Two Pictures

Two pictures from yesterday - Abi let Natalie do her hair and make up.

It was a contest. Natalie dressed up Abi, and Sophi dressed up Lily. Then they brought around their works of art for all of us to judge and cast our vote.

I asked if we were voting for the best "worst" or the best pretty. It was for the best pretty. I said my vote was for Lily. Abi knew what to expect, so she was okay to lose. She liked having Natalie do her, she liked the "freaky" look. And a picture of sweet Peter dozing off as I held him this evening.

He's so pretty.

Spring Break for Older Kids

The older kids have had spring break/end of term last weekend. It allowed Ethan time to sleep in for his birthday, and other than sleep in, the kids haven't done much. The spring breaks for the two districts our kids are in did not coincide (little girls are out all next week) so we didn't do and aren't doing anything. I guess we could have/should have done something, but oh well. Mel did a good job catching up on homework. She mostly worked on her AP art projects.

That pic is from last Friday, but she looked like this most of Monday and Tuesday as well, just in the day time too. Hyrum and Wesley have looked like this for a good chunk of their spring break -

Playing Battlefront on the Xbox. (That pic taken on 3/23) I took the kids to the park last Saturday. We walked there. As soon as we got there, Owen and Natalie both needed to go to the bathroom. I had no place to take them, and they didn't want to go home, so they held it for over an hour. I was impressed. 

Daniel was dressed in a frog costume. He's cute and hey, it kept him warm.

I walked laps around the kiddie track and almost got in 3 miles! 

Ethan has been in China for the three days off of school, plus three days in school and will be gone all next week. Luckily since it is the beginning of the term he will have plenty of time to catch up on the work he's missed. I took him to the airport at 3 am on Sunday.

He was like slap happy tired - their music producer Caleb told them to just not go to sleep so that they wouldn't miss it. He was free and loose with information, like I've heard that people are when they're drunk. He confessed to me that he and his friends went on the round about by the Draper Temple for over TEN MINUTES. Ethan was driving. They stopped when his friend was positive he was going to throw up, and because suddenly the gas indicated they had 0 miles until empty. So they left. As they left, they were on their way out, they saw a police car speeding up the hill, probably on his way to arrest Ethan and his friends had they still been there. He said he learned his lesson with that close call and that they won't do it again. This boy...

Have fun in China, Eth!

He will be back on April 3rd at like 10 pm. We haven't heard much from him this week except a few texts, we're hoping he's having a good time and trust that we shall see pictures when he gets back.

Pretty Little Face

Have we mentioned yet that Peter is the cutest little man on the planet?

Look at that little face!

Yeah, we probably take too many pictures of him, but we're coming up on prime baby time - he's almost 3 months! 2 - 3 months = still tiny and little, but also chubby and a bit less fragile than a newborn, with the bonus of interactive smiles and coos and lovely baby smells

Look at those big beautiful eyes!

And last pic the best of all the game! Peter!

He's getting so chubby, look at that squishy little arm! It is so fun, I love it. I was showing these pictures to the girls tonight before scriptures, and we were all oo-ing and aw-ing and how adorable he was, and Hyrum teased "Aww, let's look at the pictures of Peter because he's not here right now..." You're right Hyrum! Why are we looking at pictures of him when he's right here with us and we can actually look at HIM! So we looked, and we squealed and ooh'd and aww'd again -

Mel was holding him and said "Let me see!!!" (the new picture we just took) -

"AAWWW!!" she said. He's pretty adorable, in pictures and in real life. If only he would stop growing! Cause soon all we are going to have is these pictures to remember our baby Peter.

Neverland & Tea Parties

Lily led out on a game of Peter Pan tonight - they were pretty creative with the costumes

Lily was Peter Pan, complete with a little plastic flute to play her Pan song. Sophia was Wendy, Natalie was a cute Tinkerbell (I liked her hair bun) and Daniel was Captain Hook, with a black witch hat finishing off the look. They broke the top off of a plastic hanger to be his hook. I guess Owen was just a lost boy!

I admired their creativity, but I also was mad, cause I was almost getting brave enough to throw out some of those costumes! I have been telling myself that they "never" use them, and then they had to go and use them! We have so many costumes and so much toy/kid junk in general but I really want to simplify, drat, how do I let go of these things when we still have kids coming up the line? Now I have to start over with my mental prep. I really want to tidy up. Not sure how I'm ever going to be able to do it though. Sigh. I did like seeing them play, and I'm very glad the warmer weather is coming little by little (supposed to snow tomorrow).

They have also played Tea Party/Restaurant for a few days. First on Friday night, Lily set up this restaurant for her sisters. It was in an inconvenient and highly trafficked small space, the narrow entryway between the kitchen and the front room/stairs.

I asked if they could move it further into the kitchen, but they didn't want to, so whatever. She filled up one little glass thing with sugar and the other one with cocoa powder so that they could make hot cocoa. I told her that isn't how it works, but whatever. (I find myself frustrated and saying whatever a lot these days)

I wish I could relax, or I wish I would play along or help them in their game... instead I get flustered when don't clean up after themselves until I nag and follow up several times, and after that I still find myself needing to take some deep breaths when I step in sugar granules all over the floor...

Then I found these pictures on my phone of them having a tea party again on Sunday, this time in the front room (where they are not supposed to have food) 

They broke one small glass cup, not a big deal I guess. I mean why do I have these things if we don't use them? Cause if we use them, we'll break them, so I buy them cause I want to use them and make memories, but then I never have/make the time to do it, so they do it on their own, and I should be happy they're carrying on with their creativity without me. But I'm feeling just grumpy all the time. I did a little bit of googling last night on postpartum depression. I don't know if I have it bad, but I do believe my hormones are out of whack and I don't feel like myself. I feel off balance, but trust it will improve be as my body continues to adjust to caring for Peter or that it will be better in a few months as he is older and less physically demanding on me. I should probably find some time to sit and enjoy a small quiet cup of cocoa and be still.

