Haley's Birthday

Okay, so we're going way back to the beginning of March for Haley's birthday. Am I really 2 months behind in posting? Wow!

This first picture is the only one I got from her friend birthday party. There was one other little girl there too who didn't want to be in the picture. Notice how there's really only 3 friends and then Chloie and Britton. I really tried to keep it simple and easy, but it still wasn't. It was still crazy and stressful the whole time. At least Haley had a blast.


All the rest of the pictures are from the family party we had at my mom's.

With some of her presents
Her cake
On a nature walk. I just thought these pics were so cute.

With Chloie and Lizzy
I am just so in love with this little girl! She is so much fun.

A bit of randomness

It's been forever since I have blogged and the longer it goes, the more stressed out I get about going back and posting about everything. So, I'll just do it little by little. But, today will just be a random post.

The latest thing our family has been enjoying is going to Classic Skating. A couple weeks ago, Britton's school had a free family night there, so I took the kids. I was a little nervous about being there myself with two kids when none of us are very good on rollerblades. But, when I got there, it was so different than I had pictured. They also allow scooters and strollers on the rink, so it can really be a whole family affair. So, I rented a scooter for Haley and she was off! Britton is a natural on rollerblades, so it just took a little warming up and he was good. The whole night was such a blast! So much so, that this Monday we went again but this time with Jason, too. Haley brought her own scooter and the rest of us rollerbladed. By the end of the night, Britton has trying all kinds of tricks--jumps, spins, etc. I was amazed. He is so funny to watch because he's really fearless and pretty much clueless to anyone else around him so there are always some near misses of him just plowing people over. He also gets so excited about the different little games they play on the rink--the dice game, wipeout, and blackout. It's fun to see him having so much fun and getting so much energy out. I really can't believe that we had never been there before.

Doing things like that always reminds me about what good ages my kids are at right now. I think sometimes I forget that we're not toting around babies and toddlers anymore. And things are so much easier and more enjoyable. I really need to take advantage of that this summer and do tons of fun things. They are at such a fun age and they are capable of doing everything for themselves. Nice.

Jason has been really busy with work lately (which is really good) and it doesn't seem to slow down at all. We have been so blessed since he started his business that I need to sit back and express my gratitude. He's been working so hard and I'm really proud of him.

I really cannot wait for summer! I am so excited to just be able to play with my kids all day everyday. We've really missed Britton a lot this year while he's at school. Speaking of which, I am so proud of how Britton is doing in school. He's come a long way since the beginning of the year. He loves school now and is always saying how fun it is. The other day he was even laughing and joking about how nervous he was on the first few days of school. I am so glad about this because it really is hard on a mom having to send your kid somewhere for the majority of the day when you know they aren't comfortable with it.

I just finished a book called "Stick Figure" by Lori Gottlieb about a young girl's experience with anorexia. I loved it and it was a very insightful look into the mind of a struggling 11 year old. I hope I don't forget some of the things I felt from it about parenting and loving our kids exactly the way they are. And it really made me miss all of my great students from Center for Change. Oh how I loved that job.

Well, I really will go back and post all about all of my pictures because we have been doing lots of really fun things. But, I'll just end this post with something Haley said yesterday. I walked in the room and she said, "Mom, I love you. Do you know why? Because you're so nice to me when I say 'Can we make brownies?' you always say yes" And then she gave me a huge hug and a kiss. I'm glad she's so easily pleased. :)

Turbo Jam Mornings

Almost everyday, I go to my friend's house who has a dance studio and we do aerobics together--Turbo Jam. It is so much fun. It's a great workout and it's great to have friends who make me commit to working out. I love that I am able to do it, but I feel bad that Haley has to sit there and entertain herself while we're exercising. She's actually really good about it, but I know it's not her favorite thing. We've gotten it down to a pretty good routine. She usually brings her breakfast and some dolls or stuffed animals and her Barbie laptop. Sometimes she exercises with us, sometimes she falls asleep on the floor, sometimes she watches tv in the other room. The one thing I can count on though is the interruptions. She loves to make me stop so I can help her go to the bathroom. Or change the channel on the tv. Or tell me a secret. And I definitely don't love the interruptions.

Yesterday as we were exercising, she beckoned me over toward the doorway. I opened the screen door and she told me this:
Her: Knock, Knock
Me: Who's there?
Her: Haley
Me: Haley Who?
Her: Haley Loves You!

