Tuesday, January 14, 2025

Peter is 6!

It's time to celebrate, because Peter's Happy Birthday is finally here!

This little boy has been waiting long and hard for January 14th to arrive. I know how you feel Peter, I've been there. I remember after he was born, and then it was January 15th, and my brain had a little short circuit cause I'd never thought of life past the 14th! I just needed to survive until January 14th. I'm glad I did and that we've enjoyed 6 years of Peter since that blessed day when he joined our family. Peter has been an absolute joy, just like Katharine, and ever other baby and toddler I've given birth to.

He is a sweet and sensitive little soul. Happy 6th birthday Peter!
He came home from school and I wasn't here, I was bouldering, so he waited patiently, and Natalie bagged his presents, and then my mom came and then I came and he got to open presents from me, then we sang and sliced up the cake, and then he opened the gifts from my mom. She stayed and we visited for a bit while the kids all helped Peter make his lego sets. He is excited cause he has so many lego robots now: He got iron man on Saturday from Evan, and today he got Darth Vader from me, a Storm Trooper, and Spiderman from my mom. Pretty cool Pete! She came to the temple with me this morning at 5 am, woot! It was good. I took a short power nap from 8:30-9 am before I had a RS meeting, and then K watched Snow White (kind of a weird movie, there is no plot or character development. Is that giving us a peek into the culture of the 1930s?) And then we watched the BYU Devotional at 11am, and Melodie was part of the musical number! Neat! Katharine was excited to see Mel on the tv.
And then I gave K some green fingernails out of play-doh. She felt so fancy.

I bought some ice cream for Peter's b-day, and Katharine and I ate too much of it. I did a good deep clean of the side room tonight and have been thinking of how to rearrange music room, to make it a more useful space for our family. Last thing I did tonight was make the anniversary invitation for our family dinner party next month! Not bad. 

Should be fun. It's 8:30 and Melodie is here, she came up to say hi to Peter. Kids have had cake and ice cream for dinner tonight, and I think Natalie is down there making a protein shake now. Corey is still working but I'm gonna post this and go get kids ready for bed. :) 

Monday, January 13, 2025

FHE - Geneopardy

We played a game called Geneopardy for family home evening tonight. "What is a game that tests your knowledge of your family tree? If you think you know your family tree, try out our newest game." We did pretty good for it being our second time playing it since December 2019. I got one right because I knew that Mary Williamson birthday is the same as Daniel's. It inspired me to want to get to know more of my ancestors and my family tree. 

I was also inspired last Thursday at a New Year Relief Society activity and soup night. I made a tuscan potato soup tonight and I made soup yesterday too, a white bean and chicken rice soup. Yesterday my parents came over for dinner and enjoyed soup with us, and then we watched Monuments Men together. I'd never seen that and don't remember ever hearing about it, but it was pretty good. 

Yesterday and today I've been feeling a little off my drive, but I'm trying to give myself grace and be kind to myself (like we were told to do at the RS Activity). My lazy self is a little stronger at the moment, and that's ok. I've been kinda lazy and slow to get things going. Yesterday we had early  church again. Our new time is 9:30 and we did better at getting there this time. Then it was a lazy day at home. I did a good job making meals. We had hot dogs for lunch and the soup for dinner. One bad thing about me being interested in the meal I'm making is that I overeat. I overate Saturday (Irish roast potato and carrot soup) and yesterday and today. Need to sit down and coach myself and/or fast. I think I'm trying to avoid/escape something. Katharine and I have been taking it easy today. Abi took Sophi and Natalie to violin. Katharine has been dressed up as Snow White all day. 

She was still dressed in it tonight as she and Abi went to bed. Giving Abi a big hug.

Katharine loves her big sister and loves to go to bed with her "Abi". "I want my Abi". 

I'm glad that they have such a cute relationship!

Thursday, January 9, 2025

Joseph is 25!

Happy Birthday to Joseph! He's 25 years old. A quarter of a century down, 3 to go. Wes was able to call to wish J happy birthday. So that was the only time I talked to him today. K was sad, Wes was trying to get her to smile by making weird faces. 

