Let's Be Real...

One thing I decided when I started doing a blog was that I never wanted to paint a rosier picture of my life than it really is. So here you have it, let's be real...

YESTERDAY Jed spent the morning playing paintball with a group of guys. I honestly support him 100% in this. He doesn't often get the chance to do something that is solely for his enjoyment and heaven knows, he earns this time. So, I took the kids to Owen's 9:00 a.m. soccer game. The game went fairly smoothly, the little two stayed busy climbing all over me, eating everything I had for them to eat, etc. Everyone was in a fairly good mood, so we went to drop something off to a friend and headed to a department store to buy a birthday gift for an upcoming birthday party. Well, as in all department stores, there were racks of clothing and the boys were thrilled, the perfect spying set-up. I swear I was paying attention to where the kids were hiding, but as I am shopping I hear a customer service rep say something like this, "For the safety of your children we would like to remind our customers to keep their children near them at all times..." Okay, are you kidding me? Have these people ever had little kids? I mean, I used to hide in the racks while my mom shopped too. I wasn't playing spies, but it was loads of fun. I was embarrassed that it appeared that my kids were out of control, mostly because I actually felt a lot more in control than usual. Let's be real...

UPON ARRIVING HOME from the store I unloaded the soccer gear, diaper bag, shopping bags, etc. Davis had fallen asleep, so I left him in the van for a while. Kate didn't want to get out of the van, so I decided to let her "drive" for a while (all little ones love this activity, do they not?). I kept checking on her every few minutes and the last time I looked in she was looking particularly happy. Then I noticed she was smonching (a word my mom made up when I was little...it means chewing loudly) on something...GUM! She had found my pack of gum in the car and it was now empty. I know that she ate at least 5 pieces. She really is a tornado. Let's be real...

TODAY on the way home from church I was telling Owen that a lady in our ward (LDS term for congregation, basically) had passed away. Some of the children were going to sing at a memorial service in her honor this evening. Because Owen has often become very shy when it is time to sing in front of everyone, I thought that I would let him decide if he wanted to join this group or not. He asked, "will there be cake there?" When I said that I didn't think so, he decided not to participate. Somebody tell me that there is still loads of time to teach these children compassion? Let's be real...

Finally I have posted some "real" pictures of my family today...you may not be able to tell, but Kate has pulled out her pony tail and is sporting the "side pony troll look". Also, Owen has his shirt off, which is his latest obsession. He swears that he is always hot. Davis usually follows his lead on this, but had fallen asleep, as is evident. I think it makes them feel tough. Also, the house looks like a small tornado came through, which always seems to be the case on Sunday nights. Despite all of this however, I continue to know that I am so blessed and really wouldn't change this reality for anything.

Transformer Underwear

Is anyone tired of hearing me talk about Davis going potty? It was months ago now that I posted how thrilled we were that he had gone for the first time. I was trying to take the wait-until-they're-ready approach to potty training, but honestly I was starting to think that he would only go potty in the toilet when offered a major bribe, for the rest of his life (okay, not really, but you get the idea). Then finally, last Tuesday I heard these glorious words, "I want to wear my Transformer underwear today!" And the rest is history! He has only had two accidents in the last six days (including during the night!). Yeah Davis! We are so proud that he decided to potty train before he outgrew those Transformer underwear! Way to go little man!

Spies Like Us!

Here you have it, Owen's 5th birthday in a nutshell...

