Springtime Fun

I love this time of year (except the wind)!
The other day we ran the hose down the slide into the kiddie pool and the kids loved it. I remember doing this activity as a kid. I also remember sending our poor little ducks down the slide too.

The kids love to take bike rides. Samuel is now very good at riding his bike with training wheels. No more tricycle for him! Chuck was washing the car and so the kids decided they wanted to wash their bikes.

We went to the opening of the splash park even though it was a little chilly and the wind was blowing. The kids weren't too excited about getting wet at first. Samuel began to cry that he wanted to go to the old splash park because the water was warm there. I just had to laugh and explain to him that the water wasn't warm it was just over 100 degrees last summer so it felt warm. Bella on the other hand didn't seem to mind a little bit of chill. In typical fashion Samuel was crying because he wanted to leave and Bella was crying because she wanted to stay.

Don't let the faces fool you - we all had fun at the kite festival. They were taking free pictures so of course we took our turn. The old guy was trying to get the kids to smile, but in the end just decided getting them to look was an accomplishment. I just laughed when I saw the outcome. Nothing like a pack of onary kids!

One thing about all the wind is that the kids love flying their kites.

When a Good Idea Goes Awry

The red dirt here stains everything and drives me crazy! I'm pretty uptight about getting red dirt on my carpet so when the kids go out to play I tell them they're either in or out there's no going in and out, in and out. So several weeks ago Samuel decided he was going to pee outside. This was a great idea I thought - it's an advantage little boys have and then he didn't have to go in and out with the red dirt trailing behind. This then became his daily ritual every time he was outside. Chuck saw him and wasn't sure it was such a good idea, but I assured him it was a great idea. Then the last few nights while Chuck and the kids were working outside Bella told Chuck she was going to pee outside. Chuck told her she couldn't pee outside because she was a girl and girls don't do that. Bella threw a huge fit when Chuck hauled her in to use the potty.

Fastforward to Monday night - again Chuck and the kids were outside working in the yard. I look out the window and see Bella running around with no pants or underwear. I opened the door and asked her what she was doing. She ran up to me and said her hand was dirty and then wiped something on my hand. It was at that point I realized it was a little piece of poop! YUK!
Me: "Bella, did you have an accident!"
Bella: "No. I poop outside."
Me: "Chuck! I need you!"

We discovered that indeed Bella had shed her clothing and then proceeded to poop outside by the playhouse. I guess she figured since she couldn't pee outside she would try the other. We then informed both kids that there was a new rule: No one goes potty ouside!

My Baby is One!

My sweet baby Isaac turned 1 today! How the last year has flown!


My favorite time of each day is nursing Isaac just before he falls asleep at night. There is usually noise and chaos in the rest of the house as Chuck runs around playing games with Samuel and Bella. But I take my baby to the quite room with the rocking chair where I’ve watched him grow as I’ve held him each night in my arms and looked into those big blue eyes. Many nights tears have come to my eyes as I look at this precious baby and am so thankful for him. I often wish I could slow time down not knowing if another baby will fill my arms again. I try and savor every moment of this precious time. What JOY it is to be a mother! Happy Birthday my sweet boy!



It was a rough delivery for my boy. He weighed in at 8 lbs. 4 oz. which was really big for mommy! The poor guy was quite the sight when he arrived - he looked like a little old grumpy man with his head all bruised and eyes so swollen he could hardly open them.

Samuel and Bella meeting Isaac for the first time. I look at this picture and can't believe how much each of my kids has grown this year. Samuel and Bella love Isaac so much. They can be pretty rough with him, but being the third baby in three years he's got to be tough.

We celebrated Isaac's birthday early, but we did take everyone for ice cream tonight.

And Chuck's tradition of marking the Growth Stick to end each birthday.

Pictures I took today of Isaac today

Isaac loves to play with Bella's kitchen. Samuel always wants Isaac to play in his room, but Isaac will choose Bella's room every time.

Playing the piano has become one of Isaac's daily activities. He loves to hear the noise it makes.

Isaac is showing no signs of wanting to walk, but we can't keep him away from the stairs. He actually is really good at climbing, but needs some work on coming down safely.

It's been really fun to watch Isaac's personality develop. He is my little sunshine baby always quick to flash a smile, but he can throw giant fits when he doesn't get what he wants, or if one of the kids takes a toy from him. Here he is throwing one of those fits.

He loves to try and play with the other kids no matter what they are doing.

Easter Sunday

This is my small Easter miracle - all 3 kids in their new Easter clothes looking in the same direction and smiling!

I wanted to get a few pictures of the kids so we loaded them in the car after Isaac got up from his afternoon nap. The only problem was the other two fell asleep once we started driving. So we kept driving and driving. And I realized that Chuck has been holding out on me when I've asked him to help me get the kids to smile. There was no one around so he said, "I found my inner clown" and it worked. Just look at those smiles. He had two fists full of pine needles and was pretending to stick them in his ears. The kids loved it!




Thanks Grandma Jerri Lynn for Bella's beautiful dress!

Easter Fun

We did a few fun activities leading up to Easter this year. Friday night we colored eggs.

We do our egg hunt Saturday so on Sunday we can focus on why we really celebrate Easter. Here are the kids getting lined up and ready to dash for the eggs. Isaac was more interested in the grass then anything else.

Run, run!

Opening the goodies. We also have a tradition of the Easter bunny bringing the kids a game. The Easter bunny almost forgot this year, but on Friday night Samuel asked me what game I thought the Easter bunny would bring. The daddy bunny made a quick trip to the store and got hungry hippos. Chuck and I both had this game as kids.

And the kids love playing it. I've lost track of how many times we've played this game over the past two days.

After our little egg hunt we went to the park for the city egg hunt. It was cold and rainy this year, but that didn't stop us.

