Happy Birthday, Sullivan

 

 

 

 

12 years ago, after a huge snow storm and in the middle of the night, boy number two joined our family. Sullivan is a great kid. He is smart, athletic, kind, thoughtful, helpful, pleasant, good, and handsome. He is a joy and delight and a blessing to our family. He is very tender with Waverly. It melts my heart, how he treats that little girl. He is good at so many things. He loves playing soccer and is starting to love basketball. He is on the honor roll in school. He is a good friend and a good example. The kids at church and school are drawn to him. He is a leader amongst his peers. He is so excited to be out of Primary and in with the Young Men. He will be ordained a Deacon in the Aaronic Priesthood on Sunday and pass the sacrament. He is spending his birthday on his first official boy scout camp out with his dad and brother. It is really cold outside!

Sullivan is an obedient boy. I enjoy having him around and spending time with him. He usually has a smile on his face. Girls fall in love with him all the time. One girl at church already has big plans for him. She is 8.

If you look closely at the pictures, you will notice some injuries he has endured: from a huge black eye, to major poison ivy to his surgery on his foot. He was so tough through all of those experiences, particularly the foot ordeal. He hardly complained, which I guess is why it took so long to go to the doctor!

He is good. I think he is a pretty special person. I love seeing him learn new things and grow and mature. I look forward to seeing him grow up.

Happy Birthday, Sullivan. I love you much and you are one of my very best blessings.

Heart Ache

My sweet friend, Catie, passed away yesterday morning after a 3 year battle with bone cancer. I only knew her with cancer, but what an amazing woman. She was only 30, has 3 young kids and a husband, and parents and siblings. She had the most amazing smile. She was strong and faithful and I very rarely heard her complain. She wanted to be the one serving others, not the one served. She played the violin beautifully. She was funny and smart and talented. My heart aches for her husband and her children and her parents.

I know that Catie is now free from her pain and suffering and trials and I am sure she is relieved and happy. I am sure she was welcomed home to heaven by people who love her.

Now Steve faces the challenge of caring for his young kids without their mother. Now he is the one with the greater challenge.

So sad for those sweet kids who won't even remember their sweet mom, other than pictures of her.

And I can not imagine being her mother.

Riddle me this, Riddle me that...

Recently Cannon has been writing riddles on the back of his homework pages or on any spare piece of paper he finds. Here are recent examples:

I am something that you make a fort out of. What is it?
A quilt

I am something that starts with Qq and is sharp and hard. What is it?
Quartz

I am a mark, you use me when you have to say something. What is it?
A question mark


I am a thing that hops. What am I?
A kangaroo

I am a thing that a duck says. What is it?
Quack (this one made me laugh out loud!)

I am a baby cat. What am I?
Kitten

I am a thing that goes with a lock. What am I?
Key

I am a thing that goes with a locker. What am I?
Lock



I hope you enjoyed the riddles and could figure out the answers!

5 and a slice

 

Cannon has been very excited about the approach of his half birthday.He has been counting down days and asking how we are going to celebrate. He even expcets his name to be announced with the birthday kids at school. He is so excited to be "five and a slice" as he calls it. The boy cracks me up. I told him he could have half a dinner, half a party and half a cake. He asked if he could have 2 half presents so he could have one whole. This morning he announced that it is the day and gave me a big hug and told me he is so excited to be 5 and a slice.

I hope he will be happy to wait a few more months for the celebration. Maybe I will give him a cookie for a snack today to celebrate.

Who knew?

Who knew that saying I would help with the costumes for the middle school play would take over life? Who knew that being a stay at home mom really does not mean you stay at home? Who knew that being gone in the afternoon when the kids get home from school is so awful?

I can not do everything for everybody. I am wearing out. The play is in 5 weeks. I look forward to it being over! I am not even in charge. I cannot leave 4 of my kids at home in the afternoon 3 days a week to watch other peoples kids practice a play. It creates havoc at home. Home work does not get done. Dinner is a disaster. The evenings are stressful. And most of all, I miss the kids. Crazy, I know, since homework time - bed time is the hardest time of the day. I WANT to be there. It is my job and my responsibility. I love my kids. I want to do things with them.

I do not know how women willingly hand over their families. I can not imagine the stress and yuckiness a job would create.

I want to be home when the boys come home. I want to help with home work and make dinner and supervise dishes being done and tuck them all into bed.

