Keeping up with the Mathews

Change your little girl's earrings, for crying out loud.

2012-02-04T21:15:00.000-08:00

The most horrible thing just happened. I'm still shaking. Brynley got these cute minnie mouse earrings from disneyland. She's been wearing them for about a week and a half but we've made sure to twist them every day to make sure her ears don't scab around the posts. Tonight she wanted to change them. One of them was kind of stuck. This has happened once before where it bled a little and scabbed around the post but I just soaked it and it came out with a little pulling. Well tonight we could NOT get this earring out. She got the back off but the earring was STUCK in her ear. I was soaking it and twisting it. It was weird because it twisted around very easily but it wouldn't come OUT. She was screaming in pain so I went to get some ice to numb it a little bit. Brandon ended up getting it out while I was in the kitchen. She was just balling.

We didn't really want the ear to close up so we got out her really good earrings that were used to pierce her ears. I was trying to put it in and it wasn't going in. I was so confused. I looked at the back of her ear to see if it was coming through on the other side and I saw a little metal. I pushed it in thinking it was coming through and it wouldn't come. The BACK of her minnie mouse earring was stuck IN her ear!! I thought she had taken the back off because I didn't see it when I was taking off her earring. The WHOLE back was IN her ear. I almost threw up. I had to walk out of the bathroom and tell Brandon and my mom (who had just finished babysitting). I couldn't look at it. (It was the kind of back that is kind of cone shaped not wide with holes and shaped like a pretzel.) I was sick.

We didn't know what to do. Should we take her to a doctor? We got some numbing neosporin and the ice and numbed it for a while. I have some really sharp tweezers and Brandon kind of pushed on it until the back poked out through the hole. He used the tweezers to pull. He got it about half way out but couldn't get the big end out. She was just screaming in pain. It was bleeding. I was holding her and sobbing because, really this is my fault since I didn't have her change her earrings sooner. Meanwhile Caleb is downstairs with Grandma just praying their little hearts out. We held ice on it and tried to decide if we should take her in somewhere and where and when etc. He thought he'd try one more time because Brynley didn't want to go to the Dr and get a shot. He pulled and was able to get it out. She was still screaming. I was still sobbing. It was still bleeding. We put the ice back on there and just held it there for a while.

She ended up calming down (as did I) and we got the bleeding stopped. We cleaned it all out. We asked her if she wanted to let the holes close up and heel or if she wanted to put back in her original earrings for a while and we'd really watch it to make sure it didn't get infected. She wanted to put the piercing earrings back in. So we did and it didn't hurt her at all. Probably because her hole was so stretched out. No skin tore or anything and it actually looked pretty ok just a little swollen afterwards.

Anyway, that's my story. I'm still shaking. So, lesson. Change the earrings. Don't rely on just twisting them and assume everything is ok. And if you get cheap-o earrings change them even more often. (Deep breathes...)

Top ten (or more) reasons why I loved our Disneyland trip and one reason (or a few) why I didn't (plus pics)

2012-01-31T14:56:00.000-08:00

1. The excitement before going into the park is so... exciting!

2. Who doesn't want to eat as much sugary goodness for breakfast made by Goofy himself?

3. There are movie stars around every corner!

4. Minnie gives really long hugs.

5. Going on The Little Mermaid Ride and The Monsters Inc ride with Aubrey 8 times each is my idea of a really good time.
6. Absolutely nothing beats watching your kids watch a Disney Parade.
7. Splash Mountain on a warm sunny day is the epitome of happiness.
8. Aubrey did get used to the rides and was a good sport after the first day (this is her being a good sport)

9. Because of Brynley's tall snow boots she was able to ride and LOVED Tower of Terror and Indiana Jones and tried Screamin' but didn't love it. I loved watching her and Caleb so excited about the rides.
10. Because I can do pull ups anywhere! And Disneyland is the BEST place to do them!

11. It was hilarious sneaking Aubrey onto "Soarin over CA" by stuffing borrowed cowboy boots with socks and wash cloths to make her 3 inches taller. She could barely walk and loved that she was playing a "trick".
12. Loved seeing old friends Kent and Nellie Sommer and baby Win and talking with Win on the car ride home.

DID NOT LOVE:
1. The torrential rain on the first day that left all of us soaked and Aubrey quite unhappy.

2. Caleb's barfing all night long the first night.
3. That my phone didn't automatically update to CA time so I was up and ready to go the first morning at 5:45am. After being up with a barfing Caleb.

All things considered, it was a fabulous trip and I'd go back tomorrow if I could.

Merry Christmas!

2012-01-14T19:17:00.000-08:00

This year we spent Christmas with my side of the family and we had SO much fun!! We went to eat at Tepanyaki a few days before Christmas. That's kind of a little tradition the last few years to do that together when we're all in town. The kid's love the "show" and we love the food too! And, yes, Aubrey dressed herself for our night on the town. I didn't feel like fighting...

The next night we all got together and had my Grandma's chicken noodle soup and watched Home Alone.

We had SO much fun getting to know Cason! He is so cute! My kids (and I) loved playing with him!

On Christmas Eve we went to my parents house with my siblings, my aunt and uncle and some of my cousins. We ate our Christmas Eve dinner, used our nativity puppets to act out the nativity and did the "pass around game" where you read the Night Before Christmas and everyone passes gifts around the circle every time the word 'and' is read. It's a lot of fun.

Christmas morning was fantastic! My kids were all old enough to enjoy it and get excited. And besides one little crying episode by Brynley (Caleb pushed her out of the way when they were coming down the hall to see what Santa brought them) they were in great moods all day! Caleb got a 3DS, Brynley got an art easel and Aubrey got a kitchen from Santa. We also gave Brynley my American Girl doll from when I was a little girl.

Later in the morning my family came over to exchange presents and have brunch. We went to church a little later and just hung out enjoying each other's company. I really enjoyed going to church on Christmas. It just felt right. :-)

We had a wonderful Christmas with family and we hope you all did as well! And it's ok to have a little mess on Christmas, right?

December so far...

2011-12-21T09:10:00.000-08:00

We all liked Santa this year! This might be the first year that's happened... HE also liked US so much that he sent us an Elf on the Shelf the next day!

Brandon and I went on a fun date for our 11th anniversary. We had a discount at the Tree Room so went up to Sundance and had a great meal out and then walked around Riverwoods which looked so beautiful all lit up! I'm so happy I married my best friend 11 years ago. Time flies! With the way marriages go these days I'm so lucky and blessed that we are still happier than ever!

The kids have been participated in an anti bullying program at school called Verbal Judo. At the graduation the kids got to break a board with their bare hands! Amazing, I know! Brynley didn't want to do it, but Caleb sure did!

Thanksgiving 2011

2011-12-21T08:57:00.000-08:00

We had a great Thanksgiving this year! We went up to Jeremy and Angie's house and Jordan and Brandon's parents came into town. Angie always does such fun things. The kids had a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving feast while we were waiting for everyone to get there and for dinner to be ready. After dinner we went on a little walk and she had scavenger hunt sheets where the kids had to look for things on the walk and check things off that they found. It was so cute!

The food was amazing and the company was fantastic! Thanks for a great holiday Mathews' family!

The day after Thanksgiving we went to the Spanish Fork Light Parade this year. It was really cute! It was very small town but it was a fun way to kick off the Christmas season.

Halloween 2011

2011-11-16T12:36:00.001-08:00

Halloween was a lot of fun this year. Caleb dressed up like Harry Potter. Brynley was a witch. And Aubrey was Minnie Mouse. Brynley wore a witch costume that I wore when I was younger but we jazzed it up with a sash and some tights. We had a Trunk or Treat, a ward party and went trick or treating around the neighborhood.

Las Vegas Ragnar

2011-11-09T11:11:00.001-08:00

A few weeks ago I ran the Las Vegas Ragnar. For those of you who know me you know how much I love my sleep and don’t really enjoy running. A Ragnar relay was close to the top of my list of things I don’t really care to ever do. But a friend from high school messaged me a couple weeks before asking if I wanted to join the team because they needed a couple spots filled. Saundra and I ended up working out our schedules so we could go down for the weekend. We ended up having a great time!
I was in van 2 and runner 11. I was in a van with Saundra (my bff), Kent (my good friend from high school) and Nellie (his wife) so it was a lot of fun to chat with them and the new friends I met.

Since we were in van 2 we didn’t run at first. The runners from van 1 took their turns running through the Vegas heat from about 10am to about 3pm. We leap frogged with van 1 and cheered on our runner, gave them water and whatever else they needed. At each exchange one runner passed the “baton” which was a slap bracelet to the next runner and off they went.
Our van started in the late afternoon on Friday. Our first couple runners had the worst of the heat. By the time it was my turn it was close to sunset. My first leg of the run was about 3.7 miles. It was at sunset and by the end of my run it was dark. The run was on a paved path through the hills. It was really pretty and really uphill most of the time. I was feeling good though and pushed it up the hills.

Our van finished around 9 pm or so and we were starving so we passed off to the other van and went to Sweet Tomatoes for dinner. It was nice to eat a good meal and just relax and sit there and talk to other adults without being interrupted. 
Sooner than we expected (around midnight?) we got the call that we needed to go meet van 1 at the next van exchange. We finished dinner, changed our clothes and headed off to meet them. Our 2nd leg of the race was in the middle of the night. I tried to sleep while our other runners ran but I couldn’t. It was cold and I was tired so I told my teammates I might be a little slow for this leg. This leg was 3.9 miles for me. I started running around 2:30am. I felt GREAT! The weather was cold at first but it felt good for running and my leg was slightly downhill. It felt awesome. It was a little scary at times when there was no one in front of me or behind me and no vans driving by and it was pitch black out but those times didn’t last long. I finished about 5 minutes earlier than I thought so Nellie wasn’t quite ready for me. But the other team mates saw me and Nellie ran over to me, I slapped the bracelet on her and off she went! It was almost time for us to go sleep!
When she finished her leg it was about 3:30am and we headed to Kent’s sister’s house to sleep for a few hours. We woke up somewhat refreshed after 3 hours of sleep and left to go do our last leg of the relay! This was the longest part for our van with our legs totaling 39 miles.
We started about 9 am, I think. There were some crazy hard runs during this one. One runner in our van had a ten miler, mostly up a steep hill in the Vegas heat. I was second to last in our van and even though it was super hot, my leg was mostly down hill so I felt great running it. It was such a great feeling to finish my last leg. I handed off to Nellie, we cheered her on and then headed to the finish line where we would cross together as a team. Even though my legs were short (all around 4 miles) I had such a feeling of accomplishment. I did surprisingly well on the lack of sleep. The energy was great and it was fun to see all the vans and runners and everything. I am so glad I did it, even though it was on my “hope I never do in my life” list. That’s the opposite of a bucket list… I hope to do another one someday!

Fall Happenings

2011-10-26T12:53:00.000-07:00

We have done a few fun things this fall. We went on a "Halloween Cruise" on Provo river. This was kind of silly but the kids loved it. We rode a big raft like boat on the river and the guide told a scary story and we saw a lot of jack o laterns. We even almost got taken over by pirates!