We were thinking there would not be as many people at the park because of the weather, but there were still a lot of people. Samuel ran clear across the field from where we were standing because he had his eyes set on a patch of blue eggs. He actually gathered almost a whole bucket full. Bella only got 4 eggs. Chuck was with her, but she was watching everyone else instead of gathering.

Getting soaked!

Are You Even Kidding Me Moments

The past week I have had several of those moments when you think "Are You Even Kidding Me!". Last Saturday evening Chuck was gone to Priesthood Session, Grandma, Grandpa, Trina and Wes were staying at our house, but they were all gone as well. So it was just me and the three kids. It all began when Samuel and Bella decided they wanted to come in from outside, after they had been digging in the red dirt, at the same time that I noticed Isaac had a blowout. I decided I would deal with Isaac's mess first and the other kids would just have to wait a minute to come in since they were covered in dirt and would need some serious cleaning. They weren't happy about having to wait and were pounding on the glass door and making all sorts of raucous. I finished with Isaac, let the other kids in and stripped off the dirty clothes. I hauled Bella up to the tub and told Samuel not to move off the rug until I came back for him. As I was adjusting the water, Bella peed in the tub and I had to start over with the water. Then I came out of the bathroom and saw baby Isaac had climbed almost to the top of the stairs. I caused him to lose his concentration and he fell over, but I managed to grab him before he tumbled too far. I then took him into the bathroom and set him on the floor. I came back out of the bathroom looked into the kitchen and couldn't believe my eyes. I saw Samuel peeing so high it was going above the kitchen table and splattering all over the floor! And I thought "Are You Even Kidding Me!"

Me: What are you doing!!!!
Samuel: Well mom, you told me not to move and you were just taking too long.
At this point I hustled down the stairs and was trying not to laugh - I mean I really couldn't believe he had just peed on the floor. It was so shocking it was funny!
Samuel: Mom, what are we going to do about this?
Me: You're going to clean it up.
Samuel: Oh no, I don't want to get pee on my hands.
All I can say is I love my concrete floors and yes, Samuel did wipe up the mess!



Bella has been potty trained for months now, but she has been giving me grief with the toilet paper. She is so independent, but in this case it's killing me! She always stuffs way too much toilet paper in the toilet, but the other day she wiped herself with a whole roll of toilet paper and then flushed the toilet causing it to almost overflow. So I removed the toilet paper from the kids bathroom. Then she found my stash of wet wipes and used a whole new box just getting a little piece of poop on each wipe and stacking them up nice and high around the garbage can. So I removed the wet wipes from the bathroom thinking without toilet paper and wet wipes I have solved this problem. Then I heard her in the bathroom and went up to help her since there was now no means for wiping - or so I thought. When I opened the door she handed me a wet washrag with poop on it! She had dipped it in the toilet and wiped herself yet again. And I thought to myself "Are You Even Kidding Me!" - but I must hand it to her, she's resourceful!


It's also been a week of crazy accidents. We were making little bunnies out of Easter eggs and had almost finished our project when Isaac woke up from his nap. I was trying to strap him into the seat at the table and Bella went around the back side of the table, got her leg caught in the glue gun cord causing it to fall on her face! I about cried myself when I saw it happen because I couldn't do anything to stop it with Isaac in my arms. Luckily it was just a cool melt, but she still got a nasty little burn on the side of her chin.

Today we were making cookies - I found a great new recipe on the back of the cookie cutter - the secret ingredient Almond Extract. Oh they were so yummy! I plugged in the beaters and went back to the pantry when I heard Samuel start to wail. He had turned the beaters on and managed to hurt his finger. It scared him more than anything and he was very dramatic about the whole event!

It's just been one of those crazy weeks!

Isaac's Early Birthday Celebration

Happy 1st Birthday Isaac!

(His actual birthday isn't for another week, but we had an early celebration this weekend to make it easier for my family to be here.)

Isaac's birthday theme was "SO BIG". It always amazes me how much these precious little babies grow in a year - and he really has gotten SO BIG. To go with the "SO BIG" theme I made the giant cupcake (thanks Kaicie for the cupcake idea!), Grandma made Isaac a giant riceball which he did not want to stop eating and of course the vege's were just for fun.

I took a ton of pictures - 1st birthdays are special - so here are just a few.

This cake was much easier to make and decorate than Samuel's cake I made last week. Thank goodness!

Isaac usually eats anything I give him, but he was a bit hesitant about taking a taste of the cupcake. Chuck finally had to shove a piece of frosting in his mouth so he would finally take a bite. Once he got a taste he didn't want to stop and kept taking bigger and bigger bites.

The other kids were jealous of Isaac's giant riceball!

Isaac's Birthday Celebration

The SO BIG birthday boy! It was fun for me to gather and display pictures of Isaac from his first year. It's hard to believe my baby is 1!

Everyone taking a turn at eating the SO BIG birthday cupcake. They were all upset when I finally took it away.

Opening presents. Isaac wasn't really sure what was going on, but the other kids were more than happy to help him. Everyone actually got presents at this party. Samuel still had a present to open from Grandma Jerri Lynn and Grandpa Clayton and one from us. Chuck and I decided we'd better buy Bella a little game to open since she's not really old enough to understand why the boys were getting presents and she wasn't. In fact last week at Samuel's party she threw herself on the floor and was crying because she wanted to open a present. It's hard to be 2!

The new bike Grandma and Grandpa got Samuel. It's just right for his little short legs.

Thanks to my wonderful family for helping us celebrate the boys birthdays! Grandma Jerri Lynn has been here the past two weeks, but went home today with Grandpa. We're all going to miss her, it's sure been nice to have an extra set of hands helping with the kids and house!