Tricks

This week we have been learning new tricks and doing things we love to do.  First, another structure fire page went out.  Unfortunately, this time it was for a home in Ivins.     

The Ivins Fire Department called for back up so St. George City came out to help.  Russell went out to help with them. Because St. George was just there to backup, they mostly did the recovery tent and filled SCBAs.  This was okay with Russell because he loves doing the medical side of it and it was good for him to re-learn how to fill the air tanks.

Here are a couple of pictures of Russell working the fire.  He is the one in the blue shirt with the fire vest on.  I took these pictures off of the St. George News website.  Russell said he had fun on this fire.  It seems like there have been a lot of fires lately.  I guess it makes up for having nothing for the past few months.

Emily and Colby are always teaching Logan some new trick.  This is the latest trick Logan is doing:

He likes to stand on his head!  I really think he is trying to stand up by himself but can't quite figure out how yet.  Logan is so cute when he does this.  Any time we say "Tricky!" he does his little head standing trick and then smiles so big.  

Thursday Emily's school friend, Brinley, came over to play after preschool.  Emily loves it when Brinley comes over.  They have a blast playing together.  Colby loves playing with them too as you can see:

The kids played on the swing set, drew masterpieces in sidewalk chalk, and even made dirt cookies.  Then we had a picnic lunch outside on our little picnic table.  They had so much fun they didn't want to go home.  Brinley's birthday is on Wednesday this week and Emily is so excited to go.

This Sunday was our Ward Conference.  We had a great meeting and were able to hear from the Stake President and the Stake Primary President did sharing time for us.  On Thursday, we were able to do visits with the stake and we visited some of the less active families.  All of the visits went great and it was nice to meet these less active kids and share a message with them and invite them to Primary.  This week at church, we had 5 less active kids come to Primary!  I was so happy.  It really makes me want to do better and get out and visit the kids more often.

As I am sitting here typing this post, Logan is sitting on the floor beside me entertaining himself.  This is what he has been doing:

Yes he has been coloring all over himself with a pen!!  Now he is all blue!  What a silly kid.  As you can tell he loves getting his picture take.  Anytime I bring the camera out he smiles really big and says "Cheese!"  He also loves to beep people's noses.  He will grab your nose and yell "Beep!"  It is funny.  This age is my favorite.

Freezer Meals

This week has been kind of crazy busy for me.  Really it is my own fault.  I did it to myself.  So our fridge and cupboards have been very bare this last couple of weeks because I did not want to go to the grocery store.  I really don't like grocery shopping because I hate spending all that money.  My process of grocery shopping really takes me a week which is probably another reason why I hate doing it.  First, I make a menu of a month's worth of meal.  This consists of going through my recipes for new meals or old favorites.  This takes a day.  Next I make a shopping list.  I go back through the recipes/meals I have selected and write down the ingredients I need to buy at the store.  I also go through the house and see what else we need from the store like soap, shampoo, toothpaste, etc.  Then I go through the sale ads from the various grocery stores to see if anything I need is on sale.  If it is, I write it down because Wal-Mart will price match anything.  Then I go through my coupons to get the ones I need.  (By this point I am almost burned out so more often than not, the coupons get forgotten.)  These steps take another day.  Finally, with my game plan or shopping list in hand, it is time to go to the store.  This involves the most work of all because at the store, I have to wrestle three kids, and a cart full of food.  Yeah not fun.  One of these days I will get smart and leave the kids home, but on the other hand, the kids help me save money.  Yeah weird I know but when I don't have the kids, I take my time and browse the clearance racks or look at clothes or fabric and tend to buy more.  When I have the kids I try really hard to just get in, get what we need, and get out as fast as I can which still usually takes two hours!  Someday I will be faster.  Finally after wanting to pull my hair out and vowing to never go shopping with kids again, we make it to the check out counter and then out of the store.   Then it is time to put all the food away which takes another hour.  Long sob story short, grocery shopping takes me a week which is why I only do it once a month.

So anyway the reason I tell you this is not to have you feel sorry for me but to let you know why this week has been crazy.  After our Relief Society Super Saturday last week, I have been thinking more about food storage and budgeting so that is how I planned our menu for this month.  I have also wanted to simplify my life (yeah this week is a bad example but...) so I have jumped on the band wagon of freezer meals.  What you do is you take one day and you cook for the whole month then you freeze the meals until you are ready to eat them.  That is what I did on Thursday.  I cooked and prepared meals ALL. DAY. LONG.....  But, I have 25 meals in my freezer ready to eat!!   

