Announcing Baby Genho Model August 2012

Disturbing?? I need your opinion

I know this blog is badly neglected but, for the sake of my sanity, I need all your help. This is my kids favorite song right now and I think it's disturbing, while John loves it. Anyone? Can I get a little moral support over here? 

http://grooveshark.com/s/Mr+Wolf+And+Mamabear/32GDFB?src=5

Feeding on a dead raccoon and smoking opium? Really? Really?? Elias and Nathan fight over who gets to be "Coon boy" in their daily re-enactments. When they grow up to be psychos, just know I tried my best. 

(I'll have to admit, I've seen this guy in concert 2 times. Not a bad musician, just this song bothers me...) 

Lias Turns Three

Elias turned 3 with a big boy birthday party of presents and fishing. Poor kid is stuck in the middle of the birthdays so hasn't really gotten a party of his own.

He did share his toys nicely and take his spankings like a man.

Since he got a new fishing pole, we headed down to the pond and caught some nice guppies with him.

Grandpa Donovan's Birthday

(Grandpa and almost all the grand kids (clockwise Ava 7, Lydia 4,
Brielle 4 months, Elias 3, Nathan 5, Gordie 8)

For my dad's birthday we celebrated with tons of chocolate. That's about it. Oh, and a few steaks and baked potatoes too but really, the chocolate was the hit. Yum.

Dad and 1/2 of his grown kids (l-r Steve, Laurel, Dad, Lynnie, Leanne)

My dad is 59 years young and just bought a motorcycle this year. The beard finally gives away his age. My dad has become a huge help now that my kids are a little bigger and has watched my kids (overnight!) a time or two, not to mention numerous little trips. Elias keeps telling me that the "Grandpa with the noter- cycle is coming over" whenever I mention a grandpa.

Leanne and Grandpa and Baby Brielle

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!

First Day of School

As I sat sad at the hospital thinking about Nathan and Ava starting school, John was snapping these pictures. They sure don't look too sad. Lias missed them a little but mainly just had fun making Grandpa a birthday cake with Auntie Leanne and Bay-ve Bee-elle(Baby Brielle). Nathan must have learned a lot cause tonight he read me half of "Green Eggs and Ham" pretty much all by himself. Both claimed they had great days and are excited to go back tomorrow.
Awesome.

Beautiful

Really, could you ask for a better place to raise kids? Tomorrow is a big day. We'll have more kids at school than at home and that just feels weird and a little wrong. Natey is excited but pretty nervous and I'll admit, I choked up tonight when we were putting him to bed. It doesn't help that tomorrow I have to be to my clinical at 8am and it's an hour away, which leaves someone else to take my baby to his first day of kindergarten. Not cool.

Luckily, he's got the next best option (or maybe the best option to him). Dada will escort both kids to their first day, drop them off, kiss them goodbye and have to do the leaving. Something tells me he's not gonna cry since he already told me he thinks they should just take the bus.

But I'll be there to get them off and can't wait to see if they're excited. Both have great teachers and are totally comfortable with the school. Their classrooms are literally 10 feet across the hall from each other, which sets my mind at ease for some reason. And 2 days a week I get off school at just the same time they eat lunch so I'm pretty sure I'll be a regular there. But still.... 2 in school?

Shake It Baby

When I was a kid, my family lived in Japan for about 4 years. I was relatively little, 3-7, but we have tons of home videos and it's talked about so much that I really have some cool memories of the place. Some of my most vivid memories involve preparing for earthquakes and I can still remember crawling under the table in our kitchen with our whole family and our dad telling us in a serious voice, "This is where we all should meet if you ever feel an earthquake." So you can imagine my horror when, as a 6 year old, I found myself stark naked, standing in the shower watching the entire bathroom sway. I screamed my head off and everyone thought I was hurt but really I was terrified that I wasn't under the kitchen table.

So fast forward 24 years to this afternoon and I'm peacefully doing my homework on my niece's bed in my older sister's house in middle of suburban Virginia. I start to feel the bed shake and immediately I think my kids are somehow shaking it - you know the feeling when a kid climbs into bed with you in the middle of the night and it's dark and you can just feel them coming up? It was that kinda feeling but my kids were all at the park with my awesome sisters. So my immediate next thought was, "There's a mass murderer under this bed in my sister's house and no one is even home to hear me scream."

After about 5 seconds I realized this was more than the bed shaking, since now the walls were going too. It felt like an earthquake but, come on, this is Virginia, not Japan, right? Wrong. After 15 seconds I was pretty sure I had felt this before, and all my childhood memories of hiding under my desk at school during earthquake drills came rushing back. I realized I should go outside so, of course, I grabbed my laptop and walked on out to talk with all the neighbors who were also wandering outside. And like any sane person, I next googled "Stephen's City earthquake" only to find nothing so thought, "Wow, that was weird" then went back to studying. Only when my sister's came home and I realized they had totally missed it did we get online to hear about the 5.8 tremor that had an epicenter about 50 miles from the farm. Crazy world, huh?