We got our pumpkins at the pumpkin patch and there was a petting zoo with the biggest pig I've ever seen. There is also a big pit with dried corn to play in. It was fun and surprisingly clean and cool feeling.

Brynley got her ears pierced:

My new favorite seasoning - Giveaway!!

2011-09-21T13:09:00.000-07:00

My sister is doing a giveaway for my new favorite seasoning! Go to the link below to see the details! It's super yummy!!!

GIVEAWAY LINK!!!

Caleb's Baptism Day

2011-09-07T13:42:00.001-07:00

Caleb's baptism was probably one of the most special days of my entire life. Seeing Brandon and Caleb together in the font was something I want to memorize and keep in my heart forever. My heart was so full of love for both of them it could have exploded. I don't really know how to explain my feelings. If you are a mom who has had a child baptized, you probably know what I mean.

This wonderful day started bright and early with everyone arriving at our house at 9am for the 9:30 baptism. Everyone (except Roger-we missed you Rog!) from both sides of the family was there! This hasn't happened since Aubrey's blessing day almost three years ago.

The baptism was wonderful. Kelly sang "I'm trying to be like Jesus", both grandma's gave talks and the Mathews' cousins sang "I like to look for rainbows" for the closing song. The spirit was so strong through the baptism and confirmation. It was amazing.

Afterwards, we all went to the park and had a brunch.

Afterwards the Mathews' side stuck around and we took our raft out on Salem Pond.

Honestly, is this not the most beautiful thing you've seen in a long time?

It was so relaxing there with the mountains, the crystal pond, the shade, the park, it was wonderful after an emotional morning.

Of course it was followed by Cafe Rio and BYU football in the early evening.

Caleb got new scriptures, a case and a journal from his grandparents. He is so excited about his scriptures and we "scripture chased" for about the next 24 hours. He's gotten pretty good and finding the references!

Caleb is such a wonderful boy. I hope his excitement for the gospel and the scriptures only grows as he gets older. We love you Caleb!

First day of school!

2011-08-23T11:26:00.001-07:00

This summer FLEW by! We were so busy and out of town quite a bit that the first day really snuck up on me. But here they are. As cute and excited as ever! Brynley is in 1st grade this year and Caleb's in 3rd grade. Yep. Two in all day school. Whatever will I do with myself?!

Caleb's Harry Potter Party

2011-08-23T11:13:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday Caleb had a Harry Potter birthday Party. I had so much fun planning it!

When the boys got there they sat under the Sorting Hat and I choose a house badge out from a big bowl at random. They were assigned to houses and then got their wands which were bamboo sticks from my in law's house in Seattle. They were perfect wands!

We first had a divination class where I typed up Harry Potter style fortunes and put them in balloons. They had to pop the balloons by sitting on them and then read everyone their fortune. They all laughed at the silly fortunes.

Next was a Transfiguration class which was a magic show by my nephew Collin. He did a great job and the boys thought it was so cool!

Potions class was next. We started with "leech juice" (green kool aid) and they could choose from scorpion stingers (sprinkles), hippogriff eggs (big black jelly beans), dried skin flakes (oats), unicorn droppings (marshmallows), and many other yucky things to add to their potion. The final step was adding a fizzinator tablet (Airborne tablet). They watched their concoction fizz and I dared them to drink it! Most of them took a few sips and didn't want to finish it. But a few brave souls drank the whole potion!

We ate pizza and cake at the 3 Broomsticks and then the owls came and brought presents. We had Quidditch practice (freeze tag on brooms) until parents came. As each boy left he got a goody bag from Honeydukes Sweet Shoppe.

We had so much fun at our party and Caleb was on a high all day long!

I can't believe Caleb is turning 8 and will be baptized in a few short weeks. It doesn't seem that long ago that he was born. Caleb is such a responsible boy. He is a lot of fun to be with and is getting really funny. He loves reading and read the first Harry Potter book this summer and is working on Book 2. He is a great swimmer and has a collection of ribbons from swim team meets this summer. Caleb is very friendly and has a lot of friends. Kids seem to like him and so do we. :)

Happy birthday Caleb!

Brynley's water party

2011-08-23T11:05:00.001-07:00

For Brynley's 6th birthday she wanted a water party. I was happy to throw it because water parties are the easiest birthday parties in the world! We played some water games in the back yard, had cupcakes, a pinata, opened presents, ran in the sprinklers and before I knew it, it was over!

Brynley is turning 6 and starting first grade this year! I can't believe it. She has turned into such a nice little girl. She used to be a little mean. :) She loves playing with Aubrey and Aubrey loves her too. She loves playing "mom and dad", playing with the chickens, going swimming and watching Harry Potter. She loves rainbows and LOVED that she got to ride a horse on her birthday! She is really nice and fun if she's in a good mood. But if she's not in a good mood... Watch out!

We love you Brynley! Happy Birthday!

To Grandmother's House We Go!

2011-08-22T12:45:00.001-07:00

We had the most eventful trip Seattle this year!

It started on a Saturday morning when we drove up to Jeremy and Angie's for Abby's baptism. Caleb and Abby are really close in age so it was fun to watch her get baptized.

We stayed at their house that night and then left for Washington on Sunday morning. Sunday we drove part way and stayed in a hotel and then drove to Ensign Ranch on Monday morning.

We stayed in a Cabin at Ensign Ranch Monday night. They have so much to do there! The kids played for hours on the big slip n slide. Then we had a cook out and went on a hay ride, just our family! It was fun to take a hay ride when you weren't snuggled up against a bunch of strangers!

After a whole bunch of smore's we retired for the night in the cabin. The cabin was great! It was basically just a place to sleep since it didn't have bathrooms or anything so it was pretty much like camping. That's my favorite type of camping. :-) And the kids went to the bathroom about every 10 minutes because they thought the (clean) outhouses were so cool.

The next morning we took the kids on parent-led horse back rides. This was Brynley's birthday and she thought it was so awesome to go horse back riding on her birthday!

We also went canoeing that morning and then headed to Grandma and Grandpa's house near Seattle.

On Wednesday we took a (very expensive) ferry ride over to a Children's Museum. They have totally hiked up those ferry prices in the last few years, holy moly! The kids liked the museum and they had something for all of my kids to enjoy.

On Thursday we went to the Museum of Flight. This was awesome! We got to walk through a Concord and Air Force One from when Kennedy was President. They also had areas of the museum that showed things from WWI and WWII. It was cool.

Friday we took the raft to a lake and relaxed with it. It was so fun. We love the raft. Mary and Stan actually gave it to us and we are excited to use it here in Utah. Caleb jumped into the lake and swam around for a long time. Brynley wanted to go in to so I said, "Sure, hop in" and she slid right in like a wet fish. It was cute. She only stayed in for about 30 seconds before she was done though.

That night we went to Red Robin to celebrate Caleb and Brynley's birthday. When the waiters brought out ice cream for B and C's birthday Aubrey stands up and yells, "I want one! I want one!" Poor girl!

Saturday we packed up all day and then headed to the zoo for a couple hours before going to a Tacoma Ranier's game (minor league). The kids had a lot of fun and Caleb got way into the game. I would ask him questions and he'd "shh" me saying "I'm watching the game!"

We left after the game and drove part way home and the rest of the way Sunday. We had such a great trip! Thank you Stan and Mary for taking us to do all those fun things! Lots of memories were made!

Fourth of July

2011-07-08T15:55:00.000-07:00

We braved the Provo Freedom Parade this year. Not sure we'll do it again. It took FOREVER to find parking and it was cloudy so that was good. If it was sunny I don't know if it would have been worth it...

For the fourth of July we met my cousin Jessie, her family, Katie, Aunt Deb and Uncle Wayne and my parents up Provo Canyon for a picnic. It was fun to catch up!

That night we went to the Nye's for our third annual firework show.

Aloha ~ Last two days

2011-07-08T15:48:00.000-07:00

Friday was the “left over” day that we were saving for anything we didn’t get to or wanted to do again.

In the morning we hiked Diamond Head. We did it really quick and it was a lot of fun.

We wanted to head back to our favorite beach, Kailua Beach. We LOVED it there. We actually went there again on Saturday so that makes three times in one week! The sand is so soft, waves are on the bigger side and it was smooth and shallow for a long time. There were trees for shade on the edge of the beach. That beach kept us both happy! Brandon got to boogey board and sit in the shade. I got to lay out, play in the waves and then move to the shade when I was too hot. We loved it!

That night after dinner we went to Ala Moana mall. It is a HUGE open air mall with tons of nice stores. There’s a Lululemon (my favorite store and there isn’t one in Utah) and I tried on just about everything in the store. Then we headed straight for a Mochi place and got some Mochi ice cream and for real mochi with beans. It was actually super good!

Saturday we checked out of our hotel and headed up to Hale’iwa again to exchange a shirt for Brynley and then off to Kailua Beach again. We left that night and had a horrible night’s “sleep” on the plane all night. By Sunday morning we were back in Utah and exhausted! We had such a wonderful trip and came home to a clean house and happy kids! Thank you Mom, Dad, Jeremy and Angie for making our trip possible!

Aloha ~ Day 6 Hawaii Trip

2011-07-08T15:22:00.000-07:00

Today was so much fun! We got up bright and early and headed up to Hale’iwa to go stand up paddle boarding. We paddled up the river past a bunch of houses. We even saw a few turtles. They were huge! It wasn’t really that hard in the river. In the little bay were there was a little tide it was a teeny bit harder to keep your balance but still not super hard. He did give us the huge “unsinkable” boards though. ;-)

Then we went to this beach with ginormous turtles. They were so big! We saw one out swimming in the ocean and these big guys on the shore.

After lunch we headed to Sunset Beach. It was super windy but we had so much fun boogey boarding and playing in the waves.

We stopped at a fruit stand and got some fun fruits (dragon fruit and star fruit) and tried some banana, coconut, rice thing. Then we stopped at a shack selling shrimp of the shrimp farms. Oh, it was so yummy! We also went into the macadamia nut farm store. They had samples of every kind of flavor macadamia nut you can imagine.

Tonight we went to dinner at this yummy Hawaiian bbq place called Kenny’s. It is just in the food court of the Royal Hawaiian Hotel but it is so good! It’s the third time we’ve been there in 6 nights, lol. Then we walked to the Hilton Hawaiian Village to watch the how the rich people vacation. ;-). After relaxing there for a bit we walked back to the hotel along the beach. Now we are tired and ready for bed.

Aloha ~ Day 5 Hawaii trip

2011-07-07T15:37:00.000-07:00

Today we took our sweet time getting up and working out and headed to Manawili falls. It was a great hike but super muddy and slippery. I’m talking I think my shoes are ruined muddy. It was really hard to walk through parts because the mud was so slippery and thick and gooey. But overall it was really fun and kind of a hard hike which is fun. There was a lot of climbing up rocks and over roots and stuff like that.

Brandon jumped off a cliff at the falls. He likes to do that. To jump off things.

