Happy New Year!

I have totally slacked on my blog, but in order to do a quick post, I am putting my short Christmas letter/picture on here. I hope you are all doing great, and let's hope for an even better 2010!


Christmas 2009
Dear Family and Friends,

Whew! We got these in the mail before Christmas….. whether you got them or not is out of my hands~~ As you can see, we have 4 kids now, and Kory and I are missing from the picture. That’s ok, you would just be saying, “Oh, they are looking old and tired!” or “What’s up with that hair-do?” or “Hmm, putting on a little weight I see…” We are in no condition to be photographed… it’s a bit chaotic around here with 4 kids. We’re still trying to figure out how our parents had 3 times as many as us and survived! But our kids are cute, regardless of the hurried photography… Emily is 7 ¾ and super sweet! Gavin is 3 ¾ and very boyish! Matthew is 4 months and slobbering and smiling! Karissa is 10 ½ and tweeny! Even though we are crazy and not as organized and cool as we would like to be, we wanted to wish you all a very Merry Christmas! We hope your holiday season is full of happiness and hope! Even though life is busy, we think of you often and wish for a day when we can play again! Keep in touch!

Find Val online on facebook, or our un-updated blog at http://valmanac.blogspot.com or email us at valmem@q.com or kormem@q.com .

MY BABY!!!!

We have a baby! He has a name! Meet Matthew Nash Memmott, who finally decided to meet us on Sunday, August 16th at 6:40 am. He weighed 8 lbs 1 oz, and was 20 inches long.


Here he is at 1 minute old!


Proud Daddy!


Grandma C with her newest grandbaby. My Mom rushed over at 2:30 in the morning when my water broke and watched my kids. Thanks Mama!


I have 4 kids!? G-ma brought them to the hospital to meet their new baby brother.


Gavin holding Matthew... as G would say, "My baby brother finally popped out!"


Emily loves holding her new baby brother... and binkies are so cute, huh?


Ma-choo and Karissa checking each other out.... too cute! (He is very sneezy, so if you sneeze with an M in front of it, that is his nickname!)


He loves to hold his own hair....


Bath time! But check out that cute chin! You can call it a dimple, or a cleft, or a bagel, or a froot loop, or a John Travolta chin, I don't care. Just DON'T call it a bum chin, I will feel bad~


My 3 boys!!!!


I love the back of his round head and all his dark, black hair. Hopefully it doesn't fall out too quickly!


School started 3 days before Matt was born. Here is Karissa on the 1st day of 5th grade! All grown up and looking good, babe!


Here's Emily on her 1st day of 2nd grade. I must say, she is looking adorable!


And now, it is time to nap! Goodnight!

Antsy

Ok. Today would be a great day to have a baby. My legs are shaved. My toenails are painted. Sorry to make you see my fantastic leg, only slightly swollen today. Yah, yah, I know, my due date isn't for 17 more days. I promised myself I wouldn't get my hopes up of going early... I never go early. But I really want to go early! I have big babies. I think he's had plenty of time to bake. I'm baking.



This is my view looking down at the floor today. Notice I don't have any feet? Or a chest for that matter. It was fun for the little while my chest was actually bigger than my stomach for once. Not so anymore.


Do I have to wear clothes? I'm hot. Everything is too tight. All I want to wear is this maroon slip that I've had since I was 14. The elastic is gone, so it isn't tight at all, and it's light and cool feeling. My poor kids are sick of me running around in a slip with my belly hanging out. Don't show up at my door unannounced......


Come on baby-without-a-name! You can show up any time now! I think it's part of the plan for prego women to get so dang uncomfortable that we don't care how scary labor is, we just want to be done. Well, I'm done. Please!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sanity Break & 4 weeks left!

We took a much need sanity break last month. I ran away from my real life and responsibilities here in St. George, and went up north to visit family and get out of the heat for 3 weeks! Unfortunately, I wasn't the best at pulling out the camera... but here's a little of what we did:

Kory's Mom turned 69, and here is Kory roasting his Mom. They had a surprise birthday party up in the canyon. Despite the rain, it was very nice! We stayed at G-ma Memmott's house a few nights, Kory went back home, and the kids and I went to Ben and Nadja's for 3 nights.

Here's Gavin riding Ty's big bike with training wheels! Too much fun! Thanks for sharing Ty! When we got home, we went and got training wheels for Emily's old bike and now Gavin has one of his own to cruise around on. Don't tell him it has sparkly jewels and diamonds on it. He could care less!

