Thanksgiving 2013

Wow, writing on here is so much harder than it used to be. Thanksgiving is over and Christmas is upon us. We spent thanksgiving with my parents, my brother Ben and his family, and my sisters. I was in charge of pies this year. I made 1 pumpkin, 1 banana cream, my 1st pecan pie, and 2 s'mores pies (Matt's fav, thus I made 2). Good food and company were had by all. Beckett and Anabelle had the whole week off of school so we were able to see other family members and friends over the holiday as well. We had a great time. Thanksgiving is easily one of my most favorite holidays. It is all about family and focusing on love and togetherness and gratitude, not to mention all the amazing food. Love it!

This month has been a rather busy month (when is November not busy). We went to our friend's  Pie Night for the 1st time. Yes, a whole night dedicated to pie. It was heavenly. We also went to see Ender's Game. It was pretty good. Matt read the books, but I had not. I could tell they left out details, but I was able to follow the story just fine and enjoyed it a lot. I can see why it is such a popular series. I also was able to participate in an amazing fundraiser for a sister in our stake that has cancer. Last year in the evening session of stake conference, this sister gave an incredible talk on faith (I want to share it on here sometime, but don't hold your breath). She was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer. She has children ranging from 1st grade to Jr high. It was so touching to see people come and do whatever they could to help this family out. People are amazing.

Something that wasn't so happy that happened last month was that August got croup. It literally happened over night. I got home from zumba and put him to bed. He sounded like he was getting stuffed up, but nothing more than what comes from teething. When he woke up in the night around 2, he was much more congested. He was struggling to breath through his nose. In the morning, his voice sounded horse, I could hear each breath, and he had a horrible sounding cough. I could tell this was bad to come on so suddenly like that. I got him in to see the Dr as soon as I could that morning. My sister had had para-influenza a couple weeks earlier, so I thought it might be that. When I got there, I told them he had been exposed to para-influenza and they said that is what causes croup in babies, so he had croup. I have never had a baby with croup before and I never want one to have it again. It was so scary sounding. They gave him some medicine to help his swollen larynx and some advice to help with the coughing and congestion and we left. By night he was doing much better. The next day it seemed like a bad cold and kept getting better from there. I am glad I got him in right away. It was so scary to hear his breathing.

August has been my sick kid. He had RSV when he was a month old. That one freaked me out too. Beckett and Anabelle never really got sick much as babies, (but then they weren't born in the winter) so this has been hard for me to handle. I will say this, Heavenly Father has inspired me with both illnesses to get into the Dr early. The RSV didn't even test as RSV in the quick version. It came back positive in the longer test they do. "Luckily" the Dr got us one of those nose sucker-outer machines (the reversed air compressor) before we even knew it was RSV. If I had taken him in later when he was really bad, I would have been a wreak. Heavenly Father showed me some major tender mercies both times.

So anyways, November was a good month and despite some bad health, we had fun and lots of good food.

Getting back on the saddle

So it has been about 20 months (having a baby makes me view time in months) since I last posted on here. Pretty sad. We have had some birthdays, went on some trips, did all the holiday stuff people do during 20 months, survived a bad hail storm at Bear Lake, got a bachelors degree for Matt, got a certificate of completing preschool for Anabelle two times, sent everyone but me back to school (twice), got pregnant, had a baby in January, named him August Rich Jacob, made some yummy food, had my sister Sara be my nanny until she went on her mission, applied to graduate school in Ohio, & had many, many other life experiences that would take far too long to post on here (believe me, I tried). So I am starting with where we are at. Most of the people that read this, if there is anyone left, know mostly what has/is happening in our life, so I shouldn't need to recap much.
Really, this blog is my our family journal. I am a horrible journaler. Seriously, you look at my journals, I think I have a grand total of maybe 30 entries, out of all of them. Writing has never been my strong suit. But this blogging thing was somehow easier for me to do. I really want to get back to doing it again, especially before we move far, far away (maybe I will be able to finally get my family reading my blog by then). Maybe this will improve my memory that was stolen this last pregnancy. So, here's to getting back on the saddle.