On the bright side, we didn't have any damage anywhere although Culpeper, VA, which is our main stomping ground, had quite a few buildings damaged. And on the really bright side - this canceled Nathan's first day of kindergarten which delayed my sadness at letting my little man go off to school and let me blog about this instead. Hopefully these aftershocks will keep down (we haven't felt a single on of the supposed 4) and we'll all sleep well tonight.

T-Rex on the Brain

Tonight as I was wedged between Nathan and Lias, trying to get them to sleep, Lias and I had this conversation.

"Mama?" in a teeny tiny whisper that I could barely hear. I ignored it three times since 5 seconds earlier I was listening to his deep breathing and lip smacking, usually sure signs that he's close to crashing. Finally I gave in so Nathan didn't get hear and get all riled up.

"What?" I replied in a tiny whisper.

"Do's T-Rexs have 'ands (hands) to open dowrs(doors)?"

"No Lias, all the T-Rexs are dead and their hands don't work to open doors."

"Ok", then deep breathing and he's out.

9 Years

Life is Grand.
Especially after all this time…

We've decided we're not big present people, so instead of getting all worked up about finding something for each other we just don't. And nobody is offended (although I might buy myself a new pair of shoes with all the dough we saved). We also aren't big "do anything" people so tonight we went hiking in the Shenandoah National Park with all the kids. We took a fancy picnic dinner of fried chicken, slushies, biscuits and string cheese and ate to our hearts content. Then we played on the rocks over the non-essistent river (big drought) and prayed that no one would split their head open. Everyone had a great time and we even spotted a bear on the way down the trail. Really, what more can you ask for in an anniversary?

Why I love Summer

It's 8:45 am, there are 9 bodies in my house and I'm the only one awake. Amazing. All three of my babies are snuggled into my bed, where I snuck out of an hour ago to do laundry and try to study. The air-conditioner is going full blast so I'm shivering in my undies, folding, and grateful for the white-noise it provides while the kids are piled under our winter comforter that gets a year round job thanks to John and the air-conditioner. My 4 sisters and my mom have been here for the past 3 days, on and off, with the constants being Leanne and her beautiful 3 month old Brielle, and Sarah and her precious tiny 2 month old, Caroline. Ava is in baby heaven, holding, dressing, changing, playing, showering these two. And we're all in sister heaven blabbing, blabbing, staying up way too late, eating and soaking up the company. Life is nice….

Can someone tell me why this song won't leave me alone?

You know how you watch a movie and it sucks you in? Well, I don't watch many movies so when I picked this one instead of a nap on the flight home from Iceland, I was more than ready to give up on it and get my nap if it didn't suck me in. It did. I don't know why, other than the music and the whole country lifestyle thingy. Hard decisions about big life events coming up so it must have hit a cord. Whatever it is, I can't stop listening to this song and all the others he sings. Something about it…..soulful and twangy…. speaks right to me.

(PS. This was the only video I could find but it's a little PG rated so be careful if your kids watch!)

The Vikings are Coming, the Vikings are Coming!!!

In honor of our upcoming Iceland trip, Nathan and Lias are having a Viking themed joint birthday party. This is the protocol get up, minus the shield. All brought to you by cardboard and duct tape and a mother's imagination. Nathan has been raiding villages all night long.

The Ranch in Florida

Interesting newscast about the ranch John grew up on.

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=15602133&_mid=805&_rid=805.800.248816

But really, did you notice all the flies?? :-)

Cuteness

At least I think so....

One year down

Took my last final for the first year of nursing school today. I'm so ready to have a summer again and hang out with the kids, uninterrupted playing or surfing the internet, actually sleeping and seeing my husband a little. It's been a crazy 8 months but now it's done and for that I'm glad. I feel like I've learned a ton and yet hardly scratched the surface of what I'm supposed to know. I got my first B at a community college. Yuck. And failed tests galore only to find with the curve I'd A'ced it. Yuck again.

Be prepared for a onslaught of post sometime the future. I have a whole fall and winter's worth of pictures begging to get out. But my bed is begging for me to get into it!

the Strength within

This little girl is so strong, yet fragile. She amazes me daily with her insight, her devotion to us and her desire to want to do what's right.

She's always looking out for someone else, trying to right a wrong or make someone happier. I had one of her little friend's dad tell me the other day that she was destined to be a diplomat when she grew up because she can defuse any situation and it's true.