Ben and Nadja introduced us to Guitar Hero, and boy was it fun! We'll have to invest in this one soon. Here's Ben showing us his guitar skills, while Karissa plays drums.

Emily rocking out on the guitar.. it was hilarious how they would get into it!

Karissa on guitar, Gavin on drums, and Emily on the foot pedal to help G out a little. We had a blast, the kids are still singing "Eye of the Tiger" constantly, and begging for this game... We had a great time with these Campbells, and are so grateful for their hospitality!!

Next we went out to Grantsville to spend a few nights at Debbie and Matt's house and then on to the Becketts. We went swimming, to the park, movie watching, playing games, eating fresh peas from the garden (so yummy! my kids are huge fans!) and all sorts of fun stuff. Deb also cut all of our hair! My favorite hair-lady ever! Here are the girls with their new do's with bangs!

Emily

Karissa

A little explanation on the mallet above, and video link below... Deb had lots of baby grasshoppers at her house, and was paying the kids a nickle per one they killed. Karissa is holding a mallet covered in guts.. gross! Click on the video below of Gavin getting them with the mallet. It was the funniest and gaggiest thing ever! You can hear poor Deb gagging in the background, and my pregnant lady laugh. Ugh, I even SOUND like I've gained weight! Anyway, you can see G chasing some poor g-hoppers around...if its not too fuzzy of a video..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5-A4GOO6xQ&layer_token=dcec2f86cadc81f6

Here's Jaden and my kids playing in a smoke bomb...


The Becketts took Karissa to the David Osmond concert one night. She had such a blast and a great night out with cousins! Thanks guys! P.S I stole this pic from you, Allie!

Next we moved on to Tiffany and Mike's house for a few nights..

Karissa with baby Blake~ My girls loved holding him!

Emily with Blakey boy~ I know I am going to have lots of help with our new baby from my big girls!

We had lots of fun hanging out with Tif and fam, but I felt awful that Gavin and Braiden did not get along... Grrrr to Gav, for hitting Braiden with a rake (at least it was plastic?) and all the other beatings he dished out. We ate delicious BBQ, and went to Sugarhouse park to feed the ducks and play in the water. The little boys loved throwing rocks in the river, and thankfully not at each other! Tif was so sweet to me, and even though she had her own new baby, I felt like she was taking care of me the whole time! After Tif's, Kory came back up and we all went to Burley, Idaho to visit the Popes over the 4th of July.

This is the kids at a parade....This was our first 4th of July away from St. George since we moved there in 2001, and it was so nice to be able to go outside and celebrate without roasting to death! We actually went to a parade!!! The Ruuds also came up and celebrated the holiday with us. Burley had a fantastic fireworks show, and it was so fun to actually need to wear a jacket!! I loved it!

The boys went golfing, the girls hung out, the kids swam and played, we hiked at the City of Rocks, learned a new game - Wacky Six, and we had a great time hanging out in Idaho! Thanks Popes!

We went back to SL and stayed with Tif again. We took the kids to Lagoon and wore ourselves out fantastically! Lucky Tif got a double dose of the Memmotts.. I owe you big time!

I just really want to thank all of my family we stayed with and visited on this trip. All of you spoiled me rotten, took care of us, put up with us, fed us fantastically and gave me a much needed break to be able to come home and deal with the heat and get ready for this baby to come. Thanks so so so so much!!! And of course, I missed all the rest of my family that I wasn't able to visit on this trip.... next time, huh?


Here's Gav with a fun tool/work bench that our sweet neighbors passed on to him... too cute!

Kory had a birthday, shout hurray! 39 and looking fine! Next year we'll have to plan a big old birthday bash~


Here I am with 4 weeks left. Same shirt as the post below, with a little saturation added to make it look like I'm in space!!! (I do look a bit like a planet...)I really can't wait to have this boy baby.. I am so uncomfortable and hot, I can't walk, I can't sleep.. all normal, I know, but this old body of mine is wimping out! Oh, and speaking of old, I have a billion gray hairs shining right now. I was going to dye it, so I wouldn't be a new mother that got mistaken for the grandmother, but my Dr. said it's best to be safe since they don't know for sure how hair dye affects the baby, it's not actually good for it, so why not wait another month. Darn. But the countdown is on!!!! Still need a name though...