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Help fight cancer and get a laugh

Do you remember me talking about my friend that lost a lot of weight? His mom was recently diagnosed with cancer, and he is raising $1000 for the Huntsman Cancer Institute to help find a cure. The way he is doing it is a little unique. He has pledged to get all pimped out in Denim from head to toe while he runs the Salt Lake Half Marathon on April 21st if he obtains his goal of $1000 by that day. Go to his blog and get all of the details: mejosher.com © | run. laugh. repeat.: introducing the 'denim for the cure' campaign

And a new year has begun

January was mostly quiet, except in the mornings, when Beckett was getting ready for school, which were not quiet due to the protests about going to school. At least I didn't have to literally drag him out of the house. On the other hand, he has gotten smart enough to know that drawing out getting dressed keeps him from going to school a little bit longer. Smart little monkey.

On a positive note about Beckett and school, he has such a good class. I found out that Beckett's teacher has talked with his class so they understand that he has challenges and he needs their help and support to deal with his challenges. Mrs. Struthers said that the class is very willing to help him, sometimes too willing. She has also asked a girl in the class to be Beckett's mentor (I guess that would be the right word). He always stands by her in line and she helps him when there is a substitute. She is also the biggest kid in the class, so she totally looks like his body guard, which is good for Beckett because he is the smallest in the class. The nicest thing about this is she seems to like to look out for him. It seems like she genuinely wants to help Beckett. There have been a couple of times when she has told him to come stand by her in line, and the way she says it makes me want go up and give her a big hug. She sounds like she really wants him to be by her. I don't know her name though. Beckett is horrible with names and can't tell me what her name is. Maybe he just doesn't know who I am talking about. Communication is definitely one of his biggest challenges, and I am having a hard time thinking outside the box to come up with different ways to explain stuff to him. (If you can't read between the lines, this is a source of frustration right now.) 

Anyways, back to this class. I have a question to pose to the readers of this blog. Do you have any ideas of what I could do to thank his class for being so wonderful to him? I have thought about taking doughnuts or asking the teacher if we could have a special movie party one afternoon. I don't know. I want the kids to know how much we appreciate them being so good to Beckett and helping him with his challenges. I kind of want it to stand out in their mind so that they will hopefully remember how important it is to accept and help everybody all throughout their lives. That might be asking a little much though, so I am okay with just thanking them. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Beckett's class went on another field trip during January. We went to the Ogden Nature Center. Our family has never been before, so I was excited to see what was there. It was super cool. The kids got to go snowshoeing and look for animal autographs. They had so much fun walking around in the snowshoes, and it was fun to watch. Many, if not all, tripped at least once. They also got to pretend to walk like animals, to show the different gates that animals have. They got to touch stuff like snake skin, teeth, skulls, fur, etc. There were stuffed animals all over the place for them to look at. And they had a few animals in cages too. The snake in one of the cages was very active and it really freaked Beckett out. I'm glad that was at the end because he kind of became unglued at that point and was done with the field trip and wanted to go back to school. For the most part, I think he really liked the field trip. But it just wasn't part of his routine and the snake and this one little boy kept annoying him, so by the end of it, he was spent. His teacher said he had to spend the last little bit of the day in the Special Ed room because he kept falling to pieces. This Aspergers thing can really ruin fun days sometimes.

Other days, it makes things so funny and cute.

I love that kid.

On to Anabelle. She is still Little Miss Spunky Pants. I think she wants to add cheerleading to her list of things she conquer someday.

She has also become quite the dancer. She has been a dancer for quite a while, but she has really started to dance a lot lately and she is getting very good at it too. I think we need to look into dance classes.

She is still a budding fashion designer. Her best outfit of January consisted of the dress in the video above, with lime green leggings and a jean mini-skirt underneath the dress. On top of the dress she wore the blue and white striped shirt in the last video with a pink T-shirt on top of that. On her feet, she had these purple slippers that matched the skirt in that same video, with her black Sunday shoes on top of them. I hope you have a good image of her, because I couldn't get her to change before we went to pick up Beckett from school, so I had to take her all dressed up like that. As we were walking to the door that we meet Beckett at, there were people walking behind us. So I said, "Next time we come to get brother from school, we can't wear dress-ups. Okay?" She is a hoot and keeps me on my toes.

Speaking of keeping me on my toes. I have already had to come up with ages for when she can have sleepovers and wearing make-up. That's right, MAKE-UP. I didn't know I would have to come up those numbers already!. Have you guys already decided on them? This girl is going to give us a run for our money before she is even 5! Despite wanting to be an adult at 4, she really is a joy to have. She loves help me clean and tries to be a mother to Beckett whenever she can get away with it. She still loves school and has taken to primary like a duck to water. I can't believe she is in Primary already. Her teacher told me on the second or third Sunday of Sunbeams that she was spelling Anabelle's name on her paper, and Anabelle said she was spelling it wrong and then told her how to spell it correctly. She is just too much. I love my little Bananabelle.

