Happy Birthday Emily

5 years old

Please, everybody, look at me!
Today I'm five years old you see!
And after this, I won't be four,
Not ever, ever, anymore!
I won't be three-or two-or one,
For that was when I'd first begun.
Now I'll be five a while, and then
I'll soon be something else again!
(Marie Louise Allen)


Bug Cake


Ladybug Pinata

More Pictures from our Trip to Utah

I am getting anxious for Nathan to come home, but I think maybe I'm not supposed to write about it since its not all official. So instead I will post a few more pictures from Utah. Charlie (Brother in Law to be) took all these pictures. He is a great photographer and has a cool camera.


John watching for a train


A Sunday walk


Mom, Syd, and Sarah on a walk


Walking


Iris and Grampy


Em, Iris, and Syd at the top of the slide


A trip to Utah is not complete without seeing the SLC Temple

W	Wild
E	Earthy
N	Natural
D	Dignified
Y	Young

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Name Acronym Generator
From Go-Quiz.com

Procrastination Day

Today is my day to do all those things I have been putting off. All those things I have thought about doing, but just haven't done. One of the ladies that I had over for Easter dinner recommended this - she sets aside one day a week to do those things that just get forgotten. So I made a list and I am getting it done!

So far I have:
Put Frontline on Sam
Given Harley and Sam Heartguard
Called the Housing Office with a list of repairs
Bought dog food (and put it right in the container)
Returned books to the library
Made an appointment to get the oil changed
RSVP'd about a party next weekend
Picked up rocks at the Housing office
Bought contacts and ordered glasses
Made a hair appointment
Washed Emily's car seat
Put the registration stickers on the truck
Filled up the car with gas (wow - that was expensive!)

I still need to:
Take a quick nap
Make an appointment to get my teeth cleaned
Call a couple Primary Teachers
Spackle around the stairs
Clean the basement
Take a load to Goodwill

weather update

The bad weather rolled in with thunder and lightening and hail. I ran out and moved my flowers onto the porch and sat and watched the storm. The wind has been blowing ever since, and it has been snowing. The wind has been incredible - making it hard to walk or even breathe outside. This afternoon the snow melted off and I think tomorrow will be a better day.


what the hail....

-*-*-*-*-*-*-

Emily's birthday is next week and she can't wait! Today we wrote up invitations to her party and she is so excited about giving them to her friends that she cannot get to sleep. We want to have her party at a little park - hopefully the weather will cooperate. Can you trust the extended forecast? I need that poem about being five (Heather - do you still have it?)

Emily and I read a book about a little girl named Emily with hair trouble. In the book the girls ends up loving to have her hair in braids. The illustrations show some interesting hair-do's and Emily wants to try all of them. So today we put her hair up into a high pony tail, and made two braids. Then one braid was wrapped around the pony tail and the other braid stayed out. It was pretty fancy. (It is hard to see the full effect - but trust me - it looked marvelous!)


Fancy braid

Tomorrow's 'do should be even better!

Spring in South Dakota

We have had the most beautiful weekend. I planted flowers, and seeded the lawn. We spent so much time outside playing this weekend that Emily has a little sunburn and Sydney's freckles are getting darker.

But we may get some snow tonight. Blech. I like snow. In January. Not so much in April. I decided not to wash the car today, just in case.

Here are some pictures of Nathan in Guam. No snow there!

Happy Easter

Happy Birthday Iris

While we were visiting Mom and Dad, my niece Iris turned 1 year old!


Birthday Princess

Sarah made Iris a cute little cake, it reminds me of the little cakes my mom made for us when we were little.




Iris loved it!


Yum!

Emily and John loved to play with little Iris. I'm sure it worried Sarah and Charlie, but they let us hold Iris as much as we wanted. It was so fun to get to know her and watch her toddle around. Iris is a beautiful little lady.


Em and Iris


Iris and John


Ring around the rosie

Bye Baby Bunting

Today, as we were driving home from soccer, I heard John singing a little song to himself. It took me a while to realize that he was singing Bye Baby Bunting. He is so cute. Here is what he sang -

Bye baby bunting,
Daddy's gone a-hunting
To get a rabbit skin
To wrap my little Erin in.

Erin is my littlest sister (I think I may be even a smidge taller than her. Okay, maybe not. Dang) My kids all love her - she is a great Auntie. I am pretty sure I have never sung her name into that song, John must just really like her!