 Here are the fruits (or veggies and meats!) of my labors!!!  Twenty-five freezer meals that all I have to do is dump them in the crock pot on the day I want to cook them and voila! Dinner.  Many, in fact probably all, of these meals are big enough for leftovers the next day. So really I have 50 meals here!  The nice thing about these meals is that they all consist of real vegetables, meats and spices so they are healthy too.  Easy and healthy are definitely things I like.

 After cooking and preparing all day, this is what my kitchen looked like. Yeah like a tornado went through right!  I took me another hour to clean up and Russell graciously offered to mop for me.  (Okay I told him to, but he did it willingly.  How nice!)

 So despite the work and mess, I think it was totally worth it because now our freezer is full of good, healthy, and easy meals for the next month or more.  I really think this will simplify my life because I won't have to rush and put something together for dinner, or spend hours cooking at night.  All I have to do is put the food in the crock pot at lunch time and then forget about it until dinner time.  I also think this will help our food budget because these meal will last for a while and I won't have to go to the store and buy as much food.  I'll just need to buy the stables like milk, eggs, bananas, and bread.

So after being cooped up all day on Thursday, we just wanted to play on Friday.  The weather was so amazing outside we didn't even need a jacket so I kicked the kids outside and let them play for hours.

I even let Logan just go outside and roam.  He loved it.  He just crawled around in the grass and dirt and followed Emily and Colby everywhere.  He was so filthy afterward but he didn't care and neither did I.  (Besides that, it was laundry day so I just threw his clothes in the wash.)  I had to shared these pictures of Logan at our gate because it looks like he is in jail or something.  Behind him, Emily and Colby were having a blast on their scooters.  They love riding those things and are getting pretty good.

Saturday was also a gorgeous day so we went for a walk around the neighborhood and then up to the church to set up chairs for Primary the next day.  We had a blast.

This week we also started babysitting my co-worker's little baby.  It has been really fun to have a new baby around again.  The kids love baby Boston and are so excited when he comes and sad when he leaves.  Every time his mom knocks on our door to drop him off, Emily and Colby scream "The baby is here!!"  When his dad picked him up, Colby asked if the baby could stay.  I don't really know what Logan thinks about Boston.  He doesn't really like it when I hold the baby because I think he gets kind of jealous.  But then when I put the baby down, Logan is all excited about him.  He crawls right over to the baby saying "Bebe. Bebe." and wants to see him, touch him, and play with him.  I literally have to keep Logan away from the baby because Logan just goes crazy with excitement.  Baby Boston is only 3 weeks old and so small.  I can't believe how big Logan got overnight  when we started watching the baby.  This really has been a blessing for our family too and the extra money we earn will help us with our financial goals this year.  

Well there is our week.  We hope all of you are doing well too.

Basketball, Fire, and Princesses

We have had an eventful week!  We started the fun off on Tuesday.  After Emily's music class on Tuesday, we headed over to Snow Canyon High School to see Jacee play basketball.  Jacee is on Pine View High School's freshman girls basketball team.

We have enjoyed going to Jacee's games and watching her play.  This game was one of her away games but they still played really well and were able to win the game 35-28 (or so...).  

Our next adventure was actually Russell's adventure.  Wednesday morning Russell called me at work telling me there was a big structure fire in town and he needed to go to it.  He brought Logan and Colby over to me on his way to the fire.  I left work in time to pick Emily up from school.  Russell went on to fight the fire.

The fire was at the USU Extension building in the middle of town.  They believe the fire started by a ventilation fan in the bathroom.  Because the building had been remodeled so many times the fire was able to hide in the attic and roof so it was difficult to fight.  By the time the fire was out, the building was a total loss as well as all of the materials inside.  Luckily no one was hurt.  Russell said it was fun to fight a real fire.  

I got these pictures off of Fox 13 News and The Spectrum websites.  I also got the video off of the Spectrum website.  You can see Russell in the video at about 0:30 pulling hose up the stairs behind the USU guy being interviewed.  

Our neighbor, Mikell Terry, had her gall bladder taken out on Monday so to help her out, we took her son, Cayson, to and from school on Thursday.  He is in Emily's preschool class.  After preschool, we were going to the library story time so we took Cayson with us too.

During story time, they learned about playing in the mud and getting dirty so for their activity they got to play in "mud" (or chocolate pudding).  Emily and Cayson had fun making a mess but Colby did not want to get dirty.  He is so funny.  When we took Cayson home, he did not want to go; he wanted to stay and play with us.  Mikell said Cayson had been so bored the last few days because she cannot get up or do anything because of her surgery.  She was so happy that we were able to take him to the library and let him have some fun.  It was fun to have him around that day and be able to do some small service to our friends.