K was totally mad at me since she woke up. She must have had a dream that I ate a granola bar cause she was yelling at me for taking her granola bar. Kinda funny. I invited Joseph to lunch and I'd venmo to cover his meal, but he and Eliza were going out. That's better than going out to eat with someone over the phone. He said he'd call later, but life probably got busy. I had a Relief Society activity tonight so I wasn't available this evening. He made this cute post on facebook and instagram that I'll borrow to highlight him today:
____________________________________

As of today my heart has been beating for 25 years! That means my heart has beat nearly 1 billion times and pumped about 20 million gallons of blood! But this past year there were SO many wonderful moments that filled my heart with joy, took my breath away, and made my heart skip a few beats. Here are a few of the happy, exciting, and life-changing memories from 2024 and my 25th year.

1. Went on a fun sledding date with a cute girl

2. Got accepted to medical school at The Ohio State University!

3. Proposed to the love of my life (see #1)

4. Graduated from BYU with a degree in Bioinformatics!

5. Visited my missionary home in Guatemala (again)

6. Went backpacking in the Sawtooth Mountains with the funnest family

7. Eliza and I were sealed for time and all eternity in the Meridian Idaho Temple!

8. Moved across the country to Columbus, OH

9. Saw some sloths and went zip lining in Costa Rica

10. Made some amazing new friends

11. Finished my first semester of medical school

12. Spent a lot of time in the Temple and in the scriptures

13. The best Christmas with my family in Florida

14. Eliza made me a delicious and colorful birthday dinner

15. Got some exciting news about a new addition to our family! Baby girl coming in June 2025!!! We can't wait to see all that the next 25 years will bring!

That pic above is Eliza's parents visiting them in Ohio. They arrived in the evening of Dec 31, the same day Joseph and Eliza arrived home after our family vacation in Florida. So, looks like 2024 was a great year for Joseph, and that he's had a good first 25 years and yeah, it just gets better from here!

So I was glad that he made that little post, cause it makes a good blog post for me to put here! Makes my job easier. I'd love it if all the kids kept blogs. I'm not sure how good they are doing at writing in journals, but typing is just faster and easier. Um, ok, other things from today! Corey and I went climbing at Ft. Union Momentum and that was fun, we did 8 top rope climbs! I've done 7 before, never 8, and they were hard too. We attempted a 5.11a at the end and kinda did it. Got home from climbing, then I took NODPK to the church to play while I was in my meeting. Talked about new year "intentions" and about being easier/kinder to ourselves about improving. They had 4 delicious pots of soup. I'm going to get stuff to make soup tomorrow. Yum. And big news: Peter lost his first tooth tonight! 

I noticed on Sunday that his new tooth was coming in behind this baby tooth, so I'd been putting a little bit of pressure on him the past few days to get this out. I'd wiggle it pretty hard via the tooth brush when we brushed teeth before bed. Get it to bleed once a day and call it good. But tonight we tried wrapping string around it, but it didn't hold. And he was all weepy and scared, but he layed down for me and held still and I was able to get it with tweezers. He was very brave! And he's glad that the ordeal is over. 

Wednesday, January 8, 2025

Basics

Owen got up for school today, then thought he was going to throw up, so he stayed home for a little bit. Corey put on some football highlights until he calmed down and then I took him to school late. I'm glad he's better. My cough seems to be a bit lingering but I think all of us are mostly healed. Today was a busy day. I planned Peter's party, he's having a friend party this Saturday. I did some Relief Society stuff, then I went over to help my mom a little bit today, trying to figure out how to "copy and paste" and change her password on a website. Then I helped put away a few Christmas things. I like these two Calvin and Hobbes comics on their wall - they are classics. 
I've been cleaning a little bit. Corey and I have three goals to do everyday: 
  • Stretch
  • Read the Book of Mormon
  • Clean in the Basement
Right now we're just aiming for these 3 basics and we'll just 5 min of each. We'll level up after we develop a habit of that. I've been thinking about habits. Like instead of setting goals of things to do whenever, just choose a time and have them become part of your daily habits and they will automatically get done. I think I'll try to finish Atomic Habits this year. I saw a couple of different people reading that book when we were waiting at the airport. Everyone's hoping to improve this year, and I'm one of them. Here's a silly pic of Katharine being weird today. She found a plastic sacrament cup that I had a stack of (left over from covid in 2020).