Auntie Erin and the kids

Busted

My new fancy car does not like to go slow. Seriously. It likes to go about 45 mph, and I have to really keep my eye on the speedometer to keep it in the 30-35 range in town.

Yesterday Sydney threw up at church, so I hurried and handed all my Primary stuff off to others and we loaded up the car and headed home. I was feeling a little tense and I kept thinking "I need to get home, I need to get home..." I did not want her to throw up in my fancy new car!

Sure enough, I came around a bend and noticed two things: flashing police lights, and the speedometer needle pointing to 45 mph. Yikes! I knew I was busted.

I pulled over and waited for the policeman - those flashing lights parked right behind my car was sooooooo humiliating! None of the kids were crying, and everyone was buckled nicely into car seats or seat belts. I also had my purse with me. Three plusses for me. It is a small miracle that I had my purse, as I usually head to church without it.

I think our Oregon plates and my Florida drivers license worried the police man, because he also asked if we were military. I pulled out our insurance and registration info and found that my insurance card expired a month ago (I don't think they have sent me replacement cards yet - I am going to check right now.)

While he checked my information the kids were asking all kinds of questions - When is he going to put the handcuffs on you? and What will we do if he arrests you? and How many tickets can you get before they take your drivers license away? and Why were you driving too fast? and What was the speed limit there?...


Courtesy Warning

The nice policeman gave me a Courtesy Warning ticket. Whew! Just a warning. I think my sick child story helped. I am supposed to slow down and drive safely. All the way home Sydney kept her eye on the speedometer and let me know how I was doing.

Time to get Goin' - edited x2 (does editted have 2 t's?)

It is 9:10am. I am sitting here in my work-out clothes, and I need to get moving. I am not a complete slacker - I made my bed this morning, made French Toast for breakfast, emptied the dishwasher, and wiped the counters. Emily and John are dressed but we have not fixed hair or brushed teeth (mine are brushed, if you were wondering) SOOOO - I am going to get off the computer and:

Vacuum the house
Fix Emily's hair
Brush teeth
Move the laundry
Exercise

before I get back on.
Ok. I can do this

Now it is 11:11am. I did those jobs AND I am showered and dressed AND I made a couple phone calls AND got the price of a half sheet cake from Walmart AND now we have a couple neighbors here and we are just about ready for lunch.

After lunch I will:
move the laundry
take a nap
pay bills
couple more Primary phone calls
pick up Syd
wrap gift for party
Syd to gymnastics
pick up Han
Syd to birthday party
rent a movie
buy pizza

It is 2:54 My neighbor offered to pick up Sydney, so Emily and I are watching Mary Poppins. That was fun to have my to do list up here, and kept me in line. I did laundry, and paid bills, but I didn't get a nap because Emily wanted to paint. But I did a little sewing and pulled out some fabric and patterns - I think I have just enough for a couple Spring dresses for Emily. I really am going to make my last phone call before we head out to gymnastics.

What a great day!

Being the Mom

I've been doing a lot of thinking about my job as the mom. I am reading a couple of mom books that have really made me think about who I am, and am I the mom I want to be? Then last night I caught the last half of Super Nanny and could see myself (minus all the bad words- yikes!) in that mom.

At one point the mom went outside as the kids were playing, and she sat on the porch to watch. She seemed a little excited about being outside and said to Jo - Wow, I don't usually come outside with the kids, usually my husband takes them to the park , etc. and Jo said - The kids don't want to play with the $2000 worth of outdoor toys, they want to play with you. Who will be the mom if you won't. (So the mom got up and played with the kids.)

I am often "too busy" to play with the kids, or if I do take them to the park, I like to bring a book so I don't get bored. And I feel like I'm doing great as I watch on while they play. But I think Jo might be right - who will be the fun mom, if not me? And when did I stop being the fun mom and turn into the referee?

So, we have almost 2 feet of fresh snow, and it is not too cold or too windy out there, so I am going to bundle up myself and the littles and go play!

Snow Day

The weather forecasters were right. We have big snow. A few inches last night, and more snow all day. I wondered all day yesterday whether I should find a sub for a Nursery class or not. I decided to wait.

This morning we dressed for church and I worked on my Singing Time stuff. I decided it would be best to plan to go to church, then if it was cancelled I would be happily surprised. At 8am I started getting calls from teachers that they wouldn't be coming in to town, and at about 11am the Bishop called to say that we would just have Sacrament Meeting. About a half hour later the Bishop called again and said that because of the No-Travel Advisory he had decided to cancel church all together. Yippee!