Here are some cute pictures of the kids that I want to share, just because they are cute.

He found my old swim cap and thought it was hilarious.

Vogue!

My 31st birthday was also in January. My sisters and I went to Brian Regan for all of our birthdays this year. It was so much fun. He is so funny. I was dying when he was talking about dancing. It was such a good routine. I haven't laughed that hard in a while and I loved it! Also, Matt and I went to dinner with my parents to Zupas, which is one of the best places to eat. Their chocolate fondue is the best I have ever had. (Even better than the Melting Pot's, except for their smores fondue. That wins them all.) Their soups are heavenly and they have amazing sandwiches and salads, all for pretty decent prices. Go there if you have never been. I promise it is worth it. 

Matt has started his last semester of School. We are so excited for him to be done. There is light at the end of the tunnel. He is taking a Spanish class this semester and it is kicking his butt. Other than that, he likes his classes. His job is still awesome. So life is good for now. I hope I didn't just jinx us.

December and Christmas

December started out with that horrible windstorm and then life just kind of continued to feel like a windstorm throughout the rest of the month (isn't that how December always feels?). I have to admit that I was pretty happy when Christmas day came, just so I could sit around the house and not have to do anything for a while.

One of the first things we did in December was make a Graham Cracker house.

 I was surprised how well the kids did at not eating all of the candy for decorating the house. They had so much fun and loved helping me decorate it. I think we will try it again next year, but maybe we will try using real gingerbread instead. I bet it would hold together better than graham crackers.

Next I got to go on Beckett's first field trip with his Kindergarten class. We went to the Treehouse museum. I drove Beckett and two boys from his class in our car. Beckett was so excited and proud to have them ride with us. We watched a play that the kids participated in. Only one of the children was not afraid to say their lines in front of everybody. It was super cute. The kids also got to do a Chinese Dragon Dance. It was so cool. Each child got to hold one of the poles that held up the dragon and dance throughout the museum, while the adults made lots of noise with drums and cymbals. I think that might have been the favorite thing that we did that day. We also got to do a craft and then run free in the museum. It was a lot of fun.

After months and months of threatening to cut Anabelle's hair if she kept on sucking on it, I finally followed through.

On December 10th, I cut Belle's hair for the very first time, ever. It was difficult to do it, and not just for me, as you can see by the pictures, she wasn't too thrilled about it either. When it was all over though, I think she felt better about it, like she had passed a milestone and was a little more grown up.

I am a little sad that her long hair is gone. She had the cutest curls in the back of her head, just like me when I was her age. And just like me, once the hair was cut, the curls were gone too. But now her hair doesn't look all clumpy and gross. My mom didn't go for a styled cut, we just pulled her hair towards her mouth, and snipped it where it was just out of reach for her to get it in her mouth. Unfortunately, now it has grown just long enough that she can get it in her mouth again and she is starting to take full advantage of it. Urgh!! Why can't I get this child to understand how disgusting that is?! We have even told her that Paul (Matt's friend that Anabelle has quite the crush on, and yes, I am worried about that) doesn't like girls that suck on their hair, but apparently that hasn't fazed her. I guess she is just going to have to have short hair the rest of her life.

Also in December, I went on a date with my mom and aunt to see "A Christmas Carol." Two of my nieces and a nephew were in it and they did a fantastic job. "A Christmas Carol" is such a wonderful way to get you into the Christmas spirit. No wonder President Monson reads that every year.

I also got to go on a date with Matt to his company Christmas party, sans children. It was nice dress too. It has been a long time since Matt and I got dressed up to go out for a nice dinner alone (yeah. there were 400 other people there, but no children). We even got a nice picture taken, but I think Matt might have lost the link to our picture, so that was a bust. The food was really good and we sat with some fun people too. Despite the big let down of no gifts from the company, we had a really good time and were grateful to have had some time to ourselves.

That same weekend we also got to have a family sleepover with Matt's sister, Ana, and her wonderful family. We had a lot of fun having them stay with us. The kids had all kinds of fun together and Belle got to go shopping with Ana's family, so she had the time of her life. We adults made and ate way too much junk food and loved every minute of it. Isn't that what the holidays are all about anyways? I mean, really? One more bonus to having them stay with us, they put Netflix on our Wii, and have left it on there for us to use. It has been awesome! Ana and Scott, you are the best!!