Silly girl. Reminded me of these pictures of Ethan playing with his wedding ring, haha

He can be so weird sometimes! Looking at that tooth reminds me that Peter has a loose tooth, his first. I was scrubbing it pretty hard just barely when we brushed his teeth before bed. Gotta get it out cause the new tooth is already visible behind it. 

Tuesday, January 7, 2025

Almost Back to School Routine

School is back in session, but we're not quite back to our regular routines. Owen stayed home sick yesterday and today. We watched a lot of Bluey. Mel and Hyrum were here yesterday and left today. Yesterday with Mel here I was able to sneak away for a bike ride. The snow is getting deeper. I only made it up to the coalpit area.

I made a snow angel.

Today I went to the temple at 5 am, then home for carpool. Hyrum left this morning for Idaho. He's such a pleasure to have around. He's my model citizen child,  cause he hearkens to all my silly advice and ideas. He took a bag of wheat and walnuts and raisins up to school! 

I told him if he eats wheat berries for breakfast and walnuts and raisins for lunch, his meals for the next 6 weeks are taken care of with just these three bags of food. Easy and cost effective! Not like all the hassle over food that we had to deal with in Florida and ever other vacation. Like how did the Jaredites live for 344 days in their boats? And we think we can barely survive week to week without going to Costco. There's gotta be an easier way. Anyway, those are some of my ideas which make me drag my feet over food expectations around here. Sometimes the kids act like they are the nobility of Downton Abbey, and after their little excursions playing croquet, there needs to be a fancy meal hot and ready for them on the lawn. 

So Hyrum left us this morning bright and early. Melodie left later this afternoon after sticking around for me to go climbing. 
Katharine was sad and said "I want Mel..." (I thought she was saying she wanted milk but looked a little too sad to just be talking about milk...)

Yes, little ones, I'm afraid it's back to just the 8 of us. Natalie's made a step up in her church class - she's in the young women's organization now! She was excited to get her temple recommend on Sunday, and tonight she went to the temple with Abi and Sophi.
She's all grown up and glad to be done with Primary and part of the Young Women now.
Snuggling during scriptures.

Beka came over and helped me clean tonight. She was a miracle worker again (saved me from my reality several times in 2023) And then we played a game of Great Dalmuti with Owen, Daniel, and Peter. Peter was coughing in her face for a bit. I'm hoping any germs from him aren't worse than what her husband is already exposed to as a jr. high school teacher? (Beka, I'm going to call you in a week to see if we got you sick...) Owen seems to finally be feeling better, so we'll plan on him going to school tomorrow. Maybe we'll almost be back to our school routine.

Friday, January 3, 2025

Football & Calendar

There is still no snow here, so if the sun it still up, you'll find Owen practicing football in the backyard. 

Corey got him a football stand to hold the football, which you can see in that video. It's the orange thing in front of him. But he's using a black thing instead - a plunger mute for his trumpet. I guess he likes how that works better? Hopefully it will still work when/if he ever needs it for trumpet. 

I'm sick with a headache and cough. This morning, after a hard night of coughing, I was still sleeping on the loveseat couch in our room with a rice bag on my head. I hear Owen walk up next to me. I squint open my eyes and see he is dressed in his football uniform and helmet. He didn't sleep in them, he just wakes up and gets ready like it's game day every day. "Mom, you forgot to put Peter's birthday on the calendar." That was how he said good morning to me. I replied "No I didn't. I wrote it down last night." "Oh!" and he happily left. I thought that was funny. 

Peter has been waiting for months for January to get here, so that he could see his birthday and now how many days are left until his birthday. So there is still a lot to unpack and clean, but putting up our January & February calendars was a priority. I got it done yesterday, except for writing down events, and then I walked away and left it on the ground, with scissors close by. And markers. And a few moments later, Natalie found me to tell me that K had written on the calendar. I went to see the damage, and the writing wasn't bad. I was worried she'd scribbled across the whole thing, but instead she carefully colored on a few of the dates. I can deal with that. 

