February's Fun

And this is all the random things that happened in February...

{...BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION...}

Grandma Shirley made sure we celebrated Shaylyn's birthday. She had a cake for the girl and made sure she got the photos she wanted. Ignore the bandaid on the girls head, she has a habit of injuring herself in the most random of places.

{...LITTLE HELPER...}

While I was in the hospital having a baby, Grandma Shirley had a few of the kids. Jacen was one of them. Grandma does a lot of things wearing gloves and it appears that Jace wanted to be like Grandma.

{...CREATIVE=MESSY...}

While Jace and Grandma were cleaning, Nate and Ailey were being creative and making a bigger mess to be cleaned...Gotta love Play-Doh...At least they weren't fighting????

{...JUST TOO GOOD...}

Then there are times in life when you just can't decide between taking a nap and snacking...I know, it's happened to me a lot. I've just never decided to go with both...Maybe I should try it sometime.

{...BYE, BYE BABY TOOTH, BYE, BYE...}

Ailey lost her first tooth and was super, super excited about it. 

{...SLEEP TIGHT, LITTLE ONE...}

I'm a sucker for sleeping babies...I want to snuggle up with him right now...

{...CAMERA'S & KIDS...}

What do you get when the 5 year old uses your phone on the way to church? This, people...this:

{...BIG BROTHER...}

Tanis really is a great big brother and a huge helper to me. So glad I caught this moment.

Onto March we go...

What Happens Next...

Winter's Songs

Tanis had to run to the school to do an assessment type thing for band. Each band member had a time that they had to go play. I didn't realize it at the time, but he didn't even play for his band teacher. He was playing for strangers, who I think were actually college students.

He did a great job though and really overcame his nerves quite well. I was super proud of him.

The next night we found ourselves at the Jr. High for a world celebration. The school had different performers and activities that showcased life and languages in other countries. Shaylyn has been taking Chinese the past couple years and her teacher, this year, asked a few kids to sing, I'll Make A Man Out Of You from Disney's Mulan. 

If you watch the extra features, you'll see that Jackie Chan sings this song in Chinese and does some of his famous moves as well. The Chinese teacher decided to do both. So Shaylyn was selected to help sing the song and even got to do the quick line that Mulan sings in that song. It was fun and she was so excited. We were happy to be there to see it.

What Happens Next...

January's Junk

And the rest of January looked like this...

{...SO SMART...}

For awhile, Eric had been toying around with the idea of getting a smart watch. He looked around and just never really found anything he loved. Then one day he discovered a type of watch that would talk to his phone and he liked everything else about it, so he went and got one.

When he got home that day, I decided I wanted one as well. I had decided I was going to get a Fitbit after baby was born, but this smartwatch was capable of most everything a Fitbit would do. Plus, the watch came in white and I can change the watch face as often as desire strikes. There's also a watch face that uses pictures from my phone! I was pretty much sold. I also like the fact that I can check the time again without pulling out my phone.

{...LIKE THE BIG KIDS...}

As long as we've had our 'new' car, we've had headphones for the kids to watch movies without us needing to listen. Jace was always a little too small to use them. But we recently discovered that's not the case anymore and he gets the idea now.

{...IT'S ALL ABOUT THE MUSIC...}

Nate got headphones and an mp3 player for Christmas and was over the moon about it. He would listen to music daily. One day, he was so tired that he fell asleep while listening to his tunes. It was quite a sight to see knowing that he was out cold.

{...WHO NEEDS A CHAIR?...}

Tanis really is a great big brother and super patient with most of his siblings. Especially when they do things like this:

{...THEY LIKE EACH OTHER...SOMETIMES...}

Another Sunday night at Grandma's and when I went to check in on the kids, this is what I found.

I can't imagine Lex's back is very comfortable, but to each his own...

{...A CLOSE SHAVE...}

There are certain dogs that need to be groomed regularly. Flower isn't one of those breeds. Domino is. But because we weren't used to doing it with Flower, we haven't been as on top of getting Domino taken care of either...and he was getting really past due. He looked like a stray dog and he had hair growing in front of his eye and we wondered how he could even see. His hair was so matted he wasn't even fun to pet. We decided enough was enough and took him in.

When I went back to get him, they brought Domino out I wondered if they brought me the right dog! He was so much smaller without all that fur and he just looked completely different. Sure enough though, it was Domino and he was a much cuter dog afterwards.

What Happens Next...

Tanis' Christmas Concert

With Tanis being in high school this year, I had heard many wonderful things about the band director. So all year I've been expecting a concert and all year, they haven't had one. I thought that was a bit odd, but then again, it was one less thing I had to worry about being to.

Then came Christmas time and Tanis was finally performing in a concert! I was excited because I like Christmas music and I was curious to see if this band director was all he's been talked about.

Well, the concert started and we soon discovered that Tanis' group wasn't going to performing a number themselves, instead they were mixed up with all the other groups AND the music they were playing was going to be for a sing a long.

Eric and I enjoyed a night without kids and the other band groups that performed in their little sections, were actually really good. By the time Tanis' group joined everyone else, I knew I wasn't going to be able to see my kid. I also decided that recording the music with everyone singing along would be more annyoing than insightful, so I just sang along without worrying about trying to find my kid.