The week of Christmas, both Anabelle and Beckett had parties at their schools. Beckett's was your standard school party. He came home with all kinds of gifts from his teacher and special ED teachers. Lucky duck. I don't remember getting presents from my teachers, let alone 3 teachers.

Anabelle's was a pajama party. She had a blast. Mrs. Claus came and so did the missing Gingerbread boy and girl (They went missing earlier in the month and sent them postcards from their travels all month long). Anabelle still talks about finding the Gingerbread girl. That must have been much more exciting than the big guy's wife.

Christmas Eve was spent at Ana's house, having dinner, painting ornaments, and busting open a pinata. This is two years in a row we have done this, so I think we might start calling it a tradition. The kids did much better at painting their ornaments this year.

 You could actually see the different colors that they used, instead of mixing them all together until the ornament was unrecognizable, like last year. The pinata was also a big success. This year, they actually understood what they were doing, so it was a little more exciting. Ana found some super cute felt bags for them to put their booty into.

 We parents also got to play games, while the kids ate some candy and watched a movie. A great Christmas Eve, if I do say so myself.

My sister Christa, stayed with us over the Christmas weekend. It was fun to have someone else there to celebrate with us. She is always so good at helping the kids get excited about stuff and have lots of fun. Isn't that what Aunts are for? It was really nice for me because I had someone to talk to at night when Matt was playing with his Christmas gift, the Xbox.

Christmas was super exciting this year. Beckett remembered a lot from last year and so he was really into it. He wrote letters to Santa this year. The first one said,

Pretty direct and to the point. No messing around with that note. I think he started learning about sentences soon after he wrote that first note, because the next one said, "Beckett is the train." And then the final draft that he actually put in an envelope said, "Beckett, I want the train." Santa had no way of messing up that order. Anabelle also wrote her own letter:

I asked her what it said, and she said it told Santa she wanted a princess doll. I'm glad Santa could decipher that letter, because I never would have figured that one out.

The kids really wanted to leave out cookies for Santa, but we forgot to bake some. I don't think Santa minded because he wrote a very sweet note to the kids anyways, which they thought was pretty cool. Santa obviously got the message because Beckett got two trains and more tracks to go with them. Anabelle did get her princess doll (actually, she orginally wanted a set of all of the Disney Princesses, 7 in total, but Santa decided that was a little much), a Cinderella Barbie doll that she loves and Strawberry Shortcake with a bakery as a bonus. They got lots of other toys and wonderful presents that were loved just as much, but I don't want to bore you all with telling you about each individual gift, so I just went with the highlights.Thank you so much to those that gave us gifts this last Christmas. We loved and appreciated them all.

After Sacrament meeting that morning, Christmas day was spent at my brother Ben's house, eating more good food and playing more fun games. This is becoming a tradition as well. I guess we started all kinds of traditions this last year. We had such a good time, except that I started to get sick. The day after Christmas was spent mostly in bed, resting. I was able to actually take a sick day thanks to Christa. She took my kids home with her and brought them back the next day. That never happens for a mom. I appreciated it so much.

New Years Eve was a lot of fun. We spent it at our friends, James and Shana's place. We ate yummy pizza and snacks, and finally watched Captain America. We must be getting old though, because it felt like it took forever to get to midnight. We all kept saying to each other, "It's only 9?!", "It's only 10:30?!" Beckett and Anabelle, on the other hand, had no problem staying up that late. They could have watched stuff on Netfix all night long. They were mad when it was time to go.

Beckett enjoyed having a break from school, a little too much. I tried very hard to get him to understand that he was going to have to go back to school eventually, but I guess it didn't sink in because he put up a big fight when it was time to go back to school. It was worse than when he started school in some ways. I almost don't want to have Spring break if it is going to be like it was in January. Do you think they would give me a key to the school?

Random

You know that nonsense word you have to enter before you can leave a comment on someone's blog? I seem to always get this urge to copy it at the end of my comments, just to be funny and random. There have actually been a few times when they actually would kind of go along with the comment and it would have such a good inside joke for me and the person whose blog I was posting. So don't be surprised to see me do that one day. And I will totally get a laugh if anybody did it on mine.

P.S. I just got back from the Brian Reagan show and so I might be slightly hipper and weird right now and felt like confessing something totally random about me. At least it isn't something embarrassing, right?


P.P.S  I realized it is called the security word. That's what you have to type in the little box before you can submit your comment.