I was able to cut out the numbers of the old calendar and glue them on. And I taped the cut at the bottom. Then I put it up on the wall to keep it away from her. Peter was sad I didn't put his birthday on, and so last night after scriptures, even though I didn't have colored markers to make it cute, I wrote his birthday, Joseph's birthday, and our anniversary on in pencil. I was lucky I put it on there before Owen called me out this morning! 

Corey and I did go climbing yesterday. He went to his dad's to work, and I drove out there in the evening and and we met up to do some top rope. After that, he headed back to his dad's to work, and I ran into Savers for a moment. I found a "Simple Abundance" book and got it for Mel, and gave it to her and told her we are going to do it together. :) Giving it another try and hoping I can keep with it. We did through Jan 3rd today and are going to check in with each other every Sunday. Mel and I also went for a short bike ride. I was coughing a lot last night and today my voice is scratchy. It felt better in the afternoon, well enough that I decided to brave the winter air. As soon as we were outside and breathing hard, it was killing my throat for the first 15 min. I was worried I was undoing any repair/healing that had taken place, but then it felt ok and I was able to breath hard and it didn't hurt. I hoping I'm on the mend. 

Wednesday, January 1, 2025

Travel Home From Florida

We are home from Florida. I fell on the ground after we arrived. I could have stayed longer, but I had to get K out of her carseat, so it was just a brief 20 seconds of exhausted relief. I'm very grateful to be back and be done with that. It was hard, but good. I'm feeling sick now. Have had a bit of a headache tonight.

Yesterday after we landed in Las Vegas, I thought that, with the hardest parts all successfully completed, we were on the down hill. Just needed to gather our luggage and head to St. George. We were at the back of the plane and so we were the last few people off the plane. We gave Mel and Hyrum the van keys and they ran ahead to get an Uber and go get the cars. We took our time walking to the baggage claim, thinking that would give Mel and Hyrum time. We found a play area for the kids and Corey stayed there as I went ahead with Lily to find a bathroom and then we went to get the luggage. We went to carousel 16, where the baggage screen said our luggage should be, but there was no sign of it. No one else was there waiting either. I looked around, walked around, was confused but didn't see anyone to ask for help. After 45 min of waiting, and another walked around, I finally noticed the Delta bagged help desk. I went over there, and hooray all of our luggage was there. It had been put on a different flight, and it arrived in Vegas before us since our flight out of Atlanta was delayed. So mystery solved, but it did put us another hour behind. Plus we forgot about the loss of an hour by returning from Pacific coast time to Mountain time. As we were finally getting our luggage, Corey came over and had poop all down the back of his shirt, from carrying K on his shoulders when she was poopy. We opened a luggage and found Hyrum's clothes. Corey put on one of H's shirts and we called it good. Lily got a smartcart and we began our balancing act.

Mel and Hyrum had been calling us and we'd been calling them, they had some trouble finding their way around, but we had been having trouble too, so it was all working out. I went to change K, didn't give her a new dress though, so she sat in a little bit messy clothes. We called Mel and H again and we figured out where they were and where to go meet them. As we got outside and when we were crossing the busy Las Vegas airport road with all it's New Years tourists around, our smart cart full of bins tipped and almost toppled over a Las Vegas lady goer who looked dressed for the occasion in a short skirt and very high black heels. Luckily all of our crap didn't totally knock her her over. Lily was guiding it, Corey was there with Lil and sincerely apologized to the lady, she was gracious about it, but that was embarrassing in front of everyone. So I thought we were on the home stretch, but we had to really top it off with that extra hour not being able to find the luggage, poop on Corey's clothes, and having everything fall over in the street. We took a deep breath, slowly kept walking and hallelujah we found Hyrum and got our stuff to the van. I took that car with Lily as my copilot and the 4 littlest kids and the majority of luggage while CAHSN went to find Mel in her car. Corey told me to go find a place to eat and they'd meet us there. I didn't want to go eat. I wanted to start our 2 hour drive out. I drove, Wes called, Joseph and Eliza told him their baby news, I wasn't in a good spot to take a call, maybe I'd be ok to just get pizza the kids could eat in the car if we could head out. On the phone with Corey's car, kids suggested going to golden Corral. I did a big vote no. We met up in a Dominos pizza parking lot, which was close to Smiths, and instead of pizza they all went into Smiths for some snacks for the drive tonight and cereal and milk for tomorrow. I waited in the car with these 4 who were asleep.