Bye bye truck, hello undies!

Kory sold his much-loved 1987 4-runner a couple weeks ago... He's had this since we were 1st married (12 years!) and finally decided to part with it. It started out as silver, got a new paint job, lift and tires a few years later, and now is no longer part of our family. Now we just need to get something to replace it that gets good gas mileage, has AC and can go faster than 55 mph on the freeway!!


Potty-training success! Here is my Superman-Football player on the pot...he's a pro! And yes, this is a normal outfit for my little guy!


Here he is showing off all his stickers from his potty-charts and wearing his potty seat for a hat. Yippee! We're out of diapers, for a few months at least!


Alright, here is the belly shot. And that's all it is, a belly. Because I am too vain to post the pic with my head attached. Thanks, Tif for the cute clothes!!! I've got 10 more weeks to go, and so we better think of a name for this boy soon, huh?

A little, er, maybe big catch-up....

(Ok, let's see if I remember how to blog anymore...) Well, I am going to play catch-up on the last few months... I was going to try to put these pics in order, but that was taking too long, so this will just be a smlattering of info....


Here are Karissa and Emily on the last day of school. Look a little familiar? They wanted to wear the same outfits that they wore on the first day of school...clever, huh? Notice they are looking a little sleepy. By this last week of school, bedtime was out the window, and we were lucky to get to school on time!

Here is Karissa in her 50's Kitty skirt for her last Sunset Express performance (a singing group). It was an awesome program, and she did look quite darling, I must say!


We did have birthdays this year! Gavin turned 3 in February,

Emily turned 7 in March,

and, Karissa turned 10 in May!

Thanks to Aunt Tiffany for making cupcake cones for Karissa's party! Here she is with Gavin and Kody looking cute as ever!

Braiden and Gav were good little buddies, when Gavin wasn't being a bully, that is. Tif and her boys came down for a couple weeks. We loved having her here, and getting to meet her new baby, Blake! She also brought me much needed maternity clothes...and cute ones at that! I felt much younger and cuter the last few weeks of school! Thanks Tif, we loved having you here!

Emily loved holding her new cousin, Blakey Boy!


Karissa was Artemis in a Greek mythology play at school and did a fantastic job! Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for coming to watch it!

This is my favorite story of the year. I went to the grocery store with Gavin, came home and brought in some groceries, then went to the bathroom... I forgot about the rest of the groceries, until I hear Gavin yell, "Mom, I brought in the watermelon for you!" I said, "How did you get it in the house?" G-"I rolled it!" V-"How did you get it out of the van?" G- " I pushed it out!" V-"Did it break?" G- " No, but some juice came out, so I licked it off the floor, and it was yummy!" So I come in the kitchen, and sure enough, there is my smiling Gavin next to the watermelon, with a split in it and juice on the floor! He was so proud and so cute, I only wished I had video taped that watermelon's trip into the house. I am surprised it didn't splat on the way out of the van! I looked at the receipt to see how much it weighed...17 pounds! Pretty good for a 3 year old!

We went to Moab over spring break in March with the Popes. It was a blast! Here is a picture of the boys....


and here is a picture of the girls! Briana had tons of great pics and stories from the trip on her blog if you want better details!!!!

Emily was a cute Cat in the Hat for Dr. Suess week...


Emily reading to Gavin... I love this happy picture!

Some of you want to see prego pics of me.. Well, this is the only one I found in the last couple of months.... see you get to see my chubby chin!


We went on a fabulous hike over Memorial weekend to Kanarraville Slot Canyon. Next time you come visit, we'll have to take you there! I couldn't walk for 3 days after, but it was awesome!


Kory was always leading the way on the hike, until Karissa took over for about 2 minutes. Suddenly she screamed, "SNAKE!" and this is what we found in the trail ahead...freaky! We had to go home and look it up to see what kind it was, and learned this rhyme..."If red touches black, you're OK, Jack. If red touches yellow, you're a dead fellow" to see if it was poisonous or not. Luckily this one was ok, but I still wouldn't want to pick it up!!

And, this is what Gavin thinks of potty-training. He'd much rather wear the undies on his head... Oh, I really hate potty training!!!

Ok, that's a quick catch-up for now. Now that I've retired from my job, I plan on doing this more again! Now, on to check out your blogs and see what you've been up to!