Then we went to Kailua Bay. Holy cow this beach was awesome. It was super gorgeous and had big waves to play in. There was also a nice breeze so we never got way too hot. The crowds were perfect, not too many people. We totally loved it and will probably go back.

Tonight we tried this yummy grill and both got some amazing fish and then walked over to International Market Place to get the kiddos some surprises. It was a great day and I’m pooped!

Aloha ~ Day 4 Hawaii trip

2011-07-06T14:26:00.000-07:00

Today we went up to Laie and walked around BYU-Hawaii, the temple and the Polynesian Cultural Center.

This is the green house where I lived when I went to BYU-H. It doesn't look so green anymore though...

We spent most of the day at PCC. The best villages were Tonga and Samoa. They were hilarious! Brandon got called on stage at the Samoan village and the guy had him drink coconut water. I think he was expecting him not to like it but we LOVE fresh coconut water. The guy played around with him and we all had a good laugh. After he drank the coconut he said, "Now tomorrow, you'll look like me." And, of course, I let out a little holler. It was funny. In Samoa, it completely poured rain on us for about 5 straight minutes. And you are left with this wonderful picture. And bad hair the rest of the day.

Brandon actually got this fire smoking.

We ate at the Ali'i Luau and it was fantastic. Very authentic luau with lots of really different foods.

The night show was incredible. All the dances, the fire, the story, it was amazing.

We had a great day up in Laie.

Aloha~Hawaii Trip Day 3

2011-06-28T00:05:00.000-07:00

Today we got up and took our sweet time working out and having breakfast. Our room has a kitchen so we are eating most meals in the room or making them to take with us. We have been making protein shakes with lots of mango and pineapple and lime and they are to die for!

We went up to Waimea Falls today. We hiked up to the falls and Brandon swam out by them. Then we went out to the famous Waimea Bay. It was an amazing beach! Nice sand, good water and you can watch everyone jumping off the cliff for entertainment. We loved it.

We went to Angels for shave ice, stopped at a fruit stand and then headed back to our hotel to shower and go out for a night on the town!

Aloha~Hawaii Trip Days 1-2

2011-06-26T23:37:00.000-07:00

Aloha from Hawaii! Brandon and I are in Hawaii right now. Yes, right now! I figured I might as well blog as I go if I have time.

Yesterday we dropped the kids off and their cousins house (they were SO excited to have a sleep over at their cousins for a few nights) and headed to the airport. We had a direct flight to Honolulu and got in around 2:30pm Hawaii time. After picking up some groceries at Walmart and Costco we headed to the hotel. My parents have been here for two weeks and they overlapped us by a day so we got to hang out with them. It was so fun! We found them and headed to dinner. We were SO tired after dinner that we hit the sack by 8:30pm.

Today we got up and went for my parents usual walk with them. It was so fun and pretty. We were down by the beach and we wanted to hop off a wall onto the sand and explore a little bit. So we were walking along this wall (I was in front) and I was about to hop down onto the sand when I walked right into a completely naked man. Laying on his back all spread eagle. It made us laugh for a while. Anything and everything is ok in Waikiki!

We spent the day on the beach at Waikiki today. Then we had an early dinner before my parents had to leave.

After they left Brandon and I watched the sunset and came back up to our room. It has been a gorgeous and fun first day in paradise!

We're related to a local celebrity!

2011-06-22T15:54:00.000-07:00

My nephew Collin was Peter Pan up at a community production at Weber State. We spent the day up in Salt Lake last week and went and saw him in it. He did such a great job and REALLY looked the part! Way to go Collin! We're so proud of you! :-)

Cheer Camp

2011-06-22T15:43:00.001-07:00

Brynley got to experience life as a cheerleader for 2 weeks this month. Springville High Cheer put on a cute little cheer camp where the cheerleaders taught the girls a dance and some cheers and then they put on a little show. It was really cute. And really popular too because I think every little girl in Springville was there...

Father and Son's Camp out and Girl Party!

2011-06-01T13:16:00.001-07:00

Last weekend was the Father and Son's Camp out. The boys had a lot of fun fishing, hiking and playing but it was pretty cold since our ward does it so early in the year.

While the boys were gone we had a girl party! Brynley planned the whole thing. We painted toe nails, made cookies, did puzzles, played games, had a movie night and Brynley slept in my bed with me. It was so fun! At one point she said, "I'm going to go play outside but tell me when the cookies are done. I planned this party so I can't miss any of it!" Such a fun, cute little girl.

Suesical the Musical

2011-05-25T15:04:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we went to see Suesical the Musical at BYU. We went out for ice cream first and then headed up to see the play. It was just ok. The preforming was great but I'm not sure I loved the actual play. It was kind of confusing for little kids I thought. But there was enough color and music to keep Aubrey entertained and the big kids liked it so we were happy. It's always fun to go do new and different things as a family!

We also snuck around the HFAC and found the very classroom that Brandon and I met in. We even sat back in the same seats we used to sit in. Can't believe it's been 11 years!

(My kids at Trafalga)

The funny things they say...

2011-05-10T12:17:00.000-07:00

Aubrey:

May 10 - We were leaving from the gym and Brynley started running to the car saying, "I'm gonna wi-in!" Aubrey started chasing after her yelling, "I'm gonna lo-ose!"

May 7 - Brandon was putting Aubrey to bed and reading her a story in the rocking chair. I was standing in the doorway winking, smiling and blowing kisses to her. She stares at me with a straight face and says, "Oh. We forgot to shut the door." She gets up and shuts the door in my face and locks it. HA! Is that straight out of the movie Mean Girls or what?

Brynley -

May - Brynley LOVES the chicks. She treats them like her little dolls. The other day I look outside and she's got Pip in her arm on her hip and she says to her, "Did you do it Pip? Did you? DID YOU?!" Lol.

How a Two Year Old Plays

2011-04-27T14:13:00.001-07:00

Easter 2011

2011-04-27T13:49:00.000-07:00

We had a great Easter this year. Aubrey was so much fun and loved getting into all the festivities. Saturday morning started with a Ward Easter Egg Hunt at the park. The kids love this because they get to do it with all their friends.

Saturday afternoon we colored eggs. Every time we took an egg out of the dye Aubrey would say, "(Sharp intake of breath) Blue!" or whatever color the egg was. She had equal amounts of excitement for the very first egg and the very last egg.

Sunday they woke up to the treasure hunt to find their Easter Baskets. When Aubrey saw hers she said, "(Sharp intake of breath) THAT'S for ME!?" (said in a voice higher and squeakier than I can imitate.

They all loved their baskets.

After church we went to my parents house with our friends the Nye's. We had a great Easter dinner and another fun egg hunt. With 5 kids searching for 10 real eggs and 10 plastic eggs each we hid 100 eggs in their backyard! It didn't take too long though.

We had a great Easter and hope you all did to. We tried hard to teach our kids about the Resurrection and why we celebrate Easter. We are so thankful for life and resurrection of Christ.

Happy Easter!

Testing blogging with my "mobile device"

2011-04-19T17:55:00.001-07:00

I downloaded this app to see if I could add pictures from my phone to the blog easier. Let's see if this works.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

RAD Kids and Trip to the farm

2011-04-05T20:21:00.000-07:00

Today was a busy day for Caleb at school. First we visited Harward Farms for his field trip. Aubrey and I came along and it was a lot of fun.

Then tonight he had RAD kids graduation. RAD kids is a nationwide program that teaches kids safety and self defense. It was pretty cool, actually. It taught them what to do if an adult came up a said "Hey, little boy, your mom told me to come pick you up from school today." They yell "NO!" and sucker punch them and run away as fast as they can. Ok maybe not really. But something along those lines. They learned different punches and kicks and stuff like that. They each had to get away from a bad guy tonight too. Bad guy = cop dressed up tons of padding so he looks kind of like Darth Vader.

What Flavor?

2011-03-24T09:20:00.001-07:00

Brynley quotable for today:

The girls had jelly bellies and Aubrey was asking Brynley what flavor they were:

Brynley says, "Hmmmm.... brown with white polka dots... that one is... tomato!"

Spring Piano Recital

2011-03-23T13:11:00.000-07:00

Caleb and Brynley both played in Saundra's piano recital last week. They did a great job! Brynley played Old McDonald and Caleb played "Ogg, the Caveman". Caleb actually started an octave too high but then he realized it and switched to the right position but kept going from the same point in the song. I was proud of him for doing it so smoothly. People in the audience probably thought it was supposed to be that way! Great job, kids! We're so proud of you!

Basketball 2011

2011-03-15T13:11:00.000-07:00

Caleb played basketball on Mapleton City league this year. He loved it and did a great job! He scored about once or twice per game. His coach was great and very patient with the boys. The games were so cute and fun to watch. He can't wait to play again next year!

This is what happens when a two year old decides what accessories to wear.

Monster Truck Rally

2011-02-24T12:43:00.001-08:00

ast weekend Brandon took Caleb to the Monster Truck Rally with some of our friends and their sons.

The boys were SO excited and all brought their monster trucks with them.

They embraced the inner red neck in all of us (really? is there one?) and really got into it. The dad's loved all the people watching.

We are lucky to have such good friends to do crazy, red necky things with!

Update

2011-02-08T12:58:00.000-08:00

Brandon got a job last week. He ended up being in the position to choose between two jobs. He chose one in Draper. He's still not so sure about the commute though... It will normally take up about 35 minutes but today there was a storm and it took him an hour. He does not like traffic. But it is a good job with amazing benefits. We have really enjoyed the last two months hanging out together during the day and staying in our jammies until 2pm. But that time had to come to an end. And we kind of needed to start making money again. So this is a very good thing.

Last Saturday we went to a family's house that we know from the gym. They had sheep that had just had babies so we went to see the lambs. Aubrey wouldn't even go near them but ever since Saturday she's been saying, "(In a soft voice) I saw baby lambs. And I saw (loud voice) BIG LAMBS!"

I'll leave you with a funny Caleb quotable:

Last week was the school's skate night. Brandon has always taken the kids in the past but I was going to take them this year.
Me: "Do the mom's skate?"
Caleb: "Well, sometimes, but I don't really want you to."
Me: "Ha, ha, how come?"
Caleb: "Mom! All my friends will be there!"
Me: laughing so hard
Caleb: "Well, I guess if you want to you can, just don't skate with me."

He's growing up...

Cellulitis

2011-01-18T18:16:00.001-08:00

Last Tuesday Caleb called me from school saying he was sick. I went to pick him up and his lip was really swollen (like it normally is when he's sick) and he slept most of the day.

When he woke up the next morning his face was red and swollen and his lip was blistering. We took him to the Dr and he sent us straight to the hospital to be admitted and hooked up to IV antibiotics.

Turns out it was cellulitis, a skin infection. It started as strep and must have gotten into his skin through cracks in his lip because it was so swollen.