The other moms and of course, the drama teacher, have jobs during the day so all things revolve around that schedule. I have time during the day, not the afternoon/evening. Why am I the one sacrificing the time for my kids to meet the schedule of the other women? I guess there may come a time when I say, I can do whatever can be done during the day. You guys have to take over anything that needs done in the afternoons.

At least I am now in charge of the boys in the play!

Yahoo for me!

I just completed a 7 mile run! It hurt, it took a long time, it was boring as can be since it was on the treadmill, but, I DID IT! I listened to a good talk about the strength and value of women, the priesthood and the happiness that comes of living the gospel by Sheri Dew (Thanks, Mom and Dad) and I read some articles in the most recent BYU magazine. I have nice new Nike shoes and my Nike ipod+ thing to track my mileage. I sweat a gallon, I am sure I smell. I have not run that distance for about 3 years, so it feels good just to accomplish that little goal.

Now you know what I have been doing for the last more than one hour!

Off to do something good, like make cookies to take to a friend for her birthday and read Slowly Slowly Slowly and Oh the Wonderful Sounds Mr. Brown Can Do, over and over and over to the cutest little girl ever.

Have a good day!

Things that kept me up last night...

I made the mistake of looking up airplane tickets last night right before bed. It is expensive to fly across the country. It is really expensive to fly 7 people across the country. One site even said "we can only book for up to 6 passengers, please readjust your number of tickets" well, that is not helpful for a family of seven! So, while lying in bed I was thinking how easy life would be with only 2 kids. I do not mean to offend anyone with only 2 kids. I believe that family size is a personal and individual choice. I just happened to choose 5, and it just happens to feel like a lot sometimes. Then I started thinking, which 2 would I choose? #1 & #2 are old, almost out of the house, self sufficient, pleasant kids. We could have fun with them and most of my work would be done... but, #4 and #5 are so darn cute. Of course, they are the most work right now = back to #1 and #2. Maybe #3 and #2 would be a good combination or #3 and #4 or maybe #1 and #5...

You get the point. In the end, I decided that I could not pick just 2 of them because I would be missing out on something.

Other benefits of 2 kids: you can drive any kind of car, you can live in almost any size house (which of course lead to an entirely different train of thought) it would be easy to go places with 2 kids, 2 kids is way cheaper than 5, so you can do more stuff...

I will keep all my kids, drive my mini van and keep dreaming of the day I can buy the house I want with plenty of room for all of us. We will drive a million places and watch a million games. We will do a million homework assignments and spend a million years getting up for early morning seminary. Right now, I need to go shower so I can go grocery shopping and buy enough food to feed an army. And in a few short years they will start leaving home and before I know it, I will only have 2 kids.

The Blizzard of 2010!

 

 

 

We got our blizzard on Friday! The first collage is the boys outside Friday night when the snow first started falling. Obviously, they were so excited! All the events scheduled for Saturday were canceled so we had a day with nothing to do and no where to go.

The boys spent Saturday coming in and out of the house. Sledding down the hill in the back yard and in the street in the front. They had a great time. I think they wore all the socks they owned and changed clothes 4 times each. Oh the piles of laundry on Monday!

We made a fire in the fire place and roasted marshmallows and made smores. It was a fun, lazy day.

Church was canceled on Sunday, so another day off! This was the first "day of rest" I have had for a long time! The boys played out side some more and we had a Family Home Evening type lesson time for a while. Matt and I enjoyed a Sunday afternoon nap while the boys played outside some more.

No school on Monday. No school on Tuesday. For sure school on Wednesday... oh no! No school Wednesday so Madsen and Sully both spent the night with friends Tuesday night and most of the day Wednesday. Thursday they were on a one hour delayed start. So glad to have them back in school.

The snow was fun while it lasted. The last 2 days were not as fun as the snow was melted and it was cold and a big soggy mess outside. Tuesday the boys were awesome helpers and we scrubbed the house. They helped get the kitchen totally clean and we washed all the walls in the house.

So, 3 inches of snow equals 3 days off from school.

I am ready for spring!

Waverly: Just because!

 

 

 

 

This first picture is Waverly and Waverly. I just thought it would be fun to get a picture of My Waverly with the Other Waverly. The old Waverly thought I was crazy, but she did it for me any way! Truthfully, Waverly thinks it is cool that I named Waverly after her. I did ask permission!

I just love this dress! It is so pretty. She looks like a princess in it. Too bad she will outgrow it too soon!

Waverly has started carrying stuff. Not just one thing, she usually has her arms loaded with stuff. Today she chose her bears.

I love this little girl!