She's in love with babies, absolutely obsessed and still dresses them up each day and brings them to me to watch all day while she's at school. Daily,I let her down or make her cry when I bark at her or loose my temper and nightly I pray for forgiveness and hope I haven't crushed her little spirit.

Last week she wrote, illustrated and delivered this lesson entirely by herself for Family Home Evening:

"doow (do) you nowe (know) how (who) are profit (prophet) is? he is Presint Monsin. HF (Heavenly Father but she used the abbreviation HF) sprks (speaks) to Presint montsin he tells him to tell us to be good this weekende are Profit will speek to us he will tell us the things that HF tollde (told) him to tell us."

Her testimony is fragile but strong -just like her personality -and she's eager to learn. Her faith and desire are so real that they make me want to do better and be a better person for her.

She has turned the tide on John being her favorite and now I have the honor, but I'm floundering to try to fill big shoes. I have big plans this summer to hang out and really enjoy each other. We're gonna learn to sew a little, play a little barbies and babies and plan a birthday party, for starters. I love my curly girly (hair compliments of one patient Auntie Laurel who introduced her to rollers. She bounced around all day.).

A tale of 2 poops

1. My little man - I guess I really can't call him a baby anymore - pooped all by himself in his little potty tonight. He didn't even call me in until he'd tried to put it into the toilet all by himself, which was ok by me even though he made a tremendous mess. That is one of the best faces a mother can ever experience, watching your little baby so excited and proud of himself that he went all by himself and was successful. It is really priceless and I'm so glad that he waited 2 whole days to let me have the joy - and the fun of cleaning him and the potty and the toilet and the floor all up at 9:25 at night when I have 3 hours of homework ahead of me and I wished the kids were asleep at 7:30. It's a constant battle to want to see them and spend time with them and experience their little lives and know I have homework looming over me. I only have 33 more days of this first year left. I'm just taking one week at a time and trying not to let anyone die or be emotionally damaged in the process. Poor Lias has probably been ready to potty train for 2 months but I haven't found the stretch of time to help him. I don't think we can go backwards from here so here we go! Ready or not!

2. Two weeks ago we started clinicals at school which means I'm actually in a "hospital" setting now. Actually, it's just a nursing home but at least it's with real patients. On my very first day, my patient - a 94 year old dancing lady who doesn't walk or even stand very well - was having some incontinence issues. To make a long story short, on the way to getting her to the bathroom she ended up sitting on my lap instead of falling on the floor and breaking her hip. Lets just say I was sandwiched between a dirty bed and a dirty bum. Poor lady but she didn't fall and for that I'm still glad. Best part of all was we got to go to a seminar after our time at the nursing home and I didn't have a change of clothes. It felt like I was back on the farm, covered in crap after a hard days work. My classmates were pretty disgusted but it really didn't bother me. Needless to say, I did order a second pair of scrubs that afternoon.

Even Super Heros get Sleepy

Nathan and the Gospital

Every night we all gather on Nathan's bed to read scriptures and say family prayers. Nathan used to be our least compliant one - blame it on his constant need to move and fidget and roll on someone, etc - but lately we've turned a whole new corner with this kid. No longer does he test our patience with sitting still but instead with his incessant request to read more after we've exhausted our time. He is all about reading and soaking it up and trying to understand anything we tell him. He answers even the most abstract questions that John throws out to him and 99% of the time he's right, even if he can't quite say the words. It's very humbling and slightly amusing to hear a 4 1/2 year old trying to explain the Atonement, resurrection and the meaning of righteousness.

Last week we accompanied John down to Duke to sit in the hotel with he went to class and eat his fancy foods and try out the local kids museums. I gave the kids the task of packing their own bags of entertainment for the trip. It wasn't until we got to Duke that I noticed the two - and only - items Nathan had packed to entertain him: His Spiderman costume and.. his Book of Mormon. We attended a ward down in Durham where the vast majority of the testimonies were from kids and after watching the 5th one go up, Nathan turned to John and said he wanted to go up also. So up he went and fearlessly and loudly declared his love for the "Gospital" to all the congregation. Such an amazing spirit for such an intense little body.

A Sad Rooster Story

I just posted this on our family website and figured it was a nice snapshot of our lives, so enjoy:

A couple of months ago Nathan went to feed the chickens the scraps and I heard him screaming. I walked out and he was screaming about a rooster that he said attacked him so I told him to kick it really hard. Then it jumped on him again and I ran up and booted it around the yard a few times to teach it a lesson. Unfortunately, I didn't realize John and all his guys were at the office watching the whole spectacle. Luckily, a few days later John got frustrated at a final he was taking and walked out to feed the chickens, only to be attacked by the same rooster. Lets just say the rooster messed with the wrong person at the wrong time. And that's the end of my rooster story.