It was incredibly cute and put a smile on my face! What a sweet girl I have.

Giving Myself to My Kids

It seems like lately I haven't been very good at giving my kids the attention that they need. I've noticed that a lot of times I put them off to do "my" things around the house. Which means that they end up watching too much tv or playing too many video games or getting into fights with each other. I think that it's probably natural that as kids get older, there is less one-on-one time with the parents. But, I don't want it to be that way. I really want to focus on playing with them more.

Yesterday, we went to the Provo Library for bedtime stories. I'm a pretty consistent attender of the daytime story time, but I've never gone to any of the nighttime events. The kids wore their pajamas and we all really enjoyed the story tellers. It was fun to watch them singing and dancing and laughing so hard at all the jokes. It really was a fun time and I'm glad that we made the effort to go.

Today after school, I didn't want to fall into our normal afternoon routine of me cooking and cleaning and them playing or watching tv. So, I suggested that we go find a park that we've never been to before. I purposely didn't bring a book or anything else for me to work on while they played so that I could just enjoy participating in their play. We picked Exchange Park which is actually quite close to our house, but kind of hidden back in a neighborhood so we've never been there. It is right next to the Provo river, so we started off by throwing rocks in the river. Then we played on the playground, swinging, doing underdogs and spiders. Next, we played freeze tag. Britton and I both were very impressed by how fast Haley is. I had no idea. She really was good at getting away from Britton. We visited the river again for a bit and then found a secret hideout. I won't disclose where it is because it's a secret. We formed a club and decided that we needed to go back there every week for meetings. We built a club symbol out of sticks and pinecones and we're hoping it's still there when we go back. Britton made up a secret handshake and I made up a secret chant. It was so much fun and I can't wait until we make it back there.

When we got home, the kids helped me make dinner. We made pizza. We made a huge mess while rolling out the dough and making different shapes. Britton was covered in flour. But it was so much fun seeing him throw the dough up like the pros. It was good to just laugh and play.

It's sad to me that I have to keep learning the same lessons over and over again. We are all so much happier when I just make a little extra effort to give myself to my kids. It's not hard at all and the rewards are infinite.

Today Haley did something cute and I said, "Haley, do you know how adorable you are?" And she answered, "Yeah, I'm FOREVER adorable!"

The Tooth Fairy Visits!

Britton lost his first tooth Friday night! It was so exciting! That thing has been loose for weeks now. He was so surprised when it popped out and didn't even hurt him.
I was trying to get a picture of his toothlessness and Haley just HAD to be in the picture too. You can't even see his bottom teeth, so you can't see the gap, but it's a cute picture anyway. (Haley did her own hair)

In this one, you can see the gap better. I think he was more than happy to exchange a tooth for some money. What a great deal.

Britton also taught himself to climb the tree in our front yard. I think it's appropriate that his shirt has a monkey on it because he really is our little monkey. He sat out there for quite some time on Saturday. At one point I came out to check on him and he was still just sitting up there in the tree. I said, "Britton, you're just hanging out in the tree?" and he answered, "No, I'm hanging out WITH the tree!" Too cute.

Disneyland--FINALLY!!

So, I'm finally getting around to posting about our Disneyland trip. We left Feb. 28 at night and drove down to St. George. We stayed the night with Jason's brother, John, and his family. It's so nice to have them down there. It's always fun to see them. We went to church with them Sunday morning, then continued on our way. We stopped in Las Vegas to eat and meet up with one of Jason's old mission companions. Then we kept on driving. The drive seriously was not bad at all by breaking it up in St. George. Our kids were great. Good thing we have a DVD player, a PSP, Haley's Barbie laptop, and all the other things to keep them occupied in the car. What did people do on road trips before all these neat inventions? Oh yeah, they actually talked!!! :) Just kidding, there was plenty of talking for us as well.

We stayed at the Super 8 Motel in Anaheim. Definitely not the nicest place around, but it was within walking distance to Disneyland, had free internet (except Jason brought the CHinese power cord for our laptop, so we were out of luck as far as that goes), had a swimming pool, and most importantly it was just down the street from the WorldMark where my sisters were staying. My kids love jumping on the beds in hotels and I always let them. Where else are there two beds right next to each other to do tricks on?
.

