We Had a Boy!

Fynn was born on the 20th of September, 9 days early.  All went well, and we are so glad to have him in our family.

It has been a week and a half of getting the feeding thing down, but Fynn is an awesome sleeper.  I put him down around 7:00 or 8:00.  I wake him up to feed him at 2:00ish, then he wakes up to eat again around 6:30.  This has been his pattern the last week, and we hope it continues.  The days seem very short though with everything we have to do.  Thanks to my mom, the older kids did get taken care of. 

We are blessed!  We had better start a collection for mission funds...we will have a boy on a mission for almost 8 years straight.

A Few Things We have Been Up To...

My sister Heidi married Bryan in the Salt Lake Temple.  We think that he is a good addition to the family.  

A few cute pictures of my kids at the temple and reception...

Noah turned 4!  He has seemed older than 3 to us for forever.  We had a fun party in St. George, and Ian talked him into having an airplane cake.

 

The kids and I went with grandma Terri and a few cousins to see the Blue Angels airshow.  All the kids loved it, especially Ian.

Peter broke his arm...following in Ian's footsteps I guess.  He only had to have the cast on for 3 weeks, but by the end it still stunk sooo bad.

I have been forcing Brad to do hours and hours of yard work.  Things are taking shape.  We laid sod in the backyard (which took weeks of prep work and a day of tractor work donated by my brother in law JJ)  The project that is the most fun to see take shape is this dry river bed.  It will eventually extend into a dry pond in our front yard.  All these rock were dug out of the trenches when we installed our sprinkling system, and yes we do have enough for the pond part too.  I will have to post a picture with the finished project.

And finally, my mom, Britany, and I took a girls trip to Austin Texas for the Country Living Fair.  We, or maybe just I, spent too much money, but we had a lot of fun and had a break from mom duty.

Funny

I said that I wasn't going to post any pictures, but that I had some cute ones...this isn't one of them. After I posted the last post I was looking at some of my pictures on my computer and laughed out loud when I saw this one. WILL SOMEONE TELL THAT KID'S MOM THAT HE NEEDS A HAIRCUT! Wow, it always looks worse in pictures, right? I think this was last November. In my defense, Noah has had two haircuts since then.

5! Seriously?!

This is just the expression that goes through Brad and my head frequently these days...

We are having our 5th child! I was reading back on our blogs and when I announced we were having Peter, I said our 4th and final child. Well, NOW we are having our final child. I know that there is someone much more powerful than birth control out there but I am hoping he doesn't haven any surprises in store for us in the future. We are happy and most of the time a little overwhelmed by our future family size.

I am due the end of September, and was going to wait until we knew the sex to announce, but we have decided not to find out! We have never done it before, and think if we are going to do it, now is our last chance. And, by me posting this, maybe it will keep me strong enough to keep this decision for the next 3 weeks until the ultrasound. I no longer have free access to an ultrasound machine now that I am not working, so I only have to stay strong a little longer.

So, there it is. I have some cute pictures of the kids that I need to post, and if it didn't take 3 minutes per picture to post them, I think that I would post little more often. But they are all doing well, and we are all looking forward to the warmer weather!

Late Christmas Post

So I decided that I would do a post, but when I went to post some pictures, we haven't really taken any since Christmas. So...this will be a Christmas post.

We had a great time. We surprised Brad's parents and showed up on their door step at 5:00 on Christmas Eve. Mae and Ian spent Christmas Eve day skiing with Grandpa Wendell, Brad and a bunch of cousins. It was their first time, and they absolutely loved it. Noah and I made cookies for Santa, and Peter had a nap.


These are pictures from Christmas Eve. The family shot is us showing off our "Gift from the Heart" Christmas. Brad gave Mae and photo book and story titled "How to Train Your Dad"-a complete how-to guide on how to wrap your dad around your finger, illustrated with pictures of Mae. I gave Ian a collage of pictures, the Millenium Falcon, the Salt Lake Temple, an X wing fighter pic with CTR and 'May the Force be with You' on it, and Brad's mission plaque-all to hang in his room to remind him to stay on the good side, CTR, and prepare for his mission. Mae made Noah a dog house out of pvc pipe and cardboard. Ian made Peter a picture flip book with pics of family and other household things he wanted him to learn how to say (I have to say it helped Peter's language development, he knows most of the words in that book now). Noah painted a BYU logo picture for Brad--he loved giving it to him. And Peter, with the help of Brad, put his handprint on a paper, and had it framed. We love Gift of the Heart. I think that it is even the kids favorite part of Christmas.

