December 4th, 2009

Ryan playing with his 'computer'

Laura practicing piano

Eden watching her kitty in the washer

L and E playing computer together.  I love how different and similar their faces look.

 

December 1st, 2009

I'm sitting and writing in my journal by the light of the Christmas tree with the kids finally all asleep and Brent on his way home from taking his final.

Ryan has started coming up and sitting on my lap with a book and pointing at the pictures. Love it!

When Brent came through the door today Eden looked at him and said, "Woah, it's a big one!"

Laura's famous catch phrase right now is, "You're the best (insert: mommy, daddy, friend, piano teacher, ) in the whole world!" Her eyes just light up when she says it too.  She really wants to make everyone around her feel good.

I can't remember what she had just done in this picture but I happened to be holding my camera and caught her face:

 

November 30th, 2009

The other day I was getting into my cedar chest for something and I noticed my porcelain dolls from when I was a little girl.  Santa Clause used to bring us one every Christmas.  I looked at them sitting there getting dusty and called Laura and Eden in.  For Laura it was love at first sight.  They both loved taking off their little shoes and stockings and feeling their smooth porcelain faces.  Laura slept with my favorite, the one that has a yellow dress and ringlets that I tried to comb out as a little girl.  She named her Theresa and she is now sitting happily on their book shelf.  The others went back into my cedar chest for another day.

"RETREAT 2009"

I love our annual retreat.  This year was wonderful too, even though it almost didn't happen!  About an hour after Maren and my Mom left Rexburg to meet Sarah and I up at Wolf Creek Maren's kids got the stomach flu.  They almost turned around halfway.  I'm so glad they didn't!

It seems like each year we spend a little less time scrapbooking and being productive and more time just relaxing.  Pride and Prejudice, the 6 hr. A&E version, Sarah's first time watching it, Nerts, exercising at the gym, hot tubbing, eating delicious food, laughing so hard we couldn't stop, and listening to great music about sums it up.

Even though Sarah slept half the time to catch up from her overworked schedule, Maren was wishing she was helping poor Mike with the kids, we missed Ellen not being with us, and Mom got hurt in an ill-advised game of racketball, it was still a blast. 

 

November 11th, 2009

A Day in our Life:

*Woke up late, we're getting sick again

*Ryan has another cough-we just got better and here we go again

*Cleaned and did laundry

*Forgot to have Morning Devotional, rats

*Got L off to school after doing homework

*Showered and played with R and E

*Lunch-doing great eating healthy today:)

*Picked up L from school and went and bought a rake

*Came home and the kids and I played in the leaves and

put them on the garden in the back

*Preschool Music Class- L tried to take over the class and E spent

most of the time in timeout on the stairs, but oh well. You win some, you loose some.

*Girls watched Tinkerbell while I taught Jennifer violin.  She's such a great girl, we talked

about college and music majors.

*Everyone cried and fussed while I made dinner.

*Ryan has diaper rash and is getting into everything.  Good thing he's so cute.

*Brent did the dishes while I played piano. What a sweetie

*Laura and Brent went on a date to the movie theater because L filled up her entire

bedtime chart.  They saw UP and got popcorn.

*While they were gone I folded 6 loads of laundry while E and R played on the bunkbeds.

*Read stories to just Eden.  She needs to go to bed earlier if she's not going to

take naps anymore.

*Ryan kept coming up to me during prayers to give me hugs.  Melted my heart.

 Last Saturday Lanna and Scott and co. met us at the Treehouse Childrens' Museum. We went to their annual Enchanted Woods event.  Basically the kids got to walk around in a group and listen to a story from fairy tale characters.  There was Puss in Boots, Belle, the Lion from Aesop's Fable, the Pied Piper, and many others.  My favorite was the last stop: the little pig and the big bad wolf.  It was in the theater and the kids got to help the little pig 'build' a house to withstand the wolf.  Happily the wolf ended up sharing a rice crispy treat instead of pork chops, and all was well.  The kids also got a little toy or treat at each stop.  Ryan ran all over the place, but the girls sat and listened very intently to each story.  They loved it, and afterward the Whetsels came over for donuts and hot chocolate.

We spent most of October sick.  The first year that we moved here to Utah we spent the whole month of October sick inside.  We thought maybe it had to do with the apartment we were staying in, but this year the same thing happened.  It wasn't the H1N1 thank goodness, maybe that's still coming, but rather an upper respiratory cold and cough combo.  Laura got it first and it spread to Eden then to Brent and I and finally Ryan is just getting over it.  Today, Nov. 1, is the first day we've been to church together as a family in about a month and a half!  I'm starting to crack down on hand washing and sanitizing and we've also decided to not take the kids to any unnecessary public places, like the grocery store or the library.  My labors might be in vain, but I'm hoping we can stay healthy for a little while longer!

We've also been enjoying the last few days of beautiful weather.  After the snow from the last weekend we're back up into the 60's.  Love it! 

This little guy is becoming a little tornado.  Into everything and running around. His absolute favorite thing is to be outside.  He'll stay content in the stroller for hours as long as he's out of doors.  Just like his daddy.  Except the stroller bit:)