Wes' Weekend

We had a really great visit with the kids tonight. The kids at home - not the college kids. After dinner, we just stayed around visiting and talking and it continued the rest of the night. The highlight for me was Wesley talking about how he's been putting the gospel to the test a little bit more - he's tried to go to the temple, he's been reading his scriptures and praying more consistently, and today he was up and about doing lots of church stuff: after preparing and serving the sacrament in our ward's sacrament meeting, he went on to go be in a discussion panel for two other wards in their ward conference (he's on the Stake Youth Commitee) and they talked about the new For The Strength of Youth pamphlet and answered questions, some of which would have never been brought up back when I used to be in YW (one example that one of the youth in our stake asked: If I'm a girl and I kiss a girl, am I going to hell? Wesley helped answer that one (No, but you should go talk to your bishop)). He also got back late last night from being a 11th wheel to a school dance (There were 5 couples and Wes) and he said he had so much fun and danced with more girls than the guys, cause at the dance, the guys all get together in a circle and dance and the girls did the same, and Wes was like "forget that" and went to the girls group and was just being super brave and putting himself out there. As Debbie W. said today in Relief Society as we discussed the Doctrine of Belonging: "Sometimes all it takes in 20 seconds of courage."

Anyway, so Wes had so much fun there, and he got home sometime after 2 am (we went to bed but he told us in the morning) cause they were watching Cars 2. "That movie is hilarious! It was so funny! But it was 1 am..." and then he was depressed around 2, true to sleep deprivation form. (See one of the quotes here) So Wes had come back early from St. George with his aunt and cousins so that he could get to hockey practice at 10:15. He said that he did an amazing shot and scored on a 3 players vs. 2 coaches drill, and his coach was amazed "WES! Have you been practicing?!?!" He said yeah even though he really hasn't been practicing hockey much, but he has been putting the gospel to the test and he said that is the only thing he's really been doing differently. His coach also said "Whatever you're doing, keep doing it!" and Wesley sent Corey this pic to share how he felt:

Anyway, it was so great talking to him tonight and he shared some of the things he's been feeling and learning with his younger siblings during scriptures. It was really fun. My heart was full of gratitude. We also talked about dating with Wes and Abi, and some of the things their older siblings have learned so far from their dating experiences. Abi said "I'm so glad that we have older siblings so that we don't mess up like they did". Ha. I'm sure you'll mess up in whole new ways. We all mess up and that's how we learn.

After we got home, I put my hand in ice water as I looked at a cold photo and a warm photo for Sophi's science fair project. Gotta love science. I could have gone all night, but I stopped after 2 and a half minutes and easily won the family endurance challenge.

I did a good on Sophi's hair for church! The youtube algorithm gives me a lot of hair videos, I usually share them with Mel, this is one I tried on Mel that didn't work great, but today on Sophi I did good and it was so pretty. 

Owen had a baptism preview. He's going to be baptized in August. Pretty exciting. These kids keep growing up. Nice bow tie, Owen! He's a sweet and innocent little kid. He tries hard to be good and is doing a great job following Jesus.

Owen accidentally broke an ornament on my wood board thingy (2nd to last pic). It was a new one I just got this past Christmas to represent Peter and his love for dinosaurs, especially brachiosaurus's. This is an ornament like "Tiny". It had a fragile glass body and resin feet and head. Well, lately Owen's been playing with a ball throwing it up the stairs. I told him not to, cause might hit the glass ornaments. He did after church today, and I tried to glue it back together. It didn't all line up perfectly, but pretty good. There's a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in.

The kids haven't been keeping up Katharine's Instagram - they're following my example of being behind. I did a little post with these pics I took - It's never too early to begin dental hygiene! 

(But if it could be too early, "before teeth" might qualify.) Katharine is flossing her gums. And with the wrong side of the floss pick.

Such a silly baby. She's soft and warm and smooth and squishy and little and fun, babies are perfectly made to be irresistible.

Melodie is 22!

Happy Birthday to Melodie! It was fun having her here to celebrate her special day. We toyed around a bit with the idea of going swimming, but when it was 11 and we still hadn't decided, we figured it was a bit late to get in a full day, so we're saving it for another time. So we decided to go out to lunch. Corey stayed home with the boys, Katharine joined us. Her sweet little baby face!

We went to Bandits. I like Bandits. I got my usual Farmer's Harvest Salad with shrimp. Mel got that too. Good stuff. 

They brought Katharine a high chair - Katharine killed time by tasting the chair. 

She also tried slapping the table to call the waiter to serve us. That didn't work, so then she played with the little black papers from around our napkins. She found that to be pretty entertaining.