I sat there feeling tired and done and like I never wanted to travel ever again. Perhaps food will be good if it wakes these kids up though? I was feeling sad about the thought that they'd probably be all rested and wake up early in the morning and I'd still be exhausted. I hoped they would not wake up after we arrive in St. George? I guess it is midnight Florida time... so maybe they really are just exhausted too. We arrived in St. George after midnight. The guy at the front desk gave us a late check out time of noon, so that was comforting. We plopped the kids in bed and all fell asleep pretty quick, except Corey told me this morning that he wasn't able to fall asleep and didn't fall asleep until 3, he wasn't able to breathe. When he told me that I wasn't excited about driving again, but I was grateful to have gotten sufficient sleep. I was starting to feel like I was getting sick though - headache. The kids woke up this morning at 8, which wasn't too bad. I got them breakfast and we watched Bluey while Corey slept a little longer. I love Bluey. MHASODP left for home in the van at 11, I took a little power nap but didn't really fall asleep, and while I did that, K was playing with the room plunger. And she took my airpods and ripped the little ear tip. I was glad she didn't throw them in the toilet. She's really upping her game. 

The drive home was good. LNK were with us. I drove slower in Mel's car. It was a much better drive than last night. I'm grateful for daylight. I talked to Nicole, Corey researched Brandon Sanderson stuff as he talked with Lily, then turned his interest to research on the Boston Red Socks. 

I'm so glad to be home. We unpacked a little, mostly to start laundry. I'm sure I'll be on recovery for a few days. A few pics from the trip - K was the last one we woke up yesterday morning before we headed out to the airport. 

Oh I forgot to report on that travel day. Let's see. Joseph & Eliza and Ethan & Bella had earlier flights out, so they all left early. J&E dropped off E&B at the Ft. Lauderdale airport, then they drove to Miami. They had a direct flight back to Ohio, so that is good for them. I spent Monday night rearranging baggage, cause we were not going to have as much room in our cars on the way home as we did on our way here (cause we wouldn't have E&B and their extra room for people and luggage). So I packed the bins and the small suitcases, and then put the small suitcases in the medium suitcases and then put that in the big suitcases. It barely worked out and fit. We loaded up yesterday morning, headed out in time, I went straight to the rental car return, which was a mistake, cause then I had to walk with all the kids and luggage. Thankfully we didn't have bins, so it wasn't that bad. Corey didn't make that mistake, and he dropped off Mel with the kids in his car and the bins and luggage. They tagged the luggage while he returned his rental car and he was able to take the shuttle over with just him. Me and my shuttle goers were a little slower, but again, I was glad we didn't have the bins. 
Corey caught up, and we got bins all checked. 9 luggage and 2 carseats. 
That's where I was thinking the hardest part was over. And I guess it mostly was, but we still had hard things ahead in vegas. Kids liked riding the shuttle train to Terminal D.
We had some food to get us through. They took our jelly, mustard, and peanut butter at security, drat, so we just ate bread with meat and lettuce. I ate 3 heads of lettuce. We only used 1 of 6 heads of romaine during the week, so that was pretty optimistic of me to think we'd use them during our trip home, haha. But I did eat 3 of them, and they used 1 for their sandwiches. That was breakfast. I also ate two bell peppers. Flight to Atlanta was good. I watched Bluey with Katharine. Had a 4 hour layover in Atlanta. 

K wanted me to hold her the whole time. So Corey's been sick a good chunk of this trip, so I had to step up my game, and K was super needy and wanted me to hold her and ONLY me, so yeah, I have good reason to be exhausted. At the airport layover yesterday, kids ate candycanes, apricots, Corey did get some fries for NODPK. I opened a thing of gluten free wafers that I bought for Bella that we never used, and then this happened. That didn't happen with the dried apricots or prunes that we still had with us, lol. I finished my highlight of 2024 post. Mel and I decided to watch a movie together on the flight to Las Vegas. We watched The Fall Guy and it was so funny. I really really liked it, haha. Corey recommended it, so I watched it. Lily had recommended it months ago, but I thought she was talking about Free Guy and I wasn't interested. I still thought that was what it was, but when the movie started I realized it wasn't what I thought, so I didn't know what to expect and it was just all so new and fun and I watched some of it twice. Our flight was delayed departing AND they had to take a longer route because of whatever wind stuff, so that also added 30+ min I think. We ended it with a little more Bluey with Katharine. 