He was in the hospital for 48 hours and then sent home on oral antibiotics. He kind of loved the hospital the first day. Unlimited wii time, tons of movie choices, as much ice cream as he could eat(which wasn't much since he was so sick) and lots of root beer. After the first night sleep and getting woken up ever few hours for vitals and a blood test he was not loving it so much. The second day there his face was really itchy and it hurt him really bad. He was really uncomfortable. Poor kid.

Caleb is such a strong brave boy. It broke my heart as he laid there trying to be brave through the iv's and CT scan as tears welled up in his eyes. He didn't ever flinch or cry out. The tears just softly dripped. It was horrible.

Now he is feeling so much better. The redness lead to peeling and now it is pretty much gone! Thank you so much for your thoughts and prayers. He got so many cards from friends and phone calls and I could tell he felt very loved. Thank you for your kindness and friendship.

Merry Christmas 2010

2010-12-28T14:16:00.000-08:00

We had a great Christmas this year! It was the year to spend time with Brandon's side of the family and his parents were nice enough to come to all of us in Utah!

We started the weekend by going to the BYU basketball game on Thursday night. I haven't been to one of those since Brandon was a student so that was a lot of fun.

Friday night Jeremy and Angie and family and Jordan came over to our house. We had dinner and fondue for dessert, sang carols, read the Christmas story with our puppets, and did our favorite pass around game. This game is so fun. Everyone brings a little $2-5 present. You sit in a circle and someone reads "Twas the Night Before Christmas". Every time the word "and" is read you pass your present around the circle. At the end of the story you keep the present you ended up with. We usually do a kid circle and an adult circle. It's such a fun tradition.

Can you find someone jumping between pictures below?

The pajama elf surprised the kids with jammies again this year:

Christmas day was way fun. The kids got lots of fun presents. Santa brought Caleb a voice activated R2D2, Brynley a Furreal pet dog and Aubrey a baby with a crib, high chair and stroller.

We all ended up getting really sick on Christmas day and the day after. It still hasn't quite left us. Brynley has thrown up a bunch and we've all (except Brandon) had fevers. Not the ideal way to spend Christmas break but, to look on the bright side, there hasn't been much fighting because we've all just been lethargically laying around.

I hope you have all had a wonderful holiday season and had a great year. We didn't get out Christmas cards again this year. Maybe next year? I think I say that every year... Anyway, know that we love you all and think about you often!

(Job updates: Brandon has a contract job that is full time hours and good pay that will last up to 6 months. This is perfect because he can do that while he continues to look for regular work. We have been very blessed through this entire ordeal...)

Disneyland 2010

2010-12-15T20:34:00.000-08:00

Creative title, I know. Man, I just realized I haven't posted for so long. We have no pictures from November. Seriously. None. Brandon was gone for the middle two weeks to Australia and we didn't do anything because we didn't want him to feel bad. ;-) Just kidding. But we really didn't do a darn thing. Besides eat turkey and I have no pictures of that.

In other news, Brandon lost his job today. If you follow us on facebook you already know this. It wasn't really EXPECTED but it was suspected. Anyway, I don't really know what to say about this... If you know anything anywhere here is some info about what he does.

"Brandon's degree is in Information Systems. He knows sql server and crystal reports. He does software implementation and training. He wants to get into software product management or a sales engineer role."

Enough about that. We went to Disneyland last week. It was awesome. The Christmas decorations and parades and fireworks shows were incredible. We saw the Aladdin show (AMAZING!), World of Color (also AMAZING!), the Christmas parade and the firework show. The parks were more crowded than we would have liked so I think we'll stick to going in Jan/Feb in the future. But we still had a fantastic time!

Halloween Weekend 2010

2010-11-02T13:44:00.000-07:00

We had a crazy weekend around these parts! With Saturday being Halloween (or when it was celebrated in Utah) and Monday being my birthday we had lots of stuff going on.

It started with a dinner with friends on Friday night. We had a lot of fun and ate a lot of greasy food at Ruby River with the Nyes and Browns. Thanks for helping me celebrate my birthday you guys!

Saturday was the trunk or treat. I HATE trunk or treats but I'll leave that discussion for another day. Half way through the trunk or treating it started hailing like crazy. I'm talking immediate hurricane like storm. It was nuts. Everyone jumped in their cars and headed home. We were going to go REAL trick or treating later but Caleb said, "I guess we can't go trick or treating..." and I jumped on that opportunity and said, "Yeah, I guess not." So we watched Karate Kid instead.

Caleb was Darth Vader at school and Mario on Halloween. Brynley was Thumbelina and Aubrey was a ballerina.

Sunday we had a birthday dinner at my parents house and on Monday Brandon and I spent a couple hours running errands together at lunch time. It was a great weekend spent celebrating my birthday and halloween! Aubrey made me feel especially special because she kept saying to me, "Happy bowday, mommy!" She would follow that up with a kiss on my arm. She's so sweet.

Thank you all for the birthday facebook greetings and text messages! I felt so loved all day!

The Pumpkin Patch

2010-10-20T11:10:00.000-07:00

On Monday night we went to the pumpkin patch. We have a pumpkin patch post every October so this may be a little redundant. This year they added a hay ride, a petting zoo and big bales of hay for the kids to jump off of and into. It was a ton of fun.

We were laughing before we went because three years ago, when Brynley was Aubrey's age she threw the hugest tantrum (similar to this famous tantrum) on the way to the very same pumpkin patch. I'm talking HUGE. TANTRUM. HUGE. So funny how time flies.

Caleb Surgery Update

2010-10-06T19:08:00.000-07:00

Sorry I don't have any pictures. I didn't even bring my camera on surgery day. Lame, I know. Caleb had a surgery done on Monday. As you know, all year he has been getting injections once a month of a scarring agent with the hopes of his lip shrinking in size. It has been very slow progress but there is definitely progress none the less.

On Monday his ENT, Dr Grimmer, did a coblation procedure. This is where they basically shave down the inside of his lip so it lays flatter. You know how when you bite your cheek you getting little bumps for sores? He has that all over the inside of his lip. They are vesicles. The Dr shaved those off. Right now he has an open wound in his mouth but it will heal nice and smooth just like the inside of our mouths.

Right after the procedure I could tell it was going to make a difference. From the bottom his lip already looked much more similar in size to the other side. As with any surgery though, there is swelling and it is now much bigger again. We will be able to know by about 4 weeks out what kind of results we will have. They can do another procedure like this mid November if needed.

He is a resilient kid and was bouncing off the walls yesterday so I sent him to school today. I went at his lunch and gave him some Lortab and he was good to go all day. The dr said he would miss 1-2 weeks of school but he was back after two days. Such a little tough guy.

I'll get some pictures and post them but I just wanted to update you all with how he is doing for now.

Happy 2nd Birthday Aubrey!

2010-09-22T13:19:00.000-07:00

I can't believe my baby is two years old! It seems like just yesterday she was born. Aubrey is such a good little girl. She is so pleasant and happy. She hasn't quite hit the terrible twos yet so we still love her. :-) I will say this though. While she is probably our easiest toddler yet with regards to temperament, she is MESSY! She goes from drawer to drawer pulling things out and throwing them all over. Yesterday I gave her a graham cracker and when I walked away she put it down on the carpet and stepped on it over and over until it was all crumbs. But she is always happy and sweet and oh so cute, so we'll keep her.

Aubrey loves:

-her doggy blanket
-yogurt
-pacifiers (fasers)
-playing with her brother and sister (Ehcob and Binny)

About a week before her birthday this conversation ensued:

Mom: "Guess who's birthday it is next week?!"
Aubrey: "What?"
Mom: "Aubrey's!!!"
Aubrey: "YAY!!!"
Mom: "What should we do at your party?"
Aubrey: "Snacks"
Mom: "What should we have?"
Aubrey: "Goldfish. Milk"
Mom: "Ok, what games should we play?"
Aubrey: "Duck, duck, sit"
Mom: "Sounds good. Should we have cake and presents?"
Aubrey: "YEEEAAAAHH!!!!!"

She had a bit of a pacifier (faser) addiction so on her birthday we decided it was time to get rid of those suckers (pun inteded). I tied one of them to some helium balloons and we sent them to the babies in heaven. She was really sad. But she is over it now. Every once in while she asks for them. I just remind her that she is such a big girl and she gave them to the babies in heaven so they can sleep good and she just says "Babies. Heaven. Sleep good."

She is just such a little sweetie. Love her.

2010 Share a Smile Triathlon

2010-08-28T10:33:00.000-07:00

Today was the Share a Smile Triathlon. I sponsored a Lean Bodies Health and Fitness team and there were about 15 of us all in matching shirts. I was hoping for top three in my age group but I placed fourth. It's ok though because ... are you ready for this?

LEAN BODIES HEALTH AND FITNESS PLACED FIRST in the team division!!! WOOT, WOOT! I am still so shocked. Way to go to EVERYONE on the team!

Caleb also did the triathlon! He did so great and had such a fun time! I am so proud of him for doing something kind of scary and hard. He said he even wants to do it again next year. His time was 8:30 and he swan 25 yards, biked 2/3 mile and ran 1/3 mile. Brandon even said he sprinted to the finish line! WAY TO GO CALEB!!! I am sad I didn't get to see him because our race started right after the kids swim.

Here's my little recap so that I can check back next year to compare notes. Skip if you want, this may be boring.

Swim: Feeling good. At the beginning of the line because my swim time is on the faster end. My fastest time in training was 6:57 for 400m. I stood with the 7 min people. I passed one person and got passed by two which I am thinking is inevitable in a pool swim. But because of the passings my time was approx 8:10 min. I flip turned the whole swim so I was proud of that.

T1: I forgot to set my iphone up for the ipod to be all ready to go so I had to do that during the transition. Lame. I put on my helmet, garmin and ipod, put on socks and shoes and headed out. T1 time was about 2:30.

Bike: Bike felt great. My goal average speed was high 17's or 18mph. My average speed was 17.4mph which matches my fastest speed but I was hoping for faster. The bike was also 11 miles instead of the advertised 10 miles so my goal time was a few minutes too fast for an 11 mile ride. But I like that course. It includes a steep but short hill and some good slight downhills where I was going 23 mph easy. Bike time was 37:24 min for 10.87 miles. Fastest speed 29.2 mph.

T2: I rode in, changed my shoes, changed from a helmet to a hat and then ran off... in the WRONG DIRECTION!!! AH! I noticed it pretty quick though and turned around. T1 was about 1:10.

Run: When I started running, my calves immediately cramped up worse than they ever have in my life. They felt like tight tennis balls. It was aweful. I actually had to stop and stretch on the curb. I couldn't get my speed under a 10:30 min/mile for about the first mile. After that, I could speed up a bit to about a 9:30 pace and the last mile was in the 8's. I finished at a 6:27 pace. My average pace was 9:20 min/mile. This run was 3.35 miles, longer than the advertised 3.1. My time for 3.35 miles was 31:25. I was hoping for a 9 min average/mile and a time of 28 (if it was 3.1 miles).

Overall, my time was 1:20:50. My goal was 1:13 but that was based off the shorter distances. So when you account for that, I was pretty close. I came in fourth in my age group.

