Theme Days

My kids have a lot of themed days at school, which are fun and annoying. They get to dress up, which is a huge change from their regular uniforms, and they have food, which is annoying for the parents. Elizabeth had Egyptian Day and a Thanksgiving Feast and Andrew had Native American Day. Elizabeth wore make-up, which she cried and rubbed off before we made it to school because her costume wasn't quite up to her expectations. Andrew liked his costume and said that everyone enjoyed the smoked turkey cubes that was our contribution. Elizabeth brought pumpkin cookies and was too shy to tell why she likes pumpkin cookies. She did sing a great song with her class. Now we are preparing for Viking Day. Not sure how to do that one yet.

Go BYU!

Eden, Jeff and I wore our BYU blue to watch the big game last night. Our other girls now want their own BYU shirts to wear. When I asked Andrew if he is a BYU fan, he said, "I think so." We need to work on that. What I like about this picture? My counters are clean and dinner is in the crockpot.

Eden

I needed to put this picture on the blog. Her eyebrows are red. Can you see it? She was so happy because I let her crawl around naked on my bed.

Where Eden Plays

Eden loves to play in Charlie's kennel and inside the cupboards. She keeps us entertained. One thing I am noticing about Eden is that she has inherited my need for clean. She keeps her food and sippy cups perfectly organized on her high chair tray. I love watching it. Eden also got tubes in her ears last week and everything went smoothly. She was very angry about not drinking or eating before the surgery and was screaming at anyone who walked by, reaching her hands out for food. As with every other place we go, the most comments we got involved her red hair. I was able to go with her to the surgery room and watch her get put to sleep. I kind of hated it. She screamed while 2 nurses held her down and the anesthesiologist sat at her head with a mask over her mouth. She stopped screaming, moaned "mommy" and fell asleep. She looked dead to me. The nurse had to walk me out of the room with her arm around my shoulders. When she woke up, I could hear her screaming from the waiting room. She screamed for 20 minutes straight until she went hoarse and the nurse let us go home. She fell asleep and slept for 4 hours. When she woke up, she stood up and took 12 steps across the family room. Hooray for no more fluid in her ears.

La Guitarre

A couple of weeks ago, Andrew participated in a Latin Festival. He played La Guitarre and was judged by judges from Denver. He received "Highly Superior." We are proud of him. The girls were very good sports--Eden walked around the back of the room and Elizabeth and Anna played with the programs. We celebrated with donuts after.

Jeff

Just thought I should post this picture of Jeff. He carves a mean pumpkin.

Mother of the Year

I didn't win any awards this week for mothering. I am grateful my children are still alive and still like me. The most notable event was Eden falling down the stairs in her walker. She came out of the walker and both ended up at the bottom of the stairs. Eden broke her nose, I think, though the doctor didn't do any x-rays. He said even if it is broken, they won't do anything about it. Her nose is still swollen and bloody 4 days later. I panicked when I went to pick her up and blood was gushing from her nose and mouth. Luckily she is fine. Here she is playing with Charlie's dog food.

I bribed my kids this week to trade in their candy for a toy and Elizabeth was my only taker. She picked out butterfly earrings. Anna got earrings home but couldn't quite give up her candy and Andrew thought the whole idea was crazy. Why would I do that when I can just buy my own stuff?

We went to Fox Run Park on Friday and the Egberts met us there. We got Cold Stone ice cream after, in an attempt to end our week on a good note.

Garden of the Gods

After a week of crazy snow and no school we were lucky to have beautiful weather yesterday and today. After Stake Conference we packed a picnic and went to Garden of the Gods. It is a beautiful place and kind of strange because it is such a different landscape from the rest of the area. Every time I go I want to ride my bike or run. The kids climb everything and I try not to think about broken bones.


I love this picture of Eden. And yes, mom, that is the new Naarjie dress you just bought for her.

Halloween

For Halloween this year we took the kids bowling, went trick-or-treating at a high school and played carnival games, carved pumpkins, and ate dinner with friends and of course, more trick or treating. Andrew was a skeleton, Elizabeth a leopard, Anna a mean witch, and Eden a pumpkin. The kids had a great time. Andrew is at the perfect age for collecting as much candy as possible. We have a ridiculous amount of candy and have been eating too much sugar. Eden throws a tantrum when she sees candy and can't have it.

Trying to find my Creative Side

It wasn't hard to change the background of my blog, but to change the header and add pictures to it is beyond me. Maybe I will figure it out and maybe my blog will go back to the way it was.

Eden is One as of September 14th!

