Morning Photo Shoot

I wanted to add more pictures of the boys for my grandparents in Texas. However I'm missing Jacob. He was at school when I took these pictures. He's almost always at school when I have my camera out and I need to do better at taking pictures of all 4 boys. I also realized that I have hardly any pictures of my parents with the boys because I'm so use to being with them. I need to fix that too.

Adam looks so much older to me in that shirt. He looks like he's old enough to go to Kindergarten next year. I've been teaching him how to read and he's going great. Adam can be quite stubborn and doesn't like to be corrected so you have to give him lots and lots of praise and then he's better about being corrected when sounding words out. I've known for awhile that he was ready to start sounding words out and now that Lucas goes a bit longer between feedings I have the time to help him. It's been lots of fun to watch his progress.

And look, I finally caught one of Lucas's smiles on camera. He just won't smile when it's a camera stuck in his face. But he really is a smiling, cooing little boy. He's doing so great at night. He only gets up once and after eating you can just put in back in his crib still awake and he puts himself to sleep. So nice to have an easy baby when you have 3 older kids demanding your attention also.

Matthew is especially demanding and mischievous these days. He makes me question my sanity almost hourly. He is talking more and more and even sang Happy Birthday in the bathtub the other day. I can't wait for the warm weather to stay. After a beautiful day which included our first soccer practices yesterday today it has rained and snowed and I need good weather so the kids can play outside. Yesterday I spent the day at my mom's for the first time since having Lucas and it was a nice break. My sister was there too and I saw both my brothers and my dad came home for lunch and my other sister even called when we were there. It was a grand old time and I'm grateful I still live close to them all.

Oh and I have hives. If you've never had hives then there's no way to describe my suffering. After I had Jacob I broke out in hives on both my legs. Since I was nursing I couldn't take anything and they lasted a month and almost did me in. Jacob was the easiest baby in the world but the hives made life miserable. So now I have hormonal hives again this time on my arms and across my back. But my legs were obviously feeling left out because I have some sort of hormonal dermatitis that I've been fighting ever since delivery. So the joys of pregnancy live on... I've worked really hard on not scratching and today the hives seem a little less so hopefully they're on the way out. Really why can't babies just be delivered by storks? I'm not sure my body is ever going to recovery from my pregnancies.

I can't finish a post today without a shout out to the Cougars. I'm so nervous for the game tonight! Just have another game like the one against Gonzaga and we'll be fine. Go Jimmer!

Jimmer Wall

David so proudly requested that this picture be added to the blog to commerate his hard work at decorating our home.

Someday I'll get some pictures printed of Matthew and Lucas but for now this works.

What a great weekend!

First I'll start with cute pictures of Lucas. However I couldn't get him to smile. He was too tired.

We had Jacob's birthday party this weekend and he asked for a Angry Birds birthday cake. My sister had sent us a utube video of one because she knew my kids especially Matthew loving playing Angry Birds on the iPad. But once Jacob saw it he decided he needed it for his birthday. I was very proud of my jumbo gumdrop angry birds.

We had Grandma and Grandpa, and Jacob's cousins, Ben and Emily for dinner. Then afterwards the kids got in the hot tub. It was the first time we filled it up and we all thought it was fabulous. Now I'm just waiting to see what my electric bill is going to be like.

David's mother, his brother and his wife showed up just in time for cake. Moy had just picked his mother up from the airport and came straight to our house. We were so happy they could make it. So Jacob had both Grandma's at his party. How lucky!

Jacob saw this set of Magic Tree House books in his book order and asked for them for his birthday. He wanted them so badly he told me he would give my some of his money to help pay for them. I was hesitating because it was a chunk of change. David told me he never ever asked for books for a birthday present and thought we should definitely take advantage of Jacob's desire to read. So the books got bought and it's true Jacob's reading them all the time. Please just ignore Matthew with his finger up his nose.

Matthew, Ben, Jacob, Emily, and Adam

After presents, the kids had a movie night upstairs in the toy room and then got to all sleep together up there. I don't think Emily and Adam went to sleep until almost 11:00 pm but they had so much fun together that I didn't really care. I think it's great that they have cousins that live close to them and that they are good friends.

Then on Saturday we of course reveled in BYU's smashing win against Gonzaga. Jacob and Adam played in the hot tub for most of the second half. How does one celebrate BYU going to the Sweet 16? Well, by meeting the team at the Provo airport at 12:30 in the morning. Okay, it was only David who got to do that because someone had to stayed at home with the sleeping kids but I was there in spirit. He had Coach Rose and Jimmer signed our magazine cover and then he put the cover in the frame on my kitchen wall that is suppose to have Lucas's picture in it.