We have had a fun day doing Home School Primary. First we worked on memorizing this month's Scripture:
Amos 3:7 Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto His servants the prophets.

Then we played an Apostle matching game and learned a little more about our Apostles today.

For singing time we learned the Jonah verse of Follow the Prophet:
Jonah was a prophet, Tried to run away.
But he later learned To listen and obey.
When we really try, the Lord won't let us fail.
That's what Jonah learned deep down inside the whale.

Sydney dressed up as our Prophet, and did the actions to help us remember the words (running away, listening) During the "whale" line she put on the shark towel - it was a crack up to see her down inside the whale. Hannah played for us on the piano - (I forgot to mention that when the Bishop called to let us know about Sacrament-Meeting-Only he asked if Hannah knew any hymns - I guess the only two pianists in our ward were not planning to come and he was a little desperate. She is going to work on learning one, just in case they need her again.)

Sundays are often a little stressful for me. When we get home from church at 4:45pm I am usually ready to crawl right into bed. It has been nice to just focus on our children and not worry about finding a last minute CTR5 Substitute or making sure the toys have been delivered to the nurseries. I could get used to this!

I hope your Sabbath was as restful as ours.

On the Potty Train

Wooooo Wooooooo

One week on the Potty Train and John is doing great. He notices that he has to go BEFORE he is wet. He even runs into the bathroom without me. Sometimes I don't even notice that he has used the bathroom until I find a bit of wet in the potty chair.

What a big boy! I have worried and worried about just how to potty train a little boy. But apparently I put it off long enough that he could just do it himself.

Now if we could learn the trick to helping Emily stay dry at night....

Hung Over?

Last night our spouse group had the monthly "Coffee" meeting, where we discuss upcoming squadron events, welcome new people, say goodbye to those leaving, and just visit with everyone.

St. Patrick's Day was the theme for the meeting, and there was green punch, and potato soup, and mint ice cream. During the meeting part of the evening I was sitting near the dessert table. Some sliced sweet-bread and cinnamon butter were calling my name. So while we talked about the upcoming Easter party I had a piece. Mmmm.. It was so good. It was like a spicey banana bread. So I had another piece. Then I got a piece for the girl sitting next to me. And I buttered one more for myself. I had a feeling it was best if I never knew the calorie count of all that buttery goodness. Little did I know...

Another girl sitting near me asked Barbie, the hostess, what kind of bread it was. It turns out it was Irish Wiskey Bread!!! Yikes! She said that the alcohol probably baked off, but......

I really had a great time. Usually I feel a bit awkward and just visit with one or two ladies that I know really well. But last night I had fun and enjoyed talking with a few ladies that I recognized but hadn't talked to before. Was it the Wiskey bread? hmmmm? we'll never know.... (anyone want the recipe?)

Snowman

Neighborhood Sledding

There is a slough near our home. In the spring, the reeds will grow and it will be nice and green and muddy. In the fall the reeds will dry out and the tops will make lots of fluff. In the winter it makes a nice sledding run. With schools running 2 hours late we headed over for a little sledding this morning.


Neighbors


Emily


Go John


Syd, Aubrie, John


In the reeds

I have a grey hair. I just noticed it today. I was sitting in the car waiting for Hannah after school and looked in the mirror. I noticed a light colored hair, about 2 inches long, kind of curly, just standing up there on my head. It seemed to be reflecting the light, and I could see that the color was different than my regular hair. When I tried to tug on it I found that it is much stronger than my normal hair, and it's texture is also different. Yikes!


Grey Hair 40x (not my hair)

Mayoclinic.com says that "Hair typically turns gray as a result of aging." I'm getting old! When did that happen? Next thing you know I will be hiding Nice 'n Easy behind my hair dryer and curlers.

This article talks about going grey - written by a 35 year old "salt-and-pepper" man. Warning ladies - not good news: On a guy, gray hair says, "I'm mature, stable. I can be relied on." .......On the other hand, women don't get a free pass. "It's not fair," says Diane Harris, a media image consultant, "but men see gray on a woman and they think she's old." Funny article - especially the last couple paragraphs.

Refueling

Nathan sent this picture and said I could post it. You can see the B-1 and also the refueling line. He was in that B-1 getting gas from the IOWA guard guys. Looks scary to me!