The Green Gators cutest player!

For my birthday, Clark went above and beyond.  In the morning, he let me sleep in while he made bacon and mushroom omelettes. After breakfast, we went for a family bike ride.  Then we drove to Bountiful.  Clark and the kids hung out at my Aunt Brenda's house while I went shopping.  Then Clark and I went to Olive Garden for dinner. It was a wonderful day! Now if I can just get used to saying I am 30 years old!!

We're back

We're back!  Yes, it's true, I am attempting to blog once again.  We finally got internet at our home so now I have no excuses, right?  I'll give you a quick update of the past 9 months:  Actually, scratch that...too much has happened in the last 9 months.  I'll tell you what has happened in the last month instead :)

Will started 1st grade!  He has Mrs. Woodbury, who was Clark's kindergarten teacher long ago.  He loves the current unit they are doing on bugs.  He has already filled his bug box with 9 bugs. Mrs. Woodbury suggested catching the bugs, sealing them in a plastic bag with a cotton ball soaked in nail polish remover, and then pinning them in the bug box.  Sadly, we found that our first few bugs were not all the way dead after sealing them in the plastic bag.  They started to move while they were pinned in the bug box.  Now we know to keep them in the plastic bag for several hours before assuming them dead!

Addy is learning new things each day. Her new passion is toothbrushes.  As shown in the above photo, she often likes having 3 within arm's reach.  She gets quite upset if I go into the bathroom, with her on my hip, and I don't give her a toothbrush on the way out!  She does have 5 teeth now.  She scoots faster than ever, but no first steps yet. Her favorite words are, "Pepper (our dog), cracker, ball, bye-bye, hi, da-da, ma-ma, apple, good girl, and one (how old she is)."

Yep, that's an adult tooth Will is showing you!  He lost his first tooth while in Laramie.  He mentioned his mouth hurting so I looked and saw that he had an adult tooth growing behind his baby tooth.  I asked if his tooth was loose and he wiggled it and with smiles in his eyes said, "Yes!" He spent most of the day wiggling it and then after the football game, he was ready for Clark to yank it out.  Clark wrapped floss around the tooth and before Will knew it, it was gone and he was $1 richer.

Here's the best smile I've gotten from Addy so far.

Will (and Rosie . . . I will post her picture next!) started soccer last month.  Will is on the Orange Mustangs team.  It consists of 6-8 year olds.  Rosie's team is the Green Gators and it has 3-5 year olds.  They usually play one game a week.  Will is loving it!  In one game, he scored 4 goals! Before bed, I ask what he was thankful for that day and it is usually, "That I got to play soccer today." 

Adalyn 6 months old

As I've often said about raising kids, "The days go by slow, but the years go by fast." And it seems that with each kid, the years go by even faster. We took Adalyn in for her 6 month check up. She was 12 lb 15 oz and 25 inches tall. Unfortunately that equates to the 2nd percentile for height and not even on the charts for weight. Her doctor recommended cutting back on nursing and increasing solid foods. It made me quite sad.  I really enjoy nursing.  So, I am compromising and barely cutting back on nursing in addition to feeding her more solids.  She loves rice cereal, oatmeal, mum mums (rice biscuits), macaroni and cheese, pureed broccoli cheese soup, and refried beans.  She hasn't liked the peaches or banana baby food. 

Adalyn LOVES Will and Rosie.  She just loves it when they play with her.  Here they are playing in the nest they made on my bed. 

Rosie enjoys teaching her things.  Yesterday Rosie taught her how to play the princess piano.  Today she taught her about dragons by reading from her "Dragon Handbook".  Rosie also gives Adalyn a new name each day.  Today it was "Macaroni" because she ate macaroni and cheese for lunch.  Rosie has also named her Philly, Foofy, Ava, and Lucifer (I think she got that name from the mean cat in Cinderella).

Adalyn loves bathtime.  All of my kids loved baths and I'm pretty sure they inherited it from me.  Clark teases me because one of my favorite things about staying in a motel is the unlimited hot bath/shower. 

She puts everything in her mouth, which is still toothless.  She squeals when she's excited. She is such a joy to have in our family. 

We have been keeping very busy.  I feel overwhelmed most days, but I wouldn't trade it for the world.  Here are a few pictures I've taken over the last 2 months:



This is Rosie's favorite shirt.  She would wear it every day if I let her.

Will's first day of school. Notice the cast.  He is loving Kindergarten.  He has a fantastic teacher and has made a best friend, Fletcher.  They play cowboys at recess. 

 Rosie is in gymnastics.  She loves it!  She has learned how to do a tripod, a bridge, and forward and backward rolls.

 The school put on a Halloween parade.  Here's Sheriff Will.  (He will often wear these clothes on a regular school day, so we put a shiny badge on for Halloween so people knew he was dressed up).

My first little witch.

My second little witch.

 She didn't like her costume very much.  The hat ended up being too small so for most of the night, she looked like a priest.  It was quite cute!

2 Months! and Labor Day

Adalyn is 2 months old today. She loves to be in her swing. I spent a month researching the best swing and ordered her a fancy one that rocks front to back and side to side. It played animal noises and had a cute mobile hanging from it. However, whenever I put Adalyn in it, she would start crying. She was not too fond of her fancy swing. A week later, Clark found a different swing at a garage sale for 1/10th the price. We bought it and thought we would see if she liked it better. It is a basic front to back swing with a few classical songs. She loved it! She usually falls asleep after a few minutes of swinging, but occasionally she will stare at the speaker where the music comes out.

This Labor Day was an eventful one for us. Will and Rosie were in our backyard climbing trees while I was feeding Adalyn (Clark had to work). Rosie came running in saying, "Will fell out of the tree." I rushed outside to find Will crying and crawling towards the house. I picked him up and examined him to find a very swollen ankle. I asked what happened and he said he was climbing when the branch broke and he fell on his back and hit his ankle hard. After ten minutes of crying, I decided we better take him to a doctor. Since it was Labor Day, all of the doctors were off and we ended up going to the emergency room. The nurse gave him some Lortab while we waited for the x-ray tech to come in. She x-rayed his foot and then we waited for the results. The doctor came in and told us the x-rays didn't show any fractures, but with kids it is common for the fracture not to show up for a few days. He put a soft cast on Will and told us to come back in a few days for a follow-up x-ray. He told Will he needed to stay off of his foot until then because the growth plate could break and Will would permanently have a small foot. Then the nurse came back in and said she, the doctor, and the x-ray tech all thought it was broken, they were betting on how bad the break was.

To pass the time, we have watched several movies and played Will's new favorite game: Building towers out of blocks and then shooting them down with rubber bands. We are anxious for Friday to get the results.