Finally, Saturday was a busy day for us.  Our Relief Society had a Super Saturday on being prepared.  We learned how to budget, and use a pressure cooker.  I was so glad I went;  I learned so much.  I have a new goal now, I am going to start pressure cooking and canning!  The lady that taught the class said I can even pressure can venison so I just might do that with the deer meat Russell got this year.  The lady also gave us a couple of recipes for soups and chili beans and my mom and I are going to try it soon.  After the Super Saturday, Emily's friend, Rylie, had her birthday party.

Emily had a great time at the Princess birthday party.  They made crowns, had a pinata, and ate cupcakes and ice cream.  Emily was most excited because there were real princess there!  Two girls in our ward, Mckayla and Savannah Lees, dressed up as Merida from Brave and Ariel from the Little Mermaid.  Emily loved seeing them dressed up.  Each of the girls invited to the party came dressed up as their favorite princess.  Emily wanted to go as Ariel because she wanted to use her new Ariel dress/tail.  She was concerned though that she didn't have a shell bra.  I drew up some shells and cut them out of purple felt and sewed them into an easy shell bra.  Emily loved it.  It was a fun party.

Well that is our fun week.  There is never a dull moment in our family. There is always something going on and we like it that way.

11 Months

I can't believe my baby is 11 months old!  Logan is growing up too fast!  He is the cutest and funniest baby ever too.  Here are his 11 month old pictures:

Logan has gotten so active over the last month!  At the beginning of December, he was just army crawling and I could really just leave him with toys and be fine.  Well not anymore!  Within about a week or so he became very mobile.  He started crawling, pulling himself up to stand, cruising around the furniture, and just getting into everything!  He even started climbing!  I was getting Colby dressed after a bath and I looked over and Logan was climbing into the bathtub!  He had pulled himself up and had one leg up almost over the edge of the tub.  I had to hurry and grab him.  It was so funny.  Logan also gets into everything.  He has found the pots and pans and the Tupperware drawer in the kitchen and he pulls everything out of there multiple times a day.  He is a stinker!  

This is a common sight everyday.  Logan likes to climb up my legs to get me to pick him up.  He will also hold unto my legs and go for walks.  He likes to walk with his pushing walking toy too.  Logan just might be our engineer in the family.  He likes to study things and take things apart and put them back together.  He likes to put things inside other things too.  It is fun to watch him learn.

Logan is also getting his two top front teeth in.  If you look close in the picture below, you can see them.

Logan loves to brush his teeth at night.  He gets really mad is you take away his toothbrush before he is done with it.

Here are our three little knot heads:

Logan loves his brother and sister and tries to do everything they do.  The other night Logan even started wrestling Colby!  Logan has learned many "good" things from his older siblings.  One cute thing is how he puts up his little thumb and pointer finger in the shape of a gun and says "Bang!"  Logan has started saying a few words like, mama, daddy, sissy, blankie, eat, bye-bye, and hi.  He also likes playing with cars and will ever make 'vroom vroom' noises while he drives them around.

Kids are so fun.

Welcome 2014

Wow another year has come and gone.  2013 was a good year.  The best thing that happened in 2013 was welcoming Logan into our family.  Life has been very eventful, hectic, stressful, and all in all fun adjusting to three kids this year.  We even broke down and bought a mini-van!!!  Ahhhh!  We have enjoyed every minute and learned so much from the trials and blessings.  We don't have any major plans ahead of us for 2014 but I am sure we well make some as time goes on.  

Russell will be going back to school this year.  He starts tomorrow!  He has decided to go the RN route this time and I am all for it too.  He needs to take a few pre-requisites like Physiology, Anatomy, and Micro-Biology before he can apply for the program.  Don't those classes sound so exciting?  This will mean more studying and less playing and I will need to entertain the kids more so he can study.  Russell has to get A's in all of those classes to get in the program.  Good Luck Russell.  So that is one of Russell's goals for the year.

The goal I have for Emily is to progress in reading and start learning math.  The goal I have for Colby is to teach him to write his name, and help him learn the alphabet.  He know most of the sounds of the letters but has a hard time with the names of the letters.  The goal I have for Logan is to learn to walk, and get potty train by the end of the year.  Then no more diapers!  