I have to tell you about a friend I met. When I was biking up the first hill I was right behind her and we were cheering each other on. I passed her after the hill but then she passed me again and we were together on the second hill cheering each other on again. Then I was right behind her in the run, so I caught up to her. We ran together for a bit. When we were on the last mile, she said "We need to finish together." I said, "Wanna hold hands as we finish?" And she said, "Yeah, let's do it." Our speed was pretty fast (for me) that last mile and I give her all the credit. I couldn't have done it without her. Around the Scera Shell, we grabbed hands and finished at the exact same time! Thanks Abby! You were awesome!

Anyway, I was a little disappointed with the fourth place finish. (Third just sounds so much better.) But the person who placed second and third beat me by like 6 minutes so it's ok. But finding out our team WON in the team division made me giddy with excitement!!! I still can't believe it. I have a small trophy I get to keep and I get a huge trophy to keep for a year and then I turn it in next year. I am so excited! GREAT JOB to everyone on the LBHF team! You guys were AWESOME!!!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ETA: There were errors in the calculations and our team did NOT actually place first. I think we were third. No hard feelings though. :-)

Hey, I at least got a picture with the trophy, right?

First day of school!

2010-08-24T14:33:00.000-07:00

Here is Caleb on his first day of 2nd grade:

Brynley started Kindergarten yesterday:

Before school she was asking why she had to bring here folder to school. I said, "Because that is what you will bring your homework home in and take it back to school in." She got the biggest grin and started giggling. She is so excited to be joining her big brother at school! And Caleb says he loves finding her after school. It is so cute picking them up and seeing them wait there together in their adorable little uniforms!

Our weekend adventures

2010-08-24T13:25:00.000-07:00

Our next door neighbors, the Josephson's, invited us up to a cabin in WY this last weekend. We had quite a few adventures over three days!

We left on Friday and went up to Bear Lake to play for a few hours. The kids LOVE it up there. We met Mitch and Kendall and hung out for a while before going to the cabin in Afton, WY.

Sorry, but I couldn't resist including a picture of the cutest bare bum and tan lines on the planet:

When we got to the cabin it was dark out and the generator wasn't working right so the power kept going off and on. But no biggie, because we just went to bed.

The next morning I got up and went running and when I came back everyone was outside because the carbon monoxide detector was going off. Mitch and Brandon couldn't get a hold of the owner of the house to see if this was a common glitch or something, so we hurried and left for Jackson Hole about three hours before we planned on leaving.

We were about to drive off when I looked at the tire on Mitch and Kendall's car and it was completely flat to the rim. The boys changed the tire and we were on our way.

Jackson Hole was fun but kind of boring with little kids if you don't have anything big planned. We took a stage coach ride, had ice cream, threw rocks into Snake River and just hung out until the shoot out at 6pm.

The biggies loved the shoot out but baby didn't love it so much. In the beginning she kept saying, "BOOM! I like it!" after each gun shot but when they started to come more often she got a little scared.

This guy reminded me of Owen Wilson:

After Jackson, we went back to the cabin and hung out and chatted until bed time. At 11:30pm when we were all asleep, the carbon monoxide detector went off again. I was not able to sleep because I kept thinking Aubrey was going to die or something because we were in the room right next to the utility room. The boys did something to it and I finally fell back asleep only for it to go off again at 1:30am. We ended up moving the detector into our room because if the levels weren't going up in our room we wouldn't die. That made me feel better.

In the morning Brandon and Mitch went mountain biking but came back after 20 minutes because Mitch's derailer fell off his bike. Oops. Can't ride without that.

Then we decided the trip was doomed and we needed to be on our way, so we cleaned and packed up and left.
This is the awesome cabin we stayed at:

We had an awesome time and had a lot of fun adventures! Thanks Josephson's for having us along!

Happy 7th Birthday Caleb!

2010-08-17T14:57:00.000-07:00

Today is Caleb's birthday. I seriously can't believe it. I know I probably say that every year, but this year I really mean it. I can't believe I have a 7 year old. Caleb is incredible. He is so kind and loving and concerned about others. He loves his sisters and watches out for them *most* of the time. (C'mon, what kind of brother wouldn't have a *most* right there). Caleb is a good example to his friends and I have been told that by his friend's moms numerous times. Caleb really has a special place in my heart and we love him so much.

Caleb loves:

-playing with his bff, Jackson
-swimming
-Star Wars
-movie nights
-legos (he's really good at these)
-cereal
-riding his bike

He had a star wars party today. He had 5 friends come over and we played Star Wars games and did a Jedi Training Course. He had a great time!

Big River at the Outdoor Sundance Theater

2010-08-17T14:52:00.000-07:00

On Monday Brandon and I went to see Big River up at Sundance. I was in this play as a kid but I haven't seen it for 15 years. It was so good! All the music brought back so many memories and emotions. Being outside in the cool, crisp air and spending a good 6 hours alone with Brandon was so much fun. We loved it.

Happy 5th Birthday Brynley!

2010-08-11T06:56:00.000-07:00

I can't believe my little girl is already 5 and will be starting Kindergarten this year. Brynley is incredible. She has a smile (and dimple!) that will make your heart melt and an attitude that could make you scream! But even her sassy-ness just adds to her wonderful personality. She is the type who can leave you guessing as to how to handle her and then turn right and say, "I love you Mommy" (which she says a million times a day) and make you melt into the ground. She is such a wonderful, spunky addition to our family and we love her so much!

Brynley loves:
-Barbies
-Princesses
-Her scooter
-Milk, milk and more milk
-Make up (I know!)
-Sponge Bob
-Playing with London, Quincey and Makelle
-Changing her clothes
-Anything pink and girly

We love you so much Bryley!

ULCER - Utah Lake Century Epic Ride

2010-08-11T06:33:00.001-07:00

This last Saturday Brandon and his brother Jeremy rode the ULCER! They finished the whole 111 miles averaging 18.9 mph! Brandon didn't train for this event besides two 45 mile rides so I am so happy for him that he finished and finished well! I think they had a great time and Brandon even says he might do it again!

The Grotto

2010-08-04T20:36:00.000-07:00

We hiked the Grotto up Payson Canyon again this year. It did not go well. Everyone ended the outing mad.

We started happy:

But Caleb got mad because he forgot the water was about 40 degrees and didn't want to get in:

Then Brynley was mad ... I don't remember why. I'm sure it was something good.

Then Aubrey was sad because we were leaving and she didn't want to but mom and dad didn't want to stay there with mad big kids.

Maybe we'll try it again next year.

Fort Columbia and Grandma's House - Our trip to Seattle

2010-08-04T19:26:00.001-07:00

Last week we went to WA to visit with Brandon's family. We had such a great time! We started the vacation by staying in a vacation house at Fort Columbia which is right where the Columbia River meets the Pacific. The house was HUGE! It housed our family, Jeremy and Angie and kids, Grandma, Grandpa and Uncle Jordan. The halls were long and wide and perfect for running up and down while screaming.

There were bunkers to play in, paths to hike, light houses to visit and all sorts of fun stuff.

After a few days there we went to Grandma's house in Seattle. We stayed there for a few days.

While we were there Grandpa, Brandon, Jeremy, Collin and Jordan hiked up to Rachel Lake and camped.

Us girls and kids stayed home and did crafts, did a "cousin photo shoot" and had salads for dinner. Now if that's not a girl's day I don't know what is.

On our last day we went to Northwest Trek which is kind of like a sarfari mixed with a zoo. You ride a train around and see all sorts of moose, bison, big horn sheep, deer, etc. It was really cool and the kids loved it.

She was a little bugged Grandma pulled the plug

We had so much fun up there with all of Brandon's family. We love going there when everyone is there. Thanks Mom and Dad for letting us invade your house and make a huge mess of it! We loved every minute!

Salon Birthday Party

2010-08-04T19:23:00.000-07:00

Brynley turns 5 on Monday and we had her cute little birthday party today. She invited 5 of her best friends to go to the salon (ok it was just a beauty school but it was awesome still) and get all prettied up. Seriously, folks, this was the easiest and cheapest party ever. For $5 a girl they do their hair, make up and nails. AND we just picked up the girls and then dropped them back off at their homes so no mess for me to clean up! They were in heaven the whole time. Check out these cuties.

My little swimmers

2010-07-21T11:35:00.000-07:00

Caleb was on the swim team this summer. (It was actually just the summer camp that is for new, potential team swimmers). He loved it and he did so well! He started out the summer being able to swim a 25m but getting tired and having to rest during a 50m. But now he does 50's over and over again! He can also dive off the blocks (sort of) and do flip turns! Way to go Caleb!

Here he is winning his heat in the last meet of the season. He is the swimmer on the left:

Brynley has done two sessions of swimming lessons and has got one more in August. In her first session of lessons I had to walk her to the end of the diving board and drop her off the edge as she cried. Check her out now:

Aubrey gets a little sick of watching big brother and sister swim...

4th of July

2010-07-06T14:41:00.000-07:00

I loved having the Fourth of July on Sunday because it was a celebration filled weekend! On Saturday we did fireworks at the Nye's. Aubrey was so scared at first because she hates loud noises (she says "Loud. Noise." in her cute little soft voice). Then the fear turned to a half cry, half laugh until by the end of the night she was loving every minute of it!

I love this picture because this is so typical Caleb looking after his baby sister.

On Sunday we went to my parents house for a bbq complete with corn on the cob and homemade vanilla ice cream with berries!

Look at all the bff'age going on in this picture. Happy times.

Monday we spent the day at the Scera Pool in Orem and finished it off with a little bbq in our own backyard!

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday weekend!

Caleb and Jackson - BFF's

2010-07-06T14:36:00.000-07:00

These boys spend every waking minute together. And when they aren't together, they are whining about WHEN they get to be together again! I'm so glad Caleb has such a good friend right down the street!

Caleb's Piano Recital: Did he redeem himself?

2010-06-29T12:46:00.000-07:00

If you don't remember the catastrophe that was the Christmas Piano recital see the video here.

Did he redeem himself this year?

Aubrey's Quotables

2010-06-22T13:35:00.000-07:00

Aubrey has said some really funny things lately. Here are some for your enjoyment:

1. I need to preface this by explaining that Aubrey calls any grandma or grandpa "Grandpa". So no matter if you are a girl or a boy you are "grandpa. Anyway, Friday was my grandma's 97th birthday. We called and sang Happy Birthday to her. The rest of the day she walked around saying "Happy Grandpa, happy grandpa".

2. She refers to herself as "baby". She likes to say "baby do it" when she wants to do something herself. The other day she was doing something saying "baby do it" over and over again to herself. Something got stuck and she mumbled "stuck, stuck". Then she fixed and she excitedly exclaimed "Thank you baby!"

3. The other day (these were actually all on the same day) she was fussing in her crib for a while so I went in to see what was going on. She said "Baby peed". I look down and her cute, bare bum is hanging out with her diaper on the floor and a big pee spot in her crib. Great, Aubrey.