We went to Disneyland for 4 days--Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. If we were to do it over, we would go Wednesday instead of Friday because we had hardly any lines until Friday. But, Friday was Haley's birthday and we wanted her to get all the perks from that. But, more on that later.

I won't go into details about every little thing we did. I'll just say that I love Disneyland! Britton's favorite rides were: Thunder Mountain Railroad, Splash Mountain, and Pirates of the Caribbean. Haley's favorite: The carousels and pretty much anything in Fantasy Land, and Soarin over California. My favorites are still Space Mountain and California Screamin. I'm totally a roller coaster girl, but I do enjoy just about everything. I was way impressed by how they changed up the submarine ride to be a Nemo ride--good move. And I loved the new Toy Story Mania--so much fun. I loved how uncrowded it was the whole time we were there and I also loved spending 4 days, so that we could just take it easy and enjoy everything. I didn't love how much we had to pay for food everyday, seriously, $6 for a corndog? Anyway, I guess you expect that though. Haley got to spend her birthday there and the promotion for the year is that you get in free on your birthday. Since we already had passes, she got a $60 gift card to spend in the park. She loved her "credit card". She also had a pin that she wore that said it was her birthday, so everywhere we went everyone would say, " Happy Birthday, Princess!" She loved it! She is the perfect age for that kind of attention. She was beaming the whole day. She picked out some really fun princess toys and then bought a light saber for Britton to build (always thinking of her brother). It was such a fun day and a great way to end a fun vacation week.

Waiting for the Bug's Life show
My cute family
Adorable
More bug eyes!
Not sure what this is :)
Another carousel!

Indiana Jones



Gotta love the face I'm making! I was leaning forward because Dylan and Destry wanted me to so that you could see them in the picture. So, I just end up looking weird. Oh well, they look cute! You can barely see Britton back there behind Dylan.


I think the carousels must be the easiest thing to take pictures on because I have about a hundred of them. That's really not all we did, I promise!

Britton!
Haley!
Dylan, Destry, Haley, Britton




Britton wiggling his loose tooth. He really wanted it to fall out at Disneyland, but no such luck.
Biz, Dar, and Ethan
Me and Haley on Small World
Seriously, more carousel pics?

Buzz
Thunder Mountain Railroad--Haley's first (and last) time on that one
Getting Aladdin's autograph

Waiting while people went on Indiana Jones--Haley was too short


Wednesday we took a break from Disneyland and drove to the beach. Our GPS took us the LONG way there and both my kids threw up in the car. Nice! It was raining and I was beginning to question our decision. But, when we finally arrived at the beach, the sun was out and the rain was gone. My kids love the beach and didn't even care that it was cold! They got in anyway and spent tons of time playing in the sand. They buried each other, collected seashells and seaweed, built sandcastles, and jumped the waves. I really hope we're able to have a beach house one day. When we got back, we went swimming and sat in the hot tub and then met up with my sisters for dinner. It was a fun day and a nice little break from Disneyland.

Good Friends

Our good friends, Sara and Allen, stopped by when they were in town last weekend. It was a quick visit, but it's always good to see them. We hope to be able to go visit them in Boise this summer.
Eden on the horse

Sorry this picture is blurry, Haley took it.
Eden moved right as I snapped this picture.

Britton, Davis, and new baby Tyler. Of course Britton was in love with Tyler. I love the expression on both the big boy's faces. So tender.

Pictures Found on My Camera

I love some of the things I find on my camera.

Today

Today was filled with:
*car cleaning
*shopping
*errand running
*snacking
*hide and seeking
*classroom helping
*park playing
*chuck e. cheesing
*AI results show watching
*Guess Who playing
*kid goal setting
*laughing
What a great day!
*

Haley Today

This morning started out pretty rough. Haley was in a mood. She was whiney and tantrumy and I wasn't in the mood to give in and neither was she. She was definitely trying to see if I would back down. Anyway, it was a difficult morning, but once we got through it, we had a great day.

Two funny things she said today.

Haley: Mom, can I watch a movie?
Me: Can I read you a book instead?
Haley: No, that's WAY too wild.

I had to laugh at that one. Since when is reading considered a "wild" activity?


Then, later we were cleaning up some blocks and I was singing and dancing as I put them away. She quickly said, " Mom, stop that right now, it's flustering me out."

What!?!