Finally, the goal I have for myself is to be more spiritually minded, less stressed, and happier.  Now I know these are really abstract and you can't really measure them but I do have some goals to help out with that.  First, I am going to start reading my scriptures everyday and finish the Book of Mormon by the end of the year if not sooner.  I have really struggled with this in the past and I really need to make reading scriptures a habit and priority in my life.  I know it will help me with my main goals.  Second, to help me be less stressed, I am not going to procrastinate and get things done when they need to get done.  For example, have my sharing time lessons prepared by Wednesday, keep a schedule and write down when things need to get done, and clean up messes when I see them rather than putting it off until later.  The first place I am going to start is with this blog.  It seemed like last year I would get so behind on blogging that it would take me forever to get up to date and I was posting a month or so at a time a month later.  This year we have 9:00 church so I will have more time to do things on Sunday.  I have decided to blog every Sunday about the past week.  This way I will stay current and remember more things.  So this is the first Sunday of the month and the first post so I am right on track with my goals this year. Yeah!

For New Year's Eve, our friends, the White's, invited us over for games.  The Olsen's also came over and we had a fun night.  Anna White was so prepared. She had activities for the kids to do each hour until 10 o'clock.  They drew pictures, used play doh to make faces or numbers or letters, decorated party hats, and finally watched a movie at 10. For snacks the Olsen's brought chips and black beans and humus that was to die for, and I brought crackers and cheese ball and some amazing gingerbread/molasses cookies that were gone in nothing flat. We ate so well! During the movie, the adults were able to hang out and play games without interruption of kids.  We had a blast playing Chase Phrase and a new game Bret and Lori Olsen taught us called "Bang!"  It is a western/cowboy card game that you have secret identities like outlaw, renegade, sheriff, and deputy.  Everyone knows who the sheriff is but you don't know anyone else.  Through a series of card plays, the sheriff and deputy try to get rid of the outlaws and renegades, the outlaw tries to get rid of the sheriff and deputy, and the renegade tries to get rid of everyone.  It was a pretty fun game and one I would like to play again now that I know the rules and how to play.  I was the sheriff and Russell was the renegade.  The funny thing about the game was that because it was based on cowboys and Westerns, in order to get a life back you played a beer card or if you wanted more than one life back, you played a whiskey card.  So we joked the whole night about needing a beer or "oh man I need a whiskey!"  It was funny.  The movie and the game ended around midnight so we grabbed some noisemakers and went outside to ring in the new year.  The Gough's (the funnest family in our ward and my saintly Sunbeam teacher) were lighting fireworks so we walked down the street to watch.  After about two fireworks, our bodies were frozen so we went back to the White's to warm up.  We called it a night and headed home, we had a really fun time.

Yesterday, we had our annual Meet Your Teacher Breakfast for the Primary.  It was a lot of fun and we had a great turn out.  In fact there were more kids than I expected which is awesome.  We served pancakes and hash browns and boy can those kids eat!  I also introduced this year's primary theme "Families are Forever."  I am excited for this year's theme.  

For Sharing Time today, the lesson was "I am a Child of God and can be like Him someday."  I did something out of the ordinary for my lesson.  I dressed up like a princess with my old city royalty tiara and prom dress I wore in college.  I came into the room all dressed up and all of the kids were silent!  I explained that I had a special message from my Father.  I explained that my Father was a mighty king that lived in Heaven.  I told them that my Father was very powerful and created the earth and He created all of them too.  I explained that He was their Father too.  I went on to explain that they were a Child of God and I bore testimony that I knew that was true.  I told them that the special message from my Father was that they were a child of God and that He loved them so much and that they could be like Him some day and that if we are obedient, we can return to live with Him someday.  It was a very powerful sharing time and I was so amazed at how well the kids listen.  I truly love these kids I serve and I hope they all remember this lesson and remember that they are a Child of God.

As I was preparing this lesson, I didn't really know if I should dress up because I didn't really know if it was appropriate.  I finally decided to go for it and after seeing how well it got the kids attention and at how well they listened, I am glad I did it.  When I got out my prom dress to see if it still fit, I was happy that it did and was walking around the house.  Emily of course was ecstatic!  She loved the dress and didn't want me to take it off.  Colby, on the other hand, was so mad!  He asked me where I got that dress and why I was wearing it.  I told him I was a princess going to the ball.  He said, "No I don't want you to be a princess and go to the ball. Take the dress off!"  I laughed and said, "Well if you don't want me to be a princess, what do you want me to be?"  He said, " I just want you to be a mom!"  I couldn't stop laughing but I did take the dress off.  What a funny little boy.

So now we are just chilling after church.  I love 9:00 church.    This is a picture of what Russell is doing today.  He was eating a blue candy cane and made it into vampire fangs.  What a weirdo but we love him.  He got a good laugh out of the kids. (Okay and me too.) 

Happy New Year!