Eden turned the big one on September 14th. At her well-check she weighed in at a whopping 18 pounds, about 10th percentile and she was 50th percentile for height. People still comment on how tall she is, which I think is from her skinny body. Her most noticeable feature is her red hair. I am still in denial about her hair, but strangers stop me to tell me about others they know with beautiful red hair. She will stand out and I am sure she will learn to appreciate it. Eden has lots of words. Her current favorite is no. Nah-nah-no. And she says Charlie and then barks. She crawls to Jeff's office and says, "hi, daddy." She also says night-night, bottle, mama, and a couple of others. She is brilliant. Eden is currently on antibiotics for ear infection number 6, 3 of which have happened in the last 7 weeks. Eden is shy around new people still but will happily go to the daycare at the Y, thank goodness. She loves her brother and sisters and giggles when we pick them up from school. Very cute. She is also very fiesty. She likes to hit me and when I grab her hand and say no, she winds up for a harder hit and a scream. My others would have burst into tears. We love our Eden Grace.

Eden Grace

Eden is officially 10 and a half months and she is into everything. She is a fast crawler. A typical day for her begins with a breakfast of bananas and oatmeal, followed by a bath and a bottle. After she is dressed, she has a typical pattern. She takes off as fast as she can for Charlie's food and water, which she can get to about a quarter of the time before me. She grabs fists full of dog food and throws it behind her and then splashes the water until is spills on her and the floor. She sometimes eats the food too. After that she heads for the oven and pulls off the towels, and then for any cupboard or the pantry that is open. She then crawls to the family room to pull off the magazines she can reach and rips the pages. She will also crawl to my bathroom and turn on the bathtub. She can only reach the hot water, which she splashes until it gets too hot. She has also been known to crawl to the toilet and see what damage can be done there. Today she climbed up the stairs twice. She keeps really busy following her brother and sisters and chasing Charlie. She likes to pull his tail.

Eden is a happy girl and we love her to death. We are overcome by how cute she is.

Pictures

Pictures of my kids from a while ago. Michelle took them with her fancy camera. Not sure why I can't keep up with the blog. My house is clean and the garden is growing. So I do have a few things to show for myself. Just nothing of long-term value. Eden is 10 months now, Elizabeth turned 6, Anna is signed up for her first season of soccer, and Andrew is trying to discover new planets.

Anna is 4!

Anna turned four on April 18th. I can't believe it. She was my baby for so long. To celebrate we had a dog party with her friends, went to Build-A-Bear for her present from mom and dad, and finished with her choice of spaghetti for dinner. She had a great day.

Today

Today Elizabeth went to her boyfriend's birthday party. They are great friends. She came home and said, "mom, Noah wants to marry me and that's okay because he doesn't have any children, and he's a boy." I told her that she was much too young to marry and she said that Noah was too young to have kids. I like her thinking.

Elizabeth did 22 pull-ups at gymnastics this morning. I can't even do one. Jeff can struggle out four.

Andrew had a story due today in school and he wrote about Eden's birth. Before he started he said, "Mom, I'm going to go way back to the beginning for my story. I'm going to start with 9 months before Eden was born." Luckily my boy is still 7 and the beginning for him was Eden starting as tiny as a grain of rice.

I made my kids eat catfish and blackberries for dinner tonight to which Andrew said, "Oh good, I like variety just like tarantulas do." The girls and their dad looked at me like I was crazy. You want us to eat what???? Jeff is headed to the store for ice cream.

Can't think of anything funny Anna said today. She had to get her 4 year shots yesterday and she has been dramatic. She got to play with Macy for a whopping 4 hours and go to preschool this morning. She is a tired girl. She was 50th percentile for height and 25th for weight.

Eden had a stick of cheese and a snap pea today, which she loved. She got mad when I took them away. She likes to screech and scream and make cool sounds with her lips. She definitely contributes to the noise level. She is also getting more consistent with her sitting. Her bum doesn't proivde a very stable base. At 6 months she was 13 pounds--9th percentile.

Jeff and I ran the Garden of the Gods 5 miler on Saturday and were extremely wimpy about it. Too hilly for us. We miss the flats of West Kaysville. We are now in the process of dreaming a deck, finishing the fence, planting our HOA required token tree, and teaching our homeschooled son about government.

Love spring...

Bikes

Elizabeth inherited Andrew's old bike and Anna got Elizabeth's old bike. As for Andrew, you can see how he feels about the arrangement in the picture. We need to buy him a bigger bike. But we want something we can pass down to his 3 little sisters. Think he will mind a princess bike? We are hoping to find something red.