Lastly on Sunday we found out that our very large ward is splitting next week and since we've only been in the ward 2 months were happy about the change. Better to do it now when we hardly know anyone. Plus Sunday night we had great friends over to visit. So see it was a great weekend!

And a very long blog post...sorry.

Go Cougars!

Beat Gonzaga!

Although I really love John Stockton...really love him.

St. George

Since the boys didn't have school on Monday we decided to make a trip out of going to the MWC tourney. We rented a 2 bedroom condo in St. George and stayed there for 4 nights. We drove down Thursday night and Friday morning we went to Pioneer Park to climb on the rocks. The boys were in heaven. We asked Jacob what he wanted to do that day for his birthday and he choose this because he and Adam "are very good rock climbers and haven't been able to do it with all the snow." We got lots of comments on our BYU gear from the fellow park goers.

Can you see the temple in the picture below? It was a beautiful view and just right outside of town.

Lots of places for active little boys to explore. Matthew loved keeping up with his brothers and wouldn't let me help him at all. We had a few spills because of his stubbornness.

After the rock climbing the older boys went swimming with their dad while the younger boys took naps at the condo with me. Then we drove down to Las Vegas and went to the basketball game. Saturday we went to Snow Canyon and hiked a great little slot canyon called Jenny's Canyon. This picture was taken at the overlook.

And this picture is inside the slot canyon. There was a large bird's nest on a ledge in the canyon. The bird made all this noise and then came flying down. It scared the boys to death. Matthew went running screaming "mommy!" He was too scared and wouldn't let me put him down for the rest of the hike and I had to carry him. Not so fun for me! There were baby birds in the nest and every time they squawked Matthew clutched my neck in a death grip.

Snow Canyon has some great sand dunes where we ate lunch and then played. Of course our car still bears evidence of the trip there but it was worth it.

Lastly Jacob, Adam and I hiked up these petrified sand dunes while the other boys and Dad slept in the car. Again the boys thought the rock climbing was the best. I thought the view was the best.
After Snow Canyon we all went swimming and then picked up some pizza to watch the MWC championship game. The game was sooo frustrating and that's all I'm going to say about it.

Sunday we went to church, then to the St. George Temple,

and then toured the Brigham Young home. We had a great older sister missionary as our tour guide and I really enjoyed it. I think it's important to take my children to these places especially the temple. There is a special spirit there that's no where else and it's great to answer Jacob questions and get him excited for when he can go.

On Monday we all slept in and had a relaxing morning before driving home. We stopped at Cove Fort on the way home but the kids weren't as interested in that. In fact Matthew was a holy terror even though I let him take his blanket and have a pacifier. I was very happy when we got home.

We had a great little vacation and besides the drive down and Thursday night when David had a release going on, he managed to let work go. A big accomplishment for him!! But I was reminded how exhausting vacations really are and was happy to get back home. Especially to my king size bed...I don't know how anyone can sleep sharing a queen size bed. However I am missing the 75 degree weather. I'll think we'll be back to St. George sometime. There was lots to do and the condo was a fabulous. I'm still a terrible car traveler and David still has a horrible sense of direction but family vacations are important and it was lots of fun!

Where were you?

Where were you the night Jimmer scored 52 points in the Mountain West Conference semifinals against the New Mexico Lobos? I was sitting right there in the Thomas and Mack Center having the time of my life. We took the whole family down for the semi finals game in honor of Jacob's 7th birthday. And Jimmer gave Jacob the birthday present of a lifetime. I'm just not sure Jacob appreciated it as much as I did. I told David I think going to the game was more of a present to me for giving birth to Jacob than for Jacob.

I had Lucas in the baby bjorn the whole night and he did great. I think after the first 10 minutes he went deaf and so nothing was bothering him. I had that blanket over his ears to help but it was sooo loud in there. However Lucas did sleep for the majority of the game as long as I didn't forget he was there and start jumping all over the place.

The Thomas and Mack is great because every chair has a back and a padded seat and there's not a bad seat in the house. The energy in there was insane and in front of us were some great BYU fans that we had fun with. We did get some crazy looks from some fans. I think they thought we were crazy (or inhumane) bringing a baby to the game or Matthew for that matter but being BYU fans is a family affair. Plus we got to see Than and Pacen Hancock which was awesome!!