4. I rock her and sing to her before she goes to bed. She always asks me to sing "A Chi God" (I am a Child of God). I say I'll only do it if she puts her head on my shoulder. So she lays her head on my right shoulder for about 10 seconds and then says "is one" and switches to the other shoulder for 10 seconds, then "is one" and switches shoulders over and over.

Aubrey is such a cute little sweetie and we love her so much! It is so fun to hear her starting to talk and saying so many funny things!

Little Red Riding Hood Bike Ride 2010

2010-06-08T13:49:00.000-07:00

This last weekend Saundra and Jenny and I went up to Logan to ride in the Little Red Riding Hood Bike Race. It was such an amazing experience! It was so fun to have a girls weekend, too! The course was awesome with super smooth roads and no huge hills. Although we did spend a few miles slowly going slightly uphill and then we got to speed down a huge hill afterwards as a reward! We did the 58 mile course (which ended up only being 54 miles! I was a little bit bugged about that...) and I averaged about 16.6 mph over the whole ride. I was happy with that. The first 24 miles just FLEW by! I was going 18-21 mph the entire time. There was no wind and the roads were so smooth! The wind started up during the second half and thats where the small hills were so the second half slowed me down a bit. It took me about 3 hours and 15 minutes and I felt GREAT after! I haven't been sore or anything! Next time I want to do the 80 or 100 miles, for sure!

We drove up to Logan on Friday afternoon and stayed at a hotel right on Utah State campus. I think it was old converted dorms, but it was just fine for our needs. We had a dinner at the race site and then went to get some "Aggie Ice Cream" with a token we got with our hotel room. :-)

This is us before we started on Saturday morning.

This is Saun and I at the lunch break. Oh my gosh, they had so much food at each stop. We pigged out! I'm talking chocolate, oreos with peanut butter on them, yummy peanut butter sandwiches (with lots more pb and j than I use at home!), licorice and other good stuff. And best of all, NO guilt was involved all weekend!

We (and our bums) are so happy to be done!

The Big Bad Wolf

Anorexic Little Red Riding Hood, she should have joined us at the rest stations to put some meat on those bones...

Good job girls! I had so much fun last weekend with you!

I have a 2nd grader?

2010-06-08T13:45:00.000-07:00

I can't believe Caleb is done with first grade! Why does time fly by so fast? Here are some pictures from his end of the year program. I LOVED his teacher so much! Her name is Mrs Smith and she was so good and patient with the kids. If any of you have kids going to Reagan, request Mrs Smith for first grade! Love her!

Step by step through Caleb's treatments

2010-05-26T20:07:00.000-07:00

I wanted to document step by step what Caleb goes through each month when we go get his treatments.

First we get up at the crack of dawn (6am) to leave to drive an hour up to Primary Childrens Hospital. I should really be thankful (and I am) that we are so close. Other families travel from out of state every time their kid needs a sclerotherapy treatment so we really do have it easy.

We get to the hospital and walk by the fountains. He really wanted a picture here.

We wait in the waiting room for a while and then they call us back to another waiting room. Here they check his vitals.

He also gets to watch a movie. We have waited in this room for three hours before. Luckily this time it was only about an hour.

This is how we sit as he gets his IV. He hangs his hands over my shoulders and closes his eyes. He doesn't even flinch when he gets his IV. He actually looks forward to it, the crazy kid.

Look how happy he is to have his IV in. That means he gets to choose from the prize basket which I forgot to get a picture of.

Now we wait some more. When it is his turn they give him some "loopy" medicine so he isn't scared of going into the treatment room. This medicine (Versed) makes him kind of out of it and tired but it isn't the sedation.

They wheel us both into the treatment room, me holding him. Here is where they put the sedation drug in his IV. Within 30 seconds he is out. They transfer him to the treatment table.

And hook him up to the machines.

Then I leave and go hang out for about 30-45 minutes while they do the sclerotherapy. They basically give him one big shot right in his lip. It is a scarring agent, actually one of the ingredients in chemotherapy. They hope is that it will attack all of his tissue and create some scar tissue thereby shrinking the size of his lip.

Here is after the treatment when he is waking up.

He is always sick for the rest of the day of his treatment due to the injection medication.

He usually barfs the whole way home. But then he wakes up the next day like nothing every happened!

This first picture is before we started treatments:

And this one is after two treatments before the third:

The difference is small but I can definately see it. Look at the height and fullness of his upper left lip. Three treatments down! I'm not really sure how many are left but hopefully we are all done by the end of the year!

Preschool Graduation

2010-05-26T19:52:00.000-07:00

Last week was Brynley's preschool graduation. I cannot believe that she is as hold as she is. It is crazy to me. Doesn't she look so old and adorable?!

They sang a bunch of cute songs and then they got their diplomas. Mrs Suzan gave each kid an award. Brynley's was "Little Miss Creative Dresser" and then she went on to talk about all the different things Brynley would wear to school. It was so funny. I was talking to Mrs Suzan afterwards and I said, "That just means her mom is too lazy to make her wear normal clothes!" and she said, "No, I really think it says a lot about her personality and individuality." HA! Yes, Brynley is one of a kind. :-)

She is so excited to go to Kindergarten. She will be young like Caleb but she is already such a good reader and is very ready to start next year. She thinks she is starting very soon. Maybe next week. I don't think she understands that she has to wait until summer is over. She keeps saying, "I will be in Kindergarten after preschool" and I say, "After the summertime" and she says, "No, after preschool." You learn to just smile and nod with her.

We love you Brynley and are so excited for all the adventures you are going to have next year!

Hiking the Y

2010-05-18T20:28:00.000-07:00

Last night we hiked the Y. Or we tried to, I should say. We put Aubrey in the hiking back pack and she freaked. Screamed, wiggled and tried to climb out. We tried to just keep going in hopes that she'd get over it, but she didn't. Around the first switch back we got her out thinking we'd just take turns holding her. But what 20 month old wants to be held when they're in a new place? Not ours. She wanted to walk. And that, as you can imagine, didn't go so well. She and I never made it past that first switch back. We looked at rocks and gave them hugs and kisses while we waited for Daddy, Caleb and Brynley to hike up and back. We walked around holding hands and she kept saying "big steps" and "air's bini (becab/daddy)" for "where's Brynley". It was pretty cute. Unfortunately, I had the camera so I don't have any pictures of the kids at the top. So we'll have to settle for these.

Cute sister moment for ya:

Random Pictures

2010-05-10T20:03:00.000-07:00

Here are just a few pictures I've taken lately. Just us being ... us. :-)

These last ones are at Brynley's Mother's Day Program. It was so cute. They sang songs and we planted flowers and had a treat.

In basement news, it is pretty much finished! There are just a few little odds and ends to be done but that's it! Caleb is officially moved downstairs like a big boy! Pictures to come next week.

Life is crazy! Good crazy!

2010-04-27T13:08:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of postings! Things are totally crazy around here so I'll just fill you in really quick. Last week we decided to bite the bullet and finish the last two bedrooms in our basement, making it completely finished with the exception of a storage room. We got two bids, chose one, he started a last wednesday and he will be done on Friday! Things of been a whirlwind around here! The two rooms we are finishing were filled with storage so all of that stuff is in our family room downstairs. We are also adding a closet to the toy room so we had to empty that room so they can restretch the carpet. So, all of that stuff is also in our family room. We are also adding some shelving to Brynley's closet so we had to empty that mess into her room. Aubrey's room is pretty much the only clean room in the house so we go there for refuge from the mess. But it is a good exciting mess with lots of promise. We are excited. Pictures to come soon.

I am getting ready for Kelly's baby shower! Yay, so exciting! I've never planned a baby shower and I might never again until Brynley and Aubrey are having babies so it has been lots of fun!

I am training for the Little Red Riding Hood bike race on June 5. It is up in Logan and a bunch of girls are going up and staying the night and riding together. There is an 18 mile, 35 mile, 57 mile, 80 mile and 100 mile ride. We are doing the 57 mile. Saun and I are up to 33 miles in our training and it is going great!

My business is booming and I am loving it! I had no idea it would take off like this! I am so thankful I get to do what I love while still staying at home!

On top of this Brandon was out of town two weeks ago, this week and next. Can I be a single mom on top of all that other stuff? We shall see.

Caleb's Extra Special Email

2010-04-13T20:41:00.000-07:00

Caleb now has an email address. I thought it would be good for him to practice typing and writing his own "letters". If anyone wants to email him, email me for his address. He would just die of excitement.

The other day he got an email from Aunt Kelly. He was reading it out loud to me and it said "I love you and Heavenly Father loves you..." Brynley, after only hearing half of the conversation says, with amazement, "Is that email from Jesus?!"

Aubrey loves Bubbles

2010-04-06T12:51:00.000-07:00

Easter Recap

2010-04-06T11:47:00.000-07:00

We had a great Easter and Conference weekend! The weekend started out with a ward Easter Egg hunt at the church. It was in the cultural hall so candy was basically just thrown every where. As you can imagine, the kids were in heaven!

We also decorated eggs.

Saturday and Sunday we watched Conference. This was one of the first times I've been able to really watch and focus in the last couple years and wow, was it inspiring. I tried many different means to keep my kids busy during the sessions. After one of them, this is what I came upstairs to:

The 5 minutes of vacuuming it up was totally worth being able to watch half a session in peace.
Easter basket mayhem:

Sunday we went to my parents house with my Aunt, Uncle and Cousin and Wes and Saundra and their kids. The kids LOVED spending Easter with their best friends! We had an egg hunt and a super yummy dinner.

We had a great Easter this year!

(I have a cute video of Aubrey with bubbles coming soon!)

Treatment two and other random info

2010-03-30T14:05:00.000-07:00

No pictures today, sorry. I just wanted to quickly hop on and say that Caleb has his second treatment on Friday. It went about exactly like the first. Except that he got the Zophran in his IV BEFORE we tried to leave rather than AFTER. Either way, he still barfed all day. I am thinking this is unavoidable. The dr's said that the injection medication makes kids sick and the zophran just helps him not be AS sick. Again, he was fine, like new, the next morning. We will see if it does any good. I feel like it might have gotten a teensy bit smaller with the last treatment. After the next one we will have a better idea. We got another EOB from the insurance yesterday and it looks like each treatment is going to cost us about $1,000 instead of the $500 we thought. Double. That's quite a jump and an added stress. We are trying to save as much as we can so that we can pay for all the treatments and not bag the disneyland trip the kids are so excited for that was planned for December. But the Disneyland trip is not for sure anymore. Of course, I don't even need to say, that if this works, everything will be worth it.

With that said, come one come all to boot camp! Free class THIS FRIDAY morning from 6-7am at Heart N Soul Dance Studio!!! Please come and bring all your friends! :-) See www.leanbodieshf.com and click on the boot camp link for more info.

My baby is getting so big...

2010-03-20T19:20:00.001-07:00

Aubrey is now 18 months and went into nursery this last Sunday. It is crazy how time flies.