Mel and I were both just adoring her the whole time. Babies are so beautiful. It's so fun. Mel adoring Katharine again this evening after she got her to sleep in a chair in the front room.

Mel was painting her fingernails! Haha, Katharine holding the little nail file - so fun. She's our favorite!

So, my mom didn't come by today, and that was ok - she thought Mel was down at school. But I didn't get a cake, cause I kinda don't like cake, and Mel didn't mind cause we had already had a nice meal together. But the little kids said we needed cake. Daniel took matters into his own hands with some playdoh. Presenting Mel's birthday cake!

We sang Melodie a song - 

And she posed with the cake - 

Daniel was so pleased with himself and that his cake offering was so graciously received. 

And Melodie was getting a big kick out of  it. Such a sad little cake!

Sorry Mel, I guess I could have/should have gotten you a birthday dessert. 

Happy Birthday Mel! I think taking college kids out to eat for their birthday might be a good "gift". Corey already got Joseph something for his birthday (a bike rack) so we'll let him have that as a gift but then it might just be dinner date gifts. Corey also wants Joseph to forgive us/never mention again that we gave him our old piano as a birthday present. ...that was my fault. We were ready to get rid of it, he said he'd like it, then I said "hey, can that count as your b-day present?" so that was tacky, and he's never let us forget it. But honestly, we do and have done so much for them anyway, do we really "owe" them a gift every year? We don't expect or demand anything from them, we're still raising 8 more kids at home... go easy on us. We're hoping to have enough money to retire someday! Ok, we'll Mel, thanks for being so chill and mellow for us, we appreciate it! You're the best.

Henna and Cute K

Wesley brought back some Henna stuff from India. He's been making art on his siblings. Little boys like little boy designs - 

It's a great way to get them to all hold still and be quiet - they are still during the procedure so Wes can draw, and we tell them to stay still after so it can dry. Peter with spiderman on his chest and a dinosaur on his arm.

Daniel wanted a dinosaur too. Wes is a good artist.

Corey said that this trip to India that Wes just had was all fun and some work, but not the work that the adults put in who are helping out the kids. So in that way this was good but was different than what an LDS mission experience would be. Wes was enjoying free oj that someone else did most of the work for - someone else did the work planning and organizing and even paying for - Wes trip was mostly paid for by the money Hyrum earned before his trip got cancelled in 2020 with covid. So, Corey wanted Wes to learn that "In life, you want to make sure that the juice is worth the squeeze" by having Wes make some fresh orange juice.

It took 4 oranges to get Corey an 8 oz cup of juice. Usually it's us parents that do all the squeeze in life, so this was a nice way to have Wes do a little bit of the work. It's nice having him back home! He said he doesn't need anything for Christmas! "We already have so much..." "The girls there didn't have anything, yet they were so sweet and so happy, you don't need stuff to be happy" Yay, mission accomplished. I agree. Happiness doesn't come from things. It comes from gratitude for what we do have - for our relationships and for the beautiful things in this world, like cute babies! 

Haha, lately, Katharine has been cracking us up with her overactive tongue. Little video of her here. This morning she got a little taste of Wesley's oranges, she likes it!

Silly baby.

Natalie and Sophi were watching Katharine this morning while I was climbing at Momentum. I went yesterday by myself and got my first flapper (ripped off callous). I went with Lily this morning before school and I was able to climb carefully with a bandaid, and I super glued it back on. When I came in, I saw her up on Natalie's head with Sophi keeping the Cocomelon video in front of Katharine's face. "Natalie, don't carry her like that!" "It's ok mom! I've never dropped her!" 

They make me nervous! Katharine also always make me laugh when she puts her binky in upside down. 

Well find her in her supersaucer like this - 

So silly! 

Katharine practicing piano - She's our favorite.

And a cute little smile. 

She's our favorite. A few other things from today - I made a "Oh What Fun It Is To Wride" banner that I put in the kitchen - one piece of our party prep (before the cookie exchange on Saturday). And Lily had her Christmas concert at school. 

Autumn Activities

We're all doing well here. It's been the usual busy life with kids having music lessons, practicing, homework, etc. Other activites too - yesterday Sophi and Natalie went to a Trunk or Treat with a friend.  Dressed as Candy Corn and Cleaopatra. 

And P as a dinosaur. Corey and Wes are having fun in Boston, and as for us, I've actually gone and cleaned up in the basement a little bit, so that's been good. AND I cleaned the kids shower, which was super bad. So I've done cleaning, but also playing with the kids too - Peter and I colored dinosaurs and sharks - 

Here are the kids walking to the kindergarten bus yesterday - Daniel rollerblading and Peter riding his "dinosaur bike ride"

And no blog post would be complete without cute pictures of Katharine... 