I am sure that mine are not the only kids in the world to talk about their birthday and what kind of party they are going to have for 12 months out of the year, are they? Finally, about a month before the big day Owen decided...a SPY party! What fun. Owen received a package from Nana and Papa the day before his birthday. We told him that he would have to wait until the next morning to open the package, so like any soon to be five year old, he slept with the present and woke us up the next morning saying, "It's my birthday! Can I open my present?" It was too cute. Lucky for us the present was a spy laser trap that kept both boys occupied for the next several hours. We had a yummy breakfast, sent Daddy off to work and the boys and I continued to set traps. Then we went to McDonalds for lunch. Both boys were thrilled to learn that I had chosen McDonalds, not because it is my favorite place, but because they have Star Wars kids meals right now (our rule is that we only get kids meals on trips, but birthdays are an exception to the rule). Of course Owen was telling everyone he saw that today was his birthday and that he was now FIVE! After lunch we went home. I still needed to decorate the cake and do a few other things, so the boys watched a kids Spy movie, "Get a Clue", and Kate took a nap. Once again Beth helped me out with the cake decorating, just in time for the little spies to arrive. The first thing we did was Owen gave each spy a disguise to wear. We had I-Spy books out, which a few of the kids looked at, and the others ran off to set more spy traps. Once everyone had arrived we made spy watches (ie. slap bracelets that they decorated) and spy notebooks (notebooks with blank covers that they decorated with markers and stickers). Then finally, they got their mission...bring me something round, something green and something small from the backyard and they would be rewarded (ie. given a bag of candy--oh, and I did make the bigger kids bring me something they could eat as well). By this time Jed was home and able to be apart of the fun too. It was fun to see what the kids came up with. Some of them were very creative. Then of course there was the cake, ice cream and ridiculous amount of presents. Owen is so spoiled and loved by his friends and family...what a lucky boy. He even had Miss Cindy come by from Daddy's office. He had wanted Cindy and Kim (the gals who work up front) to come so that all of the kids could meet them. Then after the party we had dinner together as a family and Owen was able to end the night opening his gift (a "how to draw monsters book"--perfect for him) from Grandma Nila. Grandma Nila has a way of timing the arrival of her gifts perfectly. The gift always seems to arrive ON the actual day, which is so great. Who doesn't love having a large package arrive with your name on it, ON YOUR DAY? Anyway, he said it was the greatest day ever, so I was pleased. I always feel at the end of a birthday that I need to call our parents and thank them for everything they ever did for us on our birthdays...let's face it, we were tired!! Happy fifth birthday buddy!

Thank you Miss Beth!

Alright, I am back! I have not posted for two weeks now and finally have a minute. Last night we had a work bbq at our home, which was loads of fun. We were celebrating our office manager's 20th anniversary with the practice. She is a gem and we hope to keep her another 20 years. :) We have such a terrific staff and really for all of the women we have around the office there is very little drama--thank you ladies!

Anyway, with starting preschool and adjusting to the new schedule (oh, and our addiction to the Season 2 DVD of “24”) I am a little behind here, so here goes...

Owen was super pumped to be able to bring treats to his class the day before his birthday. I was telling my friend, Beth, that I wanted to do something "dinosaur" for the treats because he had suddenly decided that he wanted a dinosaur party instead of the spy party, which was already planned. Beth, in her usual fashion, immediately came up with a brilliant idea that seemed easy as well...rice crispy treats cut into the shape of dinosaurs and then frosted in fun colors! I loved it. Well, the cutting out of the treats proved trickier than we thought, but they still turned out cute and Owen and his classmates were thrilled...THANK YOU MISS BETH!!!!

My BABY goes to school and wears cleats!

This week was a week of many firsts for our Owen. The two most important being that he started preschool (he misses the cut-off for kindergarten by just 10 days) and had his first soccer practice/game. Selecting a preschool for me was a huge ordeal. I should probably add an extra big THANK YOU here to all of my friends and family who had to hear me sort through my thoughts and feelings in regards to all of the options. Do you ever wish that you had fewer options for things? Finally I settled on a preschool that I feel totally secure in, both in the way I feel about how Owen will do with the other children and in the teaching style...learning through play. Owen doesn't know any of the other children in the class, but that morning he was so excited to go...I took that as a good sign and wondered why I had a sick stomach when he was all smiles. Jed gave Owen a blessing that morning to help him through the new school year, we got everyone dressed and out the door we went. Owen was a tiny bit timid about things at first, so I waited around for about 10 minutes while he checked things out. Once the teacher's timer when off, however, and it was time for "circle time" he said that he was ready for me to go. Davis and Kate thought that the school was too fun, so I was grateful that Owen didn't need me to stay very long or I am certain that Kate would have had that place turned upside down...she is such a little tornado. Driving away I felt so thrilled for Owen and grateful that I had listened to that voice inside my head, until I found the right fit for him. I also had a few tears in my eyes, I will admit. I had to be strong though as Davis was looking for reassurance that he would still have a fun morning without his big brother. When we came back to pick up Owen, three hours later, he said, "I am staying here forever!" Oh, I was so RELIEVED...he LOVED it. He later told me that the only boring part was "circle time"...okay, that is hilarious. He loved everything, but the really educational part. I'm not sure how he will ever reach his goal of becoming a "cowboy dentist" as he told me he wants to do, unless he learns to appreciate learning, but I guess we will take things one step at a time, right? :)
Then Saturday Owen strapped on his new shin guards and hand-me-down cleats (he was convinced that he needed "new" cleats until he learned that the hand-me-downs were the same brand as Daddy's and everyone knows that Daddy is the all-knowing soccer expert in our house)for his first real soccer practice and game. Last year he was in a month long soccer program at the YMCA (which we loved), but this is a league where they are actually formed into teams that play each other on Saturday mornings (the practice is from 9 to 9:30 and they play from 9:30 to 10:00...nothing too intense, but they do wear shin guards and cleats...there is the difference). For some reason this just feels like the beginning of his "big kid years". Oh, but Owen loved the soccer game and while he wasn’t the most aggressive kid out there, he was one of the "smiliest"…it cracked me up, he smiled practically the whole time.