She is 23 lbs 12 oz (50th %), 33 inches tall (92nd %), and her head is in the 17th percentile. Pretty typical stats for my kids at that age, tall, medium weight, little heads. Thanks to their dad. :-)

Aubrey is hilarious. Seriously. We all just die laughing at her every day. One of the funniest things she does is she repeats the last word of anything we are saying. I'll say to Brynley "Don't get that. It's too heavy." She'll walk around chanting "heavy, heavy, heavy." The best is when she roams the house saying "money, money, money." So cute.

She says a ton of words. I can't think of all of them but here are a sampling:
buckle
fish (sshhhh)
cheese (ssssss)
oatmeal
cheerios (cheyo)
banana (amana)
drink (gink)
book
doggie (goggy)
bed
night night

She is such a good baby. She actually asks to go to bed. She'll come up to me and say "nigh nigh" if she's tired and it's not quite bedtime or naptime yet. She loves to give hugs. She'll just walk up to you out of the blue and hug you. It will make anyone melt. It is so unbelievable sweet. She loves music and likes to dance to it. She loves her daddy and grandpa. She always is asking for daddy. The other day out of the blue she said, "Baba (grandpa)? Baba? Peeeaaase? Baba, peeaaase?" So we called grandpa and she was so happy. She also loves her brother and sister. When Brynley is gone she walks around the house saying, "Mimi? Mimi? (brynley)" She calls Caleb "Becab". I'm sure she likes me too but she is just more vocal in her affection for her dad and siblings, I guess. I'm ok with it.

She is such a wonderful, perfect little baby and we all just can't get enough of her! We love you Aubs!

Brynley Makes Cookies!

2010-03-16T13:17:00.001-07:00

Brynley made her very first batch of cookies last weekend! She did pretty much everything by herself, including cracking the eggs and using the mixer! All I did was pour the liquid ingredients into the measuring spoons and the oven work. The cookies turned out great and she was SO proud of herself! The whole time she was just grinning saying "I've never made my own cookies before!" It was so cute. Check out this hapiness:

She even helped me clean up at the end! What a sweet little girl she is.

Just the usual

2010-03-09T14:54:00.000-08:00

Nothing too exciting has been going on around here lately. Caleb has his follow appointment with the ENT up at Primary Children's tomorrow. I don't notice a difference in the size of his lip after this first treatment but they said we probably wouldn't. I guess I was just hoping we would anyway...

Brandon sprained his ankle pretty bad. His third injury in four months. (First was a shoulder injury on Thanksgiving playing football. Second was another shoulder injury - the other side- around Christmas while skiing, and this one was while playing basketball).

And here's Aubrey with her toothy grin.

You want to be HOW old?!

2010-02-23T12:10:00.001-08:00

Brynley is quite the pretender and she is always saying something like, "Mom, pretend I'm 29 (or 18 or 11 or some glamorous age)." But the other day she says, as she brushes her hair behind her shoulder, "Mom, I'm 91." HA HA!

Video for Aunt Kelly

2010-02-19T20:16:00.000-08:00

Here is what we were doing tonight. Just for you Kell.
The embedding code wasn't working so click here for the video.

Strengthening Aubrey

2010-02-19T20:15:00.000-08:00

Brynley was blessing the dinner tonight and said, "Please bless this food to nourish and strengthen our Aubreys (instead of bodies)..." We all died laughing. I still laugh out loud when I think about it.

Mom Bragging Moment Alert

2010-02-19T13:24:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I have to blog about the parent teacher conference I had with Caleb's teacher yesterday. This post is going to be so braggy so if that turns you off you don't have to read it. :-) I'll understand.

Basically his reading and math are really good. His test scores were in the 90th percentile and he is in 2nd grade math and reading and at least a 2nd grade level. But the part that really got me was when she started talking about what a NICE boy he is. She said he is a friend to everyone and very well liked. She said he is a leader and she sits him with kids who might need a little bit of extra ... something, whether it be a friend or some help with their work or something else. She said he has a lot of self confidence and is very happy.

I know what a wonderful little boy he is but it felt good to hear it from his teacher. :-)

Sclerotherapy Attempt #1

2010-02-11T14:55:00.000-08:00

Today was Caleb's first Sclerotherapy treatment. It started snowing and we hit bad traffic so we were about 15 minutes late to his 9am appointment. We checked in and got taken back to a room and then had to wait until about 11:15 before he got his IV.

He was so brave for his IV. He didn't even flinch or make a sound! Around 11:30 they were finally ready for us. The radiologist came in and told us what to expect. He said the lymph tissue is basically marbled into, wrapped around and intertwined in his normal tissue. He said getting it out will be like mixing 2 T. of pepper and 1 c. of salt and saying get out the pepper without ruining the salt. He kept saying he has no idea if it will work but there are not really any risks so we might as well try. He said he was optimistic that it would work but I was kind of discouraged.

We walked into the treatment room and Caleb kind of freaked out. I think because of all the big machines and there were 5 or 6 strangers in scrubs walking around. I got him calmed down and they hooked up his sedation medication to his IV and within minutes he was asleep!

After about 30 minutes they wheeled him into recovery and I talked with the doctor again. He said he didn't see any vesicles to inject into and treat from the inside so he basically stuck the needle way in through all the tissue and as he pulled it out injected the bleomicin. He said it was like killing the weeds by treating the soil. (Loved the metaphors.) He said we probably won't notice a difference at all until after at least 3 treatments. He recommended just scheduling about three treatments and then we would reevaluate and see if it is making a difference.

Caleb was doing well and eating as many popsicles as they would give him (4). He got up to use the bathroom on our way out after discharge and he started throwing up all over. They ended up hooking him up to another IV in his other hand and giving him Zofran for his tummy. So we had to wait for another 45 min or so.

After we left he barfed on the way out to the car, on the way home and when we got home for a while. Now, about an hour later, he is playing the wii with Brandon and I think feeling better. Next time they can give him the zofran earlier so this won't happen again hopefully.

He is in good spirits and tolerating it well. When he woke up he said, "Is it big and swollen?" and I said "Yeah, it's pretty big" and he goes "YEEEESSSSS!" I think he wants a battle wound to show his friends. The doctor thinks he will be able to go to school tomorrow for his Valentine's day party and he is thrilled with that.

Thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers. But please don't stop! We will need them throughout the entire process!

On a different note, yesterday we had our first annual Valentine's Fondue Party! It was so much fun! We had my parents, my grandma and the Nye's over for dinner. We did all sorts of dippers into swiss cheese and chocolate caramel dip. The food was yummy and we had a lot of fun. I forgot to take pictures of the spread so you'll just have to believe me that it was good!

Caleb's Big Year

2010-02-02T13:15:00.001-08:00

I don't know how many of you are aware of what is going on with regards to Caleb's lip. Let me start from the beginning.

Caleb was born with a very rare condition called Lymphangioma. This basically means that he has extra lymph tissue in his lip. When he gets sick it gets all red and puffy. He had an MRI when he was 3 months old to determine the extent of the condition. It turned out that he has a microcystic condition which means that there are MORE SMALLER vesicles as opposed to LESS BIGGER ones. This version is much harder to treat because with BIGGER ones you can go in and shrink them. But with smaller ones, they can't really be shrunk much more. The only option at the time was surgically removing them. The MRI also showed that the lymph tissue went all the way through his entire lip including the muscle. In order to take it all out they would have to remove muscle which was not an option. So, we went into it knowing that the surgeon wouldn't be able to get it all out. The surgeon said that since he couldn't get it all out, it would grow back because it multiplies. But he had no idea how fast it would grow back. It may take 10 years or 2 months.

Two and a half years ago when he was 4 years old he underwent surgery. You can read about it here. It was healing perfectly. So perfectly that we didn't even notice how fast it grew back until we looked back on pictures. It took about a month for the swelling to go down and about two months before it was back at it's previous size again.

We didn't want to put him through the pain and scarring of another surgery so we waited a while. We talked to the surgeon again last year. He felt like he would probably respond the same way to another surgery. But there was an experimental treatment going on in San Diego that we should look into. To make a long story short, after about 6 months of calls and faxes to Dr's in CA we were put in contact with Dr Grimmer an ENT at Primary Children's who, as it turns out, specializes in Lymphangioma in children. Who knew! Our surgeon definitely didn't! He was surprised when we told him who we were put into contact with.

He met with us and we discussed a new experimental procedure that he though may help. Caleb needed another MRI to figure out if he was a candidate. He had this MRI last month. After many hopes and prayers (and scares!) we found out that he is a candidate to at least TRY this procedure. They will know after one or two treatments if it is going to work.

This procedure is a form of Sclerotherapy. He will be sedated and they use ultrasound to find certain areas where they will inject bleomicin (spelling?). This is a scarring agent that will create scar tissue to shrink the area down. This is also an ingredient in chemotherapy and the medicine my dad uses to get rid of warts. Talk about many uses! He will need 4-6 treatments. Then he will probably require another plastic surgery to finish it off and make it look nice.

This method of treatment, as I said, is relatively new. Probably just a few years old in the states. It has been used in other countries for a long time, though. He has done it on half a dozen kids (I told you the condition is rare) in the last few years and most have very favorable results, especially the kids who don't respond to other types of treatment because of the microcystic nature (what Caleb has).

As the Dr said, the goal here is not perfection. He will never have that (but who does?). The goal is for his lips to look similar enough to each other that when he walks through school or the store, he doesn't turn heads. Hopefully people won't notice unless they are talking to him face to face and even then it might not be too noticeable.

His first treatment is next Thursday. If this procedure is going to work we will notice some shrinking after one treatment. If it doesn't work, we don't really have any other options until technology catches up with us. We are hopeful that this will work. Please remember him in your prayers and think about him next Thursday!

I will keep you all posted.

"Make a Funny Face"

2010-01-26T20:23:00.000-08:00

Aubrey makes the funniest faces! All you have to do is say "Aubrey, make a funny face!" and she'll throw something good your way.

Isn't she looking so old lately?

Sunday Jan 17: Heading Home

2010-01-21T12:08:00.001-08:00

We got off early this morning and headed to the airport (after a huge breakfast and grabbing one last ice cream cone as we left the ship!) to come home. We ended up being upgraded to first class for our first flight to Atlanta! Gotta love the “traveling husband” perks!

I am writing this as I sit here on the plane, in first class, me with my Net Book and Brandon with his iphone, watching the coach people walk past us and I think of Brian Regan, “I’m making money right now! (About the curtain separating first class and coach) Snap it shut! I don’t even want to see ‘em! Not even in my peripheral!”

We are excited to go home and see the kids and get back into the normal swing of things. But we are dreading the snow and … getting on the scale. Oh. Dear. Me.

Here's Brandon signing off:

Saturday Jan 16: St Martin

2010-01-21T12:05:00.000-08:00

Today was our last day and we were stopped in St Martin. We didn’t want to spend much money today so we just got off and took a water taxi to a close beach and shopping area. The beach was really pretty and the water was crystal aqua blue but it was a little rocky. Saundra and I walked to a little Belgian Chocolate Shoppe (isn’t that how you spell shop in other countries?) We bought some truffles and a Dutch Stroopwafel dipped in chocolate. All of our treats were so good and we scarfed them down in like 5 minutes! (1000 calories, BAM!) Lol. We never buy chocolate treats at home so you better believe we’re going to do it on vacation!

