks to Breje's awesome camera skills, I was able to find out some of what they were up to this summer. I should probably freak out and never leave them alone again, but no one got hurt and you have to admit that these are some pretty great shots!

It's a bird, it's a plane ....

... it's synchronized jumping!

Summer

Mom says she has no time to blog, so she is having me do it for her. These are just a fraction of some of Brielle's little poses she loves to do.

We're Back!

I vaguely remember May. It was full of piano recitals, final school projects and soccer games. It consisted mostly of mad dashes from one place to the next, with between 1 and 4 children in tow and the hope that it was the right number, the right children, and they had -at some point- been fed something! I remember thinking that, surely, when all this stuff is over and summer finally begins, I will relax a bit and then get caught up on my blog.

I guess I've always been a bit forgetful. I forgot how ready I'd be to sleep in everyday, to spend time soaking up sunshine, and to visit the fam. I forgot how much mess kids make when they are home all day and how often those pesky creatures insist on being fed! I forgot that I usually spend the month of August whistfully imagining all the free time I'll have when the kids start school again.
Lucky for me, they started seriously early this year. While we are still lamenting the loss of those final weeks of summer, I, for one, am feeling extremely ready to have a real schedule again!

This is the first year that I had 3 of my kids leaving for school bright and early in the morning. These are the largest and most sincere smiles that I could coax from them. They don't seem to be sharing my enthusiasm!Actually, they are all doing really well so far (they've been back for a whole week now!) so there is a slight chance that I may find time to share a few pictures from the summer. Who knows?

Happy Mother's Day!

A mother is a person who seeing there are only four

pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never

did care for pie---Tenneva Jordan

I spent a lot of time today listening to the talks on motherhood in church and thinking about all of the wonderful moms that I've been surrounded by in my life. Several of them are the friends gathered around me in church, some are friends I've left behind in other wards. So many of them are women I get to thank my own mother for --- my aunts, her closest friends, my sister, my grandmother (my 2 yr old told me that she loves me "from ocean to ocean" the other day, and that reminder of her legacy alone is enough to be truly grateful for!), my great gram. There's all the women in my extended family -- my many wonderful sils, my mother in law, grandmothers. I was overwhelmed with the many wonderful examples of motherhood that I've been given and all the amazing things I've learned from them. It got me to wondering if I could even list all the things I've learned from my mom. I'm pretty sure I can't, but here's a few of my favorite....

.... Integrity is EVERYTHING. Chocolate is a food group --- in fact, it is the most important one. There is ALWAYS something you can do for someone else. It is important for women to go shopping together - even if there's nothing they need to buy --- (but there's usually something they need to buy!). I am a daughter of Heavenly Father and He loves me and that's really all I need to know. I have a coupon! It is NEVER okay to judge someone else. It's ALWAYS possible to make something prettier and it is not meaningless or unnecessary to do so. It's important to expect a lot from other people. She taught me my love for books and gave me the knowledge that sticks and stones are way less harmful than words. Choose them carefully! You can never have too many friends. Chocolate should be shared. Most people are truly wonderful, if you give them a chance to show you that they are. Laugh at yourself. A Lot. Make sure you KNOW your kids, and it's a pretty good idea to know their friends, too. Be fun. Be happy. Make sure you treat yourself sometimes -- but treat others way more. ALWAYS be willing to drop everything to whip up a quick dessert, throw together a cute craft, or write someone a quick note because somebody you know needs a little boost today. It's always possible to learn something if you're open to learning. You should always be open to learning. EVERYONE has a talent, some of us just have to look harder to find them. Kindness is everything. Willingness is right up there. It's okay to think your own children are better than everyone else, and to tell them that all the time! Being a mom is harder but the only thing better than being a mom is being a Grandma!

Thanks, mom, for all that and so much more! I love You!

What have we been up to?

for the last three weeks? I can't believe it's been 3 whole weeks since I've blogged, and I hardly have any pictures on my camera to prove it. The last month has been such a blur that I can hardly remember why we've been so busy. Here goes ....



Trayson got celebrated in his school assembly. His teacher couldn't stop saying nice things about him. It was almost embarrassing. We got to see Breje compete in track. Doesn't she look like such a pro?! She did great this season and it was so much fun to watch her improve every week!

Jody made a quick trip to Utah to watch his little sis and her family be sealed in the temple. It was tough to not be there, but I think this pic says it all! Aren't they cute?

We headed back to Utah for another weekend that we packed absolutely full! We did baptisms at the Salt Lake Temple with our 12-year-olds, saw the Beehive House and the conference center, saw a motocross race, drove tons of my in-laws nuts (thanks so much Marcus and Yvette and Heath and Kaycee, for being so kind!) visited with tons of family, drove Jody to the airport for a last minute TDY, and stopped by Travis and Sienna's birthday party before we finally made it home!

(Can you tell Kutter is ticked that we've spent all our time at Temple Square and he still hasn't seen one motorcycle?)

Add countless soccer practices and games, scouts, young womens, and school activities and is it any wonder that I've been too tired to blog?

Easter Weekend!

Yes, I know, Easter was last weekend. I am way behind. Again. Sue me! Do any of you know who invented soccer? I would like to hurt him. Anyhoo....

... True to our natural way of doing things,we crammed way more than is humanly possible into our Easter weekend. We kicked it off with a drive to Grandma Kay's, where Brielle discovered how much cooler real babies are than their plastic counterparts. She's met her baby cousins before, but this is really the first time she "got" how amazing they are. She couldn't keep her eyes off them. Thanks, sils, for being so kind and understanding about that! After as much drooling over babies and playing with cousins as we could fit into a 4 hour period, Kutter and I were off to Primary Children's for his sleep study. Please, people, put this on your list of experiences to avoid in life! So not fun! The nurses were awesome, but it was still sheer torture. If you don't believe me, check out this picture of how Kutter looked right before he fell asleep!

and he was way more positive about the whole thing than me!

On Saturday morning, they woke him up bright and early for a finger stick and kicked us right out of there, which was fine with me since Breje and I had a shopping trip planned with the girls. We spent the entire day eating, shopping, laughing, eating, gossiping, and eating some more. (See picture at the top, the one which refuses to move to the correct spot and is driving me crazy but accurately displays the disgusting display of gluttony that we were so dang proud of!)

Next on the list of must -do's for the weekend was egg decorating at Grandma Linda's. The amounts of glitter and tie dye consumed in ten minutes of this is staggering. Their cute creative little faces were so worth it!

I found a fun idea on the internet for the adults involving old silk ties to decorate eggs and I must say that it was quite a hit! Even the older kids could do it and it was way fun to see how well they turned -out!

Easter morning had the kids driving us all nuts, so Grandma gave them one of her famous surprises -- Easter monster trucks. You would not believe how well this went over, even with the little girls, and one of the best parts of the day was watching them play monster trucks together.

Finally, the Easter bunny remembered to hide the eggs and we let all 7 kids loose on Grandpa's lovely yard! How cute are they? I love this picture of Brielle, she's not even pretending to hide her excitement -- and I love that she's just turned her back on an egg hidden right at her eye-level!

It was a matter of minutes before they'd found all eggs and were ready to compare their loot!

The only thing that could've possibly been cuter than that is watching them all pushing each other on the swing set. It almost looks like a lovely spring morning!