I'm not really a spontaneous person and I like to plan out the details so when I mentioned to David that we should go to the game for Jacob's birthday and then bought tickets the next day I was a little nervous that it was going to be a fiasco taking all the kids. But words cannot describe how awesome it was. I love me a good sporting event and this was one for the history books. Oh life is sweet when Jimmer's in the house! The only thing missing was Greg Wrubell. We tried to get the radio stream from David's phone and wear our ear buds but it wasn't working and Greg was greatly missed. However David follows Greg Wrubell on twitter and Greg posted a link to a 7 minute clip of the highlights of the game so I got my "voice of the cougar fix" that way.

Justin Bieber

Last night at dinner David was asking Jacob about his day at school. Jacob told about his day and then suddenly exclaimed "Mom, there is a big problem at school. Some of the kids like Justin Beaver (that's how Jacob said it) and some kids say he stinks and sings like a girl. And I don't even know who Justin Beaver is." My thought was thank goodness you don't know who Justin Bieber is. I barely know who Justin Bieber is. Jacob said he just told the kids he didn't know who he was. David told Jacob he could tell kids he listens to U2 because that is what we listen to in the car and Jacob loves the song "I'll Go Crazy if I Don't Go Crazy Tonight". Maybe U2 isn't any better of an influence than Justin Bieber but why do first graders have to be discussing a teenage singing heart throb? Ugh!

Lucas at two months

For starting out small, Lucas is catching up. He's almost doubled his birth weight at 2 months. He weighs 12 pounds 1.5 ounces. He's smiling now and cooing and I even got one little laugh out of him. However I haven't done a good job a catching his smiles on camera yet.

Yesterday was Lucas's blessing day. We were blessed to have my parents, my brothers, and two of my sisters and David's two brothers all there. I never get tired of seeing my husband and my dad blessing my babies. It is so special to me. However I had a small hole in my heart missing my Grove Creek 7th ward friends. The bishpric member conducting said our last name wrong and Jacob turned to me and said "When are they going to learn how to say our name?" In time they'll figure it out but in the meantime it's just as hard as I thought it would be to adjust to a new ward and I'm a big baby about it. I miss my friends and my calling and I miss just knowing who everyone is. So I especially grateful that our family came for the blessing. It helped me feel like there was at least someone there who knew had to say my name. At the end of sacrament meeting, Lucas pooped out his clothes and so I don't have a single picture of him in his blessing outfit. I'll just put it on him another time and take some other pictures. Here are some we took after church yesterday.

Here are a few more of Lucas's smiling.

Saturday night we had my family over for dinner and Sunday night we had David's family over for dessert. We had a great time with everyone. Thank you so much for coming and especially for all your help during the pregnancy and the move. We're very grateful to have Lucas and that he is healthy and such a good baby. He even does some 7 or 8 hour stretches at night and David gets to sleep through the night. In return David took care of Lucas yesterday afternoon and I got a 3 hour nap. It was lovely and helped make up for a nasty night last night.

I had to call Poison Control yesterday...

My Matthew boy is giving me quite the ride lately. He is into EVERYTHING. Yesterday I walked into the kitchen to find Matthew sitting half on the stove top and half on the counter eating the Flinstone vitamins. When he saw me he quickly shoved more into his mouth. I raced over and dug all the vitamins out of his mouth and then tried to remember how many were in the bottle when I handed them out to the kids earlier that morning. I know I put the child proof lid back on the vitamins and stuck them back on the 3rd shelf of the top cabinet. But that obviously did not deter Matthew one bit. How he got them open is beyond me and I think he eat probably 20 or 25 of them before I stopped him. So I called Poison Control. I was more mad at Matthew than worried about iron overdose. But I still called and they told me that the amount he ate for his weight wasn't above the toxic level so probably he'd be fine and might just throw up. Matthew didn't even do that nor complain or get fussy or anything. It was like nothing happened. Matthew pushes the kitchen chairs over to the counter tops so he can climb on them and get what he wants. He also pushes the chair into my walk in pantry and gets down the fruit snacks, pop tarts, chips and gum. I move these items on a regular basis trying to hide them from him and he has some sort of junk food radar because he always finds him. Most of these "adventures" occur while I'm nursing Lucas. David asked me last night what I'm going to do. My suggestions were to bolt the chairs and bar stools to the floor and chain Matthew to Lucas's crib while I'm nursing. I've never had to fanatically child proof my house before. Jacob and Adam never got into things like Matthew does. It seems every time I turned my back Matthew has gotten into something that not only is he not suppose to have but I thought it was out of his reach or hidden. Twice last week he found the hidden diaper rash ointment and spread it all over his face, hair and shirt. This week he got a hold of the Vicks vapor rub and did the same thing. I obviously need better hiding places. That or I need a straight jacket. Probably two...one for Matthew and one for me.