After a few hours at the beach we headed back to the ship.

Friday January 15: St. Kitts

2010-01-21T11:27:00.000-08:00

Today was our big hiking day in St Kitts! We booked a volcano hike with Thenford Grey (David was our guide) and we had SO much fun! We got to see the whole island and lots of towns on the way to the volcano.

The hike was through a rain forest jungle and it was really dense and green. It was pretty steep and there was a lot of climbing (thank you lunges and step ups!) but it felt good to work hard.

The views from the top were amazing. A famous Caribbean soccer player who was friends with the tour guide tagged along with us because he had never done the hike. His name was “Cruckas” or “Crackers” or something like that. It was a nickname. It was not a very popular, touristy excursion because of the difficulty of the hike so we were the only ones on the trail the entire time. It was awesome!

At the top David, the guide, gave us some local raisin and coconut bread that was so good! We also got to try a local ginger punch and it was interesting. Don’t worry, we made sure it was non-alcoholic before we tried it! I really liked it. Then we made our way down the mountain. It was such a great hike!

After seeing the richer, resorty side of the island we headed to a beach for an hour or so.

Then we got back on the ship for our afternoon eats, nap, ice cream cone, dinner and show!

Thursday January 14: St. Lucia

2010-01-20T11:27:00.000-08:00

Today we were stopped in St. Lucia. Today’s tour was your typical island tour finishing off with a beach stop but our tour guides made it amazing! We also got to try a ton of local food made by a lady who I think was one of the tour guides wives. We tried some very interesting and yummy dishes I never would have tried otherwise. It was great!

We started off by driving down the coast and seeing a few fishing villages. It was really cool to see all the villages and how people really live on the island.

Our first stop was the banana plantation where they told us all about banana farming. The bananas were really sweet and yummy.

After the bananas we went to a look out point where they had made us a huge breakfast of local foods. We tried fish cakes, fried dough balls, mango, avocado, mystery fruit, fried chicken, banana ketchup, coconut candy, guava cheese, some homemade fudge, and some other things that I can’t remember. We loved all of it! It was so interesting to taste so many different things that the local people eat every day.
The mountains in the background are the Pitons, a famous landscape in the Caribbean.

We then went to a pretty waterfall and a dormant volcano.

Then we took a water taxi to Jalousie Beach which is the beach between the two Pitons (famous mountains in the Caribbean) for swimming and snorkeling. The beach was in a gorgeous setting. It was so relaxing to sit in the shade and look out at the Pitons and the pretty water.

After the beach we stopped and got to try local hot bread and cheese. This was so fun. The bread was really hot and it was sliced down the middle (it was a big roll thing). Then you put a cheese stick like thing in it and it melts. Basically a local, Caribbean version of a grilled cheese sandwich.

Then we headed back to the ship where we, of course, ate some more and slept the afternoon away.

Our tour guide, Jean Claude:

Here we are at dinner. This is a typical dinner for us. Lol, and this isn't even showing the appetizers!

AND... Desserts!

Wednesday January 15: Barbados

2010-01-19T12:18:00.000-08:00

Today we spent the day in Barbados. After breakfast and exercise, we got ready to head off the ship. The day started kind of crappy but ended up being one of our favorites. Ok, they were really all favorites, I don’t think I could choose a favorite. I had read on cruise critic that you can take a city bus to Accra Beach. We walked for about 20 minutes to the bus terminal only to find out that they don’t take US dollars.

So we ended up just getting a taxi. We were both a little annoyed and then in the taxi it started pouring rain. We got to Accra beach and it was still rainy. We waited under a tree for a while for it to blow over. It finally did and was gorgeous the rest of the day!

Now he's happy!

Let it be known that as of Jan 13, 2010 Accra Beach on Barbados officially overtook Sunset Beach on Oahu as our favorite beach we’ve ever been to. The sand was soft; the water was aqua blue and clear; there were biggish waves (most Caribbean beaches are really calm); It was PERFECT. We had so much fun body surfing and playing in the waves. It was by far the best beach on the cruise and probably the best of my life.

After a few hours at the beach we took a taxi back to the ship for the afternoon/evening usual.

Saundra was in part of the show this night. Isn't she so cute?! :-) I LOVE her!

Tuesday Jan 14th: Dominica

2010-01-19T11:24:00.000-08:00

Today we went to Dominica. This was possibly our favorite port. We had an amazing tour today with Levi and Gary (meow - we can't say the word 'Gary' without thinking of Sponge Bob - "Goodnight Gary" "Meow") at Bumpiing Tours. They were awesome. We saw the entire island today. It was incredible.

The first adventure we did was at Titou Gorge. Titou Gorge is this narrow cave that you swim through back to a little water fall that you climb up and then jump off of. The water was freezing but that made it even more exciting. There was a natural warm water shower spring that came out right by the gorge. It was nice to cool off, eh, warm up after swimming and playing in the gorge. Brandon and Wes jumped off the ledge down into the freezing cave. They loved that!

This is where we swam into the narrow cave.

After Titou Gorge, we went to Trafalgar Falls. This was a pretty touristy place but Gary (meow), our guide, knew where to take us when to avoid most of the crowds. We sat in some mineral hot springs and then climbed around on some big rocks to get over to play at the bottom of Trafalgar Falls. The waterfall was gorgeous and climbing around on the rocks was really fun! Brandon and Wes swam around at the bottom of the falls. Saun and I were glad they both had each other to do that with!

After the falls we went snorkeling at Champagne Reef. It is called Champagne Reef because there are cracks in the coral or ocean floor (?) that release bubbles like you are in an aquarium. The bubbles were awesome. Some of them were really big. We also saw a turtle and a lot of really pretty fish. It was some good snorkeling.

Then we headed back to the ship for our daily trip to the deli, afternoon nap, sail away ice cream cone, dining room dinner and the show!

Monday January 11: St Thomas

2010-01-18T08:35:00.000-08:00

Today was spent in St Thomas. We slept in, ran on the track (one of our favorite places in the world to exercise!), ate breakfast and then got off the ship. We took a taxi over to Magen’s Bay.

It was beautiful there. We relaxed on the beach for a couple of hours and then went on a little nature hike. It was about 45 min total and kind of a steep hike actually. It was just in the Magen’s Bay Preserve area and we were the only ones on the trail. It was awesome! There was a beautiful view at the top!

After Magen’s bay we headed back to the ship for lunch and nap time. That afternoon we also sat in the hot tub, met some interesting New Jersey folks and had a “sail away ice cream cone”.

Sunday January 10th: Bon Voyage!

2010-01-18T08:29:00.000-08:00

We left for the airport late on Saturday night after the kids had gone to bed to catch our red eye flight. We left Salt Lake around 1am and got into San Juan around 1pm. From the airport we caught a taxi and headed straight for the port to get on the ship!

Of course the first thing we did on the ship was eat! We headed straight for the Carnival’s deli that we love so much. And of course, the dessert buffet! After our good eats we took a much needed nap. I love napping in a cruise stateroom because it is so dark you never have any idea what time of day it is! And with no where to be, that is ultimate relaxation! After our nap it was time to eat again! We ate every dinner in the dining room sharing a table with Wes and Saundra. We love the dining room experience and all the different types of foods we can try. And, boy, did we try LOTS of food! It was fun to have friends to talk with for hours in the dining room and throughout the trip. After dinner we headed up to the deck to watch us sail away from San Juan at 10pm!

Southern Caribbean Cruise Day by Day!

2010-01-18T08:27:00.000-08:00

We just got back from our Southern Caribbean cruise on the Carnival Victory. We had an amazing time. It was probably our favorite cruise we’ve ever been on. We hit a great port every single day, ate amazing food and travelled with our best friends, Wes and Saundra Nye. Due to the amount of pictures I will post a different post for every day of the week. You may want to scroll down to the first post to start reading at the beginning. I hope you enjoy reading about our vacation!

It was a very, Merry Christmas at our house!

2009-12-29T16:09:00.000-08:00

We had SUCH a wonderful Christmas! Both of my sib's were in town and we did so many fun things! The festivities started last Wednesday night when we all went out to eat at Tepanyaki. The kids LOVE going there because they like to watch the "show" and the fire. Those cooks are pretty entertaining!

Thursday was Christmas Eve and we went to my parents house. There were a lot of people and a lot of fun was had by all! There was my parents, Dane, Kelly, Roger, Aunt Deb, Uncle Wayne, Katie, Jessie, Cory and their 5 kids. Jessie (my cousin) has a girl 6 months older than Caleb, a girl born within a few days of Brynley and a girl born within a few days of Aubrey. My kids are in friend heaven when we are with them! They love hanging out with the "second cousins" (yes, that's what they call them). We had a nice dinner:

The traditional program (I played a duet with Rog and Jess and Caleb and accompanied Kelly - I didn't really mean for it to be the Lindsey show - oops)

A gift exchange (ok, this was way fun. We all brought under $3 gifts. We sat in a circle and someone read the story "Twas the Night Before Christmas" and everytime they read the word 'and' you pass your gift around in the circle. When the story is over you get to keep your gift. Everytime 'and' was said everyone screamed and threw their gift. It was really funny.)

And we used the nativity puppets Angie (my sis in law) gave me for the Nativity story. These puppets are amazing. Nice and easy. No dress up involved. The kids all start sitting and when they come into the story they stand up and hold up their puppet. The kids actually LISTEN to the story to see when they stand. They're awesome.

After dessert and lots of playing:

we came home to wait for Santa! Here's what he brought:

My kids slept in until 7:30am! Amazing!

My family came over around 10:30 and we had breakfast and played all day.

In the afternoon we went sledding up Hobble Creek Canyon.

I LOVE Christmas and this year did not dissapoint! I hope you all had a fabulous holiday and thank you all for the Christmas cards. I'm going to do them next year. Here's your promise. To make up for it I'll share some Christmas cheer (ha, ha):

Am I the only one who thinks their baby is so cute when they cry? Poor baby. She has such a mean mom.

Change of subject...

Now, I feel like I have SO much to do in the next 10 days! We are leaving for our Southern Caribbean cruise on Jan 10. In that time I have to get Christmas decorations put away and do a ton of work for my online clients (I've got over 50 next month!), in addition to packing and getting everything ready for us to be gone. It's going to be a crazy week but we are SO excited for our trip!

Caleb's First Piano Recital

2009-12-21T19:45:00.000-08:00

Check out Caleb's first piano recital. This video doesn't quite capture the frustration demonstrated when he threw his music on the floor and stormed off. We're going to have to work on how to handle messing up.

Back by popular demand...

2009-12-16T15:35:00.000-08:00

Here are some more videos back by popular demand!

This is Caleb's Christmas concert on the piano

This is Aubrey walking, all of the good stuff is in the first half so you don't have to keep watching after she starts looking at the book