Funtopia

Corey took the kids to Funtopia tonight (with our Get Out pass) for our FHE activity. This was the first time there for our family - they were all impressed! Corey took 117 pictures and videos... what shall we share? Let's see if I can find some highlights - Owen and Daniel trying to climb a fortress wall... Looks like Daniel fell

Trying to get the hang of hanging... he's saying "I got this!" 

Daniel is ready for greater challenges! Let me climb that wall! 

You sure you're ready to take that on? It seems your big sisters are struggling with it - little fire fighter Natalie needs some rescuing herself...

On a different wall - it's a good thing they are always saved with their harnesses 

Sophi climbing up the "funwall"

She looked like a real Sydney Bristow spy climbing in her black clothes -

Lily jumping across sky scrapers! 

Abi was climbing a wall when Corey pushed a button that made all the supports collapse, it gave her a good scare and Corey a good laugh

The kids and Corey give Funtopia two thumbs up, they had a good time.

La Manzana del Templo

Tonight we went with our new friends to Temple Square.

They came over to our house on Friday and we were going to try to get together again, but they will need to spend tomorrow and Tuesday looking for an apartment (they can only stay in their current home until April 1st) So then we asked if they wanted to get together tonight, and we were glad they took us up on it. It was great to be there together and to be able to share things about the Church of Jesus Christ with them. We had two lovely sister missionaries, one from Argentina and the other from Brazil, give us a tour.

The older kids (Mel, Hyrum, and Wes) all expressed frustration and wished they spoke Spanish so that they could have understood what we were talking about, since we did speak in Spanish most of the time. We started in the North Visitors Center, then the Tabernacle, and then the Assembly Hall.

The kids were a bit crazy in the vistors center and when we were outside - they were all running around playing tag or something, but they sat quietly when there were benches.

I think Diego and Iveth learned some new things and had some questions answered, but they mostly probably just left with lots of new questions. They are just the cutest family though, we love them! The missionaries asked us how long we've known each other. "Um, like a week? Yeah, 8 days!" They said it seems like we've been friends a long time, and I feel like we know them really well and we just click. It's been fun. We went by their house at 7 so they could follow us to temple square, but Diego didn't get back from work until 7:30, so we got there a little bit later than we planned. It closes at 9 and when it was time to leave there was still so much more to see, so we're going to have to go back again to show them the South Visitors center and the Conference Center. They might come for General Conference, which would be amazing! We'll see!

Ethan is 17!

Happy Birthday Ethan! Today is the first day of his spring break/end of the term, so he had a break from school, which was a nice gift from the school district. He still had Crescent rehearsal though - they're leaving on Sunday for their tour to China! When he got home, we sang Happy Birthday to him.

We had ice cream for him yesterday too - my mom had brought by his gift early cause she knew he'd be gone Friday at Crescent. One funny thing as I scooped out ice cream - I put it in sugar cones that my mom had brought over, and the ice cream was a little sticky in the scoop, so the cones weren't that big, but kids were anxious to be served, so I just hurried and passed out small cones. I gave Ethan his cone, and he took it with a sad face and said "They ask too much, and give too little..." which is a quote from the movie 17 Miracles, where the members of the handcart were starving and receiving their small ration of food for the day. It made me laugh. Hyrum continued the movie quote as he said "We're grown men!! Look at these portions!!!" I thought it was really funny. So they got a good laugh out of me yesterday with that. Tonight we all got a good laugh from watching Daniel, who thought the cake was for him.

Ethan's birthday cake request was strawberry short cake with cookies and cream ice cream.

Being the nice big brother he is, Ethan let D try to blow out the candles.

Our big and little Ethan (aka Daniel who is pretty close to being Ethan's clone)

Cute boys, they grow up so fast.

Daniel was a little worried when we started to cut it up, like when we broke his big hershey's kiss... "Hey, that's my cake!"

But we let him have one of the first slices, and then he was cool with it. Today was a fun day because our friends from Leon came over. Iveth and I talked about children, music, getting in shape, and diet... you know, all the girl topics. The kids played. It was fun to hear Hyrum speaking Spanish to the boys as he tried to explain how to play Go For It. I was there to help him translate. Hyrum kept forgetting the word for "buy" - comprar.

The older boy is Diego Emilio, he goes by either name. He's 7 I think. Asis is dressed in the frog costume.

The little girls had been playing with the strawberry shortcake dolls and left a mess in their wake.

Their little girl is Maria. She's super cute.

And we think Owen has a crush on her.

He calls her "Ria" but we're going to try to teach him the West Side Story song so he can sing to her one day and proclaim his love.

One of the funniest moments of the day was when they were all outside in the front yard playing in the street. Hyrum was hitting a tennis ball up the street with a tennis racket. The kids ran up the street to get it. Owen was already half way up the street when Hyrum hit it. Maria was close to Hyrum, and Daniel was in between. Hyrum hits a ball and they all go running. Maria quickly passes Daniel and is catching up to Owen fast, despite the fact that he booking it as hard as he can. She totally beat him, it was so funny. Hyrum was like "Owen!? You had a solid lead!! What happened??"

We decided he let her win, cause he's a gentleman.

But he had to make it look like he was trying.

I picked them up around 11 this morning and they stayed all day until Diego got off of work at 9:30. They joined us for dinner and cake - Iveth and I dishing out cake and ice cream

The kids all played while Corey and I went out for date night. They are a really cute family. Her kids are on spring break like my older kids, and we're going to try and get together again before they all are back in school.