Wow,..Another 6 Months

We had a great summer...we literally played 80% of it. It has been nice to get back into the swing of a schedule-cheaper too. Here are a few of the highlights of our last 6 months...

Mae turned 8 and got baptized. We were so excited for her. She seems to know so much more about her decision than I think I did at that age. But I am pretty sure she thinks she knows more about most things than me, even now! We sure do love her. She loves giving all the lessons in family home evening, and she loves Choosing the Right. She is loved by all who know her, teachers, primary teachers, family and especially her brothers.

School started again. Ian started Kindergarten..does he looked excited? He is pretty sure he is awesome at every subject, and insists he already knows how to read (he can memorize sight word books brought home).



Mae started 3rd grade. She loves her teacher and has made a bunch of new friends. I never have to worry about her.
Peter is still stinking cute, wouldn't you agree?
I turned 30...I wish I hadn't but I didn't have much say in the matter.
Mae got her first bloody nose in soccer. She was a good sport about it and I was "that mom" that said "ahh she's fine" after the ball hit her and then felt bad when she came off the field dripping.
Ian lost his first tooth. Two in fact. When he came to us saying he lost his tooth, the other was also gone. Who knows where that one went.
Halloween was fun. Brad was a Utah fan. I was actually a BYU fan. Ian and Mae are obvious. Noah was Super Dog (and fell and cut his head open 5 minutes before this picture. A lot of bloody rags and some super glue later, he was fine), and Peter again was stinking cute as an owl.
Last but not least. Ian turned 6. He had a Star Wars cake (cookie). Lots of black food coloring sure looks cool on the cake, but I had that whole think thrown in the sink after everyone had one bite because it was staining EVERYTHING it touched. Tongues and fingers included.

Anniversary, Track, and a Birthday

I tried to post this so that Peter's birthday was first, but I forgot that it posts pictures in reverse, so here we go...

Brad and I went to Lake Tahoe for our 9th anniversary, just the two of us for 4 nights and 5 days. We had a blast; we camped the first two nights and then stayed in a hotel the next two. I thought that it was the perfect combination. We were able to eat dutch oven while camping and get a massage and a real shower at the hotel. We did almost everything we wanted to do and were exhausted by the end.

While at a spot called Sand Harbor it was actually hot enough that Brad had to jump in. I professional photographer that was taking pictures of the landscape caught this picture of Brad and emailed it to us.

Brad really wanted to go parasailing, I wasn't so sure. I think I wanted to know how I would like it since my love for heights has taken a huge dive in the last 10 years. Consensus, Brad loved making fun of me the whole time we were up there, and I know I never have to do it again...
This picture was taken while we were attempting a hike. Were were trying to make it to the top of Mount Talac. The snow stopped us about half way up the mountain but we saw some beautiful views--Fallen Leaf Lake and Lake Tahoe in the background.


Us kayaking. Going on a trip just the the two of us, we weren't able to get great pictures so you will just have to take my word for it. This was probably my favorite part. We kayaked at Sand Harbor one evening and then kayaked into Emerald Bay the next--we kayaked about 9 miles that day. We were exhausted, but it was fun.

Mae did city track this year. I think she enjoyed it. They only awarded medals and ribbons at one of the 5, but Mae did great at that one. She placed 1st in the 400 meter, 2nd in the long jump, 5th in the 50 meter, and 6th in the 100 meter.

Peter's Birthday!!!! We love this little guy, we promise, even if he had the lamest party ever. Thats how it goes with the 4th I guess.


We got him a wagon....

He is crawling all over the place and is attempting to stand without holding on to anything. I can't get him to say anything but DaaaDaa most of the time, but that does make me apprectiate the couple times he says Maaaa in my week. He tries to copy what we say sometimes and mimicks the sound more than the word. Going along with his most frequent word, he is loving his dad these days. This always happens after I wean my babies...they no longer need me and change their allegiences. He does still love me though.

Sorry for the next picture, but Brad really wants me to post it: Peter frequently has hard stools and so he cries every time he poops whether it it hard or not. He was doing the poo cry so I went to change his diaper. He had not pooped yet but it was on its way out. I swear that this is exactly how it greeted me, "head first", there was no manipulation what so ever. Brad calls it the "Frankinpoo": I am sorry if you will all have nightmares after this.