The Bluey episode "Rain" is soooo cute. I watched that several times. Ok, that's good enough for our travel log. SO glad to be home. Hyrum and Mel were helpful around here. They arrived home before us and when we arrived, they had unpacked the van AND Mel was vacuuming it out! Our poor van hasn't been cleaned for years. Thank you Melodie! She's a lifesaver. Our teens left to see friends that they've missed, and the boys have been busy playing with toys. They were especially surprised by the box of toys and costumes that was in the car from my sister Patrice. That's kept them busy.
K was happy to sit in her chair and watch princess movies. Corey and I were going to go climbing after we unpacked a little bit. I called to make sure they were open on New Years Day. I called at 5:40. The lady who answered said they were open, but that they closed in 20 minutes. Drat. We should have gone before we unpacked. Probably better this way, since I am feeling sick. We'll go tomorrow. When we were unpacking, I just happened to look at the clock at 4:28 (my bday) and I felt like that was God giving me a hug and telling me good job and that he loved me. We did it. We gave our kids a good experience, I didn't murmur out loud, and God watched over us on our flights and drives and we are back home. Thank you Lord.

Tuesday, December 31, 2024

Highlights of 2024

I am in the Atlanta Georgia Airport right now. We have a long layover (still 2+ hours before we board) on our trip back home after spending the holidays in Florida. Since I have free time (kids are all on screens) I thought I'd finish up this highlights of 2024 post. I began this post a few weeks ago and started by looking at our 2023 highlights from last year. When I saw our family photo taken in September 2023, I immediately thought "Shoot, we didn't get family pictures taken!!" but then my brain looked through some files and remembered "Oh duh, yes we did! We had two weddings!" 

Ethan and Bella's wedding in March above, and Joseph and Eliza's wedding in June below.
We didn't get individual shots, so I'll be sure to do that sometime in 2025, but a big family photo with coordinated colors take a lot of work, and that counts. Wow, we're at the end of 2024. This whole year is such a blur now... I'm glad that I do these recaps for myself. It's nice to take time to look back and remember that yes it was busy, but it was great. We did a lot of wonderful things together! Sometimes in the day to day rush of life, I think and feel like there's no time for anything - it's just carpool and lessons and dishes and dinner. OR we're busy with skiing, wedding trips or traveling (like right now) and Corey and I are both so busy and interrupted that we go a week without having a one on one conversation. Life takes 100% no matter your work or how many kids you have. My advice - write it down. Record it for yourself and for your family, cause soon it will be over and you won't remember what happened to your time. If you keep some highlights for yourself, I think you'll be impressed with all that you do. I'm glad I've still been able to mostly keep up with blogging here, even thought lots of it is mundane info. I like to have details to trigger memories for me and the kids (Hyrum and I were just talking about the stuffed animals that he and the older kids had in Costa Rica and he couldn't remember the name of his Webkinz gecko, but I found it on the blog - Ben!) But big or small stuff, it's the brick and mortar of your life story. Kids, I hope you are reading this - write in your journals! Today is NOT your final destination, but it could be a pivotal part of it! So write it down or you'll forget what happened on your journey. Ok, I'll get off my soapbox. As for our journey this year, yeah, two weddings, one missionary, lots of birthdays, and a few dozen more wonderful memories ~

March - Wedding dinner, Ethan & Bella est 2024, wedding photos, Ethan is 22, Abi in New York

May - Natalie won 2nd in a state debate competition, The Wride House: World PremierOwen trumpet recital, Daniel First Grade ProgramSkyline Super ReunionNatalie Young American AwardKatharine is 2


It's been a full year with many blessings. We look forward to the ways God will guide us along this new year, to help us learn and grow... er... thrive in 2025!! (haha, yeah, ya gotta make it rhyme!) :) 

Happy New Year!
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