That was from yesterday morning, Natalie should have been getting dressed and ready for school, but instead she was getting Katharine dressed. She just can't help playing with her doll! Katharine in a little snow jumper thing that also I got for her yesterday, in addition to the three Halloween costumes... And today they dressed her in another winter outfit I got (like I said, I might already be spoiling her like a grandma!) 

Look at you sitting up!!

I sent that pic above to Corey, and he texted back asking "Is she always that happy and smiley?" I replied "Almost always!" followed by this pic of her that I just took of her being impatient for food. 

So I guess she's not perfect all the time, but even when she's crying, we all just think it's adorable and we laugh at her. (and jokingly quote Lotso Bear "Don't be such a BABY!!!") Another pic of her adorable face! 

We love how she sucks on her lower lip. That is so cute when babies do that. And we also laughed at her when she fell asleep sticking out her tongue - haha!

Yeah, we pretty much love everything about this little girl.

Last Caterpillar

Well, we're down to our last caterpillar...

(cause all the rest are already in their chrysalides) I took that pic above an hour ago - now I'm ready to head to bed, but this guy will be changing any minute now. I've been in here collecting milkweed seeds from the pods I've collected as I listened to this Hello Saints guy be interviewed. I found his channel thanks to the YouTube algorithm. I like it. As I listened, I called and let the kids know "It's your last chance to see a caterpillar molt!" but no one came. I didn't push it. 

We've all seen it before, but I still find it amazing though! ...and a little stressful... I haven't had any of them fall, but it seems, to me, like hanging upside down by your toes and shedding off your skin is a bit of a risky position to be in... I'm amazed that they just happen to have a little velcro peg (cremaster) that had grown inside their body and comes out of their abdomen to grab onto the silk pad to catch them from falling to certain death in their soft and vulnerable state. Pretty amazing programming code that went into these little creatures. Just the luck of evolution? That would be pretty amazing luck indeed, but I don't buy it. There is a Creator and Grand Designer behind all the amazing things in this world - from snowflakes to rainbows, fall colors to caterpillars, not to mention the amazing human body that comes in the package of beautiful babies! 

I spent part of the evening reclaiming the laundry room desk. I moved the caterpillars inside on Wednesday cause the wind was crazy. It was blowing over empty garbage bins in the street, so these guys would have been goners. So I put them back in the laundry room on Wednesday and they've been in there... I have kept the window open. It's not too cold outside, but hopefully they're still getting cues from mother nature that it's time to migrate, even though I have them inside. I recently ordered some official monarch supplies - floral tubes for the milkweed and a peg rack to hold them, and a large cage. 

It's been working very well. I have a plastic thing to catch the frass, but the cake lid from Natalie's birthday is still in there too and I'll be keeping that in storage for next year. I've been putting things away...

What will I do with my time now that monarch season is almost over? Haha, I'll start to catch up on the house that I've been neglecting since July. We'll have a few days of releasing butterflies over the next 2 weeks, but now all the hard work is done. We will enjoy a few more weeks of biking in the lovely fall weather. The elementary kids didn't have school today, cause of PTCs yesterday, so it was a teacher work day. So after I took Lily to jazz band, I came home and Corey and I went out for a ride up the canyon. When we came around a corner and I saw the mountain, I about fell off my bike - 

I yelled "WOW!!! Look at that!" and anyone seeing me might have though I was seeing a comet or UFO. No, it was just the AMAZING fall colors on the mountain. HOLY COW it was amazing. 

It invigorated my soul and put wind in my sails - I was ready for the last few hills and their tricky rocks. Corey was ahead of me. I was thinking that if I followed his line, I might make it over any tricky spots. Psyching myself up I said "Show me where to go!" His simple reply - "UP." "Noooo..." Up up and up the mountain. Up the hill, over the obstacles. Work work work. It's a bumpy ride, but we can do it. “The road ahead will always be bumpy, but the destination will be serene and secure. So, fasten your seat belt, hang on through the bumps, and do what’s right, and your rewards will be eternal.” - President Nelson. I'm sure there will also be beautiful picturesque moments along the way - 

I passed some rock obstacles that I hadn't gotten over before. Yay, I'm improving! I made it all the way up to the top of Lisa Falls. Can you see the ruins behind us?

It's a beautiful world. It was a great way to start the day. Carpool, a bit of cleaning, K had a 4 month well visit and I also finally went to get a few copies of her birth certificate. Date night tonight at Blue Lemon, I got my usual (Mediterranean salad with shrimp and dressing on the side). We are so excited for this weekend - it's General Conference! Time to nourish our souls with hours of hearing the uplifting messages and the word of God, so excited, goodnight!