So anyway, I feel a little sad that my baby is growing up, but really can't dwell on that too long. For one thing he would NOT like to be called my "baby" and for another I have two other little ones...there is no time to dwell on much of anything. :)

A review of "the happiest days on the earth"

Okay, so I have to back-track a little bit here. It has now been a week and a half that we have been home. From where you may ask? Well, in Davis’ words we went to “the happiest days on the earth” or in other words “the happiest place on earth”…Disneyland! Of course the reason for making the trek to So. Cal was in fact to spend the week with my side of our family. We had such a great time. Here are a few highlights…

Day 1: We began our journey. We decided to do something out of the ordinary for our little family and we took our time getting to our destination, stopping at a lake on the way down for lots of rock throwing, wading in the water and a picnic. That night we spent the night, a little past the half-way point, at a hotel. The kids has a ball in the pool and Jed and I counted our blessings that they are all such good little travelers (or in other words Kate is a good little traveler, totally entertained by food and toys, and the boys are zombies when a DVD player is placed in front of them)!

Day 2: We arrived at my sister, Amy’s, house and were greeted by all of the cousins. We all (minus my mom and dad) stayed at Amy and Rob’s and they were so gracious to put up with the chaos...we even slept in the master bedroom while they slept in a tent! You guys are so generous! That night we had a yummy family dinner and Dessert at Yogurtland.

Day 3: The Guys went to ride go-carts and play at the batting cages while the kids and gals went to Castle Park (a park with a giant castle…the boys LOVED IT!).

Days 4 and 5 were spent at the Magic Kingdom, Disneyland and California Adventure! We really had a great time. Owen’s favorite rides were Buzz Lightyear (we rode it 5 times!), Pirates of the Carribean and Soaring Over California. He will also say that he loved the roller coaster in Tune Town. Look at the photo above. Does it look like he loved it? Jed and I love that photo...my dad took it. Davis also loved Buzz Lightyear and the Dumbo ride. Kate loved the ice cream and was terrified by Pirates of the Caribbean and the Aladdin show. Jed and I enjoyed several hours the second morning by ourselves and then loved being able to take Amy and Rob’s little girls home so that they could spend some time with just their big kids (and Nana and Papa) that night. A major highlight for me was watching my kids laugh, run, play and enjoy the magic of their surroundings, with their cousins. We all had a great time. Oh, and thanks Auntie J and Uncle Dan for joining us!

Day 6: Girls Day Out! I love my sisters, mom and niece, Emma, and I got such a kick out of being with them all as we got Manicures and Pedicures and then went for Smoothies. Meanwhile the guys and kids played the Wii—Owen is a huge fan…oh, and I did beat Jed at tennis later, thank you very much. Also, this night Uncle Rob got some tickets for a show called "Walking with Dinosaurs". Rob, Jed, Papa (my dad), Matt, Emma, Hunter and Owen were all able to go. The report was that this show was unlike anything any of them had ever seen and I'll tell you, Owen says it is his favorite thing from the week. Better than Disneyland?!?

Day 7: Our last day, so we went out with a bang. My Dad took some pics of our little family in the morning and then we all hit the beach! Jed says the beach was one of his favorite things of the week. I think that the adults enjoyed it as much as the kids.

What fun! Thank you all for a great week, for helping out with and loving our kids and for being our family. Jed and I feel very blessed that we genuinely enjoy being around our family on both sides!