Family Pictures

Hazel had her Kindergarten orientation at Ogden Preparatory Academy on August 15th (my Dad's birthday!). I tried to get everyone dressed nice since we were going public, so we decided to take some family pictures at watermelon park. Unfortunately, I always get a little tense when we take pictures because there's always someone who isn't willing to cooperate. I'll keep working on that and maybe family pictures could be fun?

That face!

Edison is SIX months old!

My little chickens. I love them so much.

One of our friendly neighbors offered to get all of us together. Not too shabby!

Summertime

We've really enjoyed our trips to the splash pads in town. The girls can run around in the water and play at the park while I watch and play with this little boy on the blanket.

I sent this picture to David because when he left for a work meeting, he told Edison, who was lying on his blanket, to start crawling! A few minutes later, Edison had scooted a few feet away. 

Obedient boy.

This girl and her paint. I can't say no.

And besides, when she's done I get a cute and naked companion in my kitchen sink to help me with dishes.

I love feeding my kids veggies out of our garden.

 A creamy lemon pudding dessert at Grams. We DO love Sundays.

The little things

I came back from our Atlanta trip feeling so recharged and ready to be the best mom ever...and slowly reality has sunk in again and I'm faced with the fact that sometimes my job as full-time mom is hard and even a bit monotonous. So here are a few things I recorded in my journal that make my life WORTH IT:

Lottie's blue eyeballs.

How good it feels to hold Edison--like a gift every time.

Hazel's beautiful long hair and helpful attitude, especially when I'm having a tough day.

Prayer. Hope. 

Love and admiration for my husband.

I love how our newest chicken, Caramel, lays light pink eggs. 

I love that the windows in my bedroom open, even though most of the others in the house do not.

I love that my washing machine works again.

I love that we are all healthy and my body is strong enough to carry two babies and herd two preschoolers at the same time.

I love love love that I have children and have easy pregnancies.

I'm grateful that my husband has a good job and is a hard worker. 

I'm grateful that I know truth and who I am and where I came from.

I'm grateful to be sealed in the temple to a worthy man who adores me.

I'm grateful that I'm holding a perfect baby in my arms and I still have milk to feed him.

I'm grateful for my faith and my Father in Heaven who is just waiting to bless me with spiritual gifts to combat my weaknesses as I seek those gifts earnestly.

I love how Ellie tags along with her sisters and is the most demanding and loud one of all. She can now say, "Hi! I'm Ellie" and tried to repeat everything she hears. She tries on everyone's shoes and stops to dance when she hears music. She loves to go outside. The other day I paused my dinner preparations to dance with her which helped me endure to the end when I still had a crazy mess and hungry kids afterwards. She is my pet.

Loves to paint. And eat paint.

I'm grateful for the freedom to be myself. And my kids still think I'm cool.
(Whenever I can't think of anything to do for activity time, I usually end up taping letter bugs or numbers, or in this case "questions" for the letter Q all over my body. It's a winner every time.)

I'm so grateful that I get to stay home and be with my kids and
be present in almost ALL of their memories so far.

I can't help but be a little jealous of other moms who spend their summer days at the pool where their kids are happy and they can quietly sift through a magazine. I came very close to buying a pool membership until I went there with my husband. After one hour of chasing and bouncing and pretending to be dolphins while balancing a baby in one arm, we were totally exhausted. We're sticking with swim lessons and the occasional Saturday with Dad.

I'm grateful for the funny things that my kids say.
Charlotte was outside playing with one of the chickens and ran inside saying,
"A chicken pooped on my foot!" Then she said, "That is not appropriate."

I love how Ellie will sometimes wear this helmet all day and cry when it starts to slide off her head.

Friends. Best friends.

 I'm grateful for a husband who plays with our kids.  

(We really want our girls to be able to swing a bat.)

Eye on the ball?

Eyes on Dad.

You won't find a perfectly clean house or perfectly groomed children and that fan on the floor behind Ellie fell over every time we blinked until it finally broke, but here we are growing a family. 

It's messy business.

 And finally, I'm grateful for perspective because sometimes the difference between pure happiness and straight up depression is simply how I choose to look at my life.

August 1st

"P" is for Popcorn. I typically don't post on my family blog about our activities and crafts since I started an entirely different blog to record those things. However, they have become some of my favorite memories with my children and I can't help but write about some of them!

At one of my Learning Circle meetings, I heard a mom tell a story about when her mom was popping popcorn for her kids the "old fashioned way" and spontaneously decided to pull off the lid and let the popcorn pop out of the bowl. I loved this! Since the following week was the letter P, 

I decided to give it a go.

 And so we did. I got out the kernels, heated the oil, poured them in and waited for those popping sounds to start. Once they got going and the girls were leaning in with anticipation, I lifted the lid excitedly, thinking I was seriously the coolest mom ever. Immediately Hazel hit the floor, covering her head, yelling, "What are you doing??!" I looked down at her surprised and said, "Look! The popcorn is popping out of the bowl! Isn't this fun?" She slowly stood up, still protecting her face and said, "Put the lid back on!" And so, instead of making a great memory with my kids, I scared them to death. With popcorn kernels.

They were still happy with the end product though.

 

Sometimes I take picture of myself making dinner because I'm so d@#% proud of myself.

 

This was banana that I later realized had been there for a long time.

Look at that tiny closed fist and cleft chin. Love him.