I did decide I should probably get a picture or two of him to sort of recognize the night. And the tie he's wearing is a little big. When Eric's dad passed away, Eric's mom had Eric and his brother and Tanis choose some ties of Grandpa's to keep. Tanis is a lot like his grandpa and chose a lot of holiday ties. This is just one of them.

What Happens Next...

Homecoming 2015

Shortly after school started we told Tanis that if he wanted to go to a dance this year, he probably could. He'd just need to talk with us first and we'd go from there. Because his birthday is in the summer, he'd be missing out on every dance this year and Eric and I both felt that if Tanis really wanted to go to something he should be able to. Of course, we wanted him to be with a big group, etc. So that was that.

Shortly after that we heard that one of Tanis' friends wanted to go to Homecoming with him. She has been his friend for many years and was really looking forward to Homecoming, but wanted to go with Tanis.

She was talking to Tanis one day about it and Tanis told her they could go together. And then I heard about it. We couldn't tell the girl that he wasn't going after he had already told her they could, so we tried to have look for a group to go with. I don't know if he didn't really ask or around or what - but he never found a group.

Eric and I decided we'd just do the driving and go to dinner as well, but we'd let the kids have their own table. We'd then drive them to the dance and wait for them to decide they were done.
So the day arrived and thankfully I had thought about flowers a couple days before and begged my good friend to make the corsage and boutenniere. I felt bad as she was 10 days away from delivering a baby, but she said she didn't mind doing it.

We got ready to go and Tanis got all dressed up and we were out the door.

I could tell that he was a little bit nervous, but he did his best to contain it. We tried to tell him that he's been friends with this girl for so long and they hang out all the time, so it really didn't need to be awkward.
We went and picked the girl up and then we headed to dinner. They chose to go to Chuck A Rama for some reason, so that's where we headed. 

We asked for seperate tables and it kind of confused the hostesses, but they eventually got the idea.

They sat Eric and I in a place where I was able to kind of watch Tanis and Shaila. I wasn't watching them to be nosy, I was more curious if they'd talk to each other or kind of ignore each other the whole meal. When I saw that they were having a conversation, I relaxed and paid attention to my date.

The kids let us know when they were done eating and I just had to finish up my dessert. 

We then took the kids to the school and decided to wait in the parking lot. Eric was convinced the kids wouldn't stay at the dance very long and I told him to not be so sure of that. I wasn't sure what we were going to do for 2 hours sitting in a parking lot, but Eric had planned ahead and got the necessary equipment together so that we could watch some of our 'shows'. I was thankful to him for that and it was nice to watch shows without kids running around crazy and loud.

Tanis and Shaila spent the whole time at the dance (we should've wagered on it) and they said they had fun. They met up with some friends at the dance and had a good night. We took Shaila home and Tanis didn't walk her up to the door. We kinda failed at teaching him that. But we made sure to let him know that the next time he goes to a dance, the proper thing to do is walk her to the door.

It was kind of a hard day for me realizing my oldest is old enough to do things like this and that he really didn't have a whole lot of fear in doing so. He is a good kid and I was super proud of him and the way he handled the whole situation.

What Happens Next...

The Big 1-5

Trying to keep your kids from growing is a useless feat. I really was kind of sad about Tanis' birthday this year because this birthday signified a lot of things that I didn't want to particularly think about.

Things like Tanis heading to high school, getting a learner's permit, dating, a job and just not being home as much. Things I wasn't sure I could handle as a mom.

But, the sun rose the day of July 22nd and this kid had a birthday anyway. He's usually so obedient.

At some point in the day I let him open his gifts and out of all my kids, he is the most grateful for whatever we get him. I tried to do my best and get things that he would really like, but the budget for birthdays and with him getting bigger, it doesn't always mix well.

{...Sabrina Carpenter CD...}

Shaylyn ran across a neat idea previous to Tanis' birthday and really wanted to do it for Tanis. So I took her shopping previous to Tanis' birthday so she could do it. She really kind of amazed me with her talent and her brother liked his gift as well.

We spent the night playing Tanis' new games and just enjoying each other's company. I'm still sad this boy is growing up so fast and even more sad he's taller than me now. I'm thankful for the person he is and the person he strives to be. He's a terrific helper and is always willing to lend a hand. He has a hard time being the oldest, sometimes but he's learned to take everything in stride. I pray he continues to be such a person as he grows older.

Happy Birthday, Buddy!

What Happens Next...

A Link Between Worlds

Tanis had a birthday that was soon approaching and because his birthday is 2 days after Pioneer Day, he feels like less friends are able to come if we have a party after his birthday because it's so close to Pioneer Day. So this year he insisted that he have his party before Pioneer Day and even had his theme chose weeks in advance. He also had a lot of ideas that he found of things to have at his party.

His theme was The Legend of Zelda and so we of course started out with the invite.

I spent the two days up to his party putting together some of the treats and the day of his party cleaning the house and doing some last minute prep work (like the name signs that I had forgotten until about an hour or two before his party).

This is how the table turned out:

And individual items:

(These were taken more for my benefit so I can realize, one day, that I used to do cool things for my kids)

We had some decorations....I had planned to make the blue balls look like the bombs from the game, but completely forgot and then ran out of time...

I had to get creative with the candles. I just know years from now this picture is going to confuse the life out of me.

The traditional birthday song was sung, candles were lit and the kid made a wish that probably won't come true.

For the majority of the party these boys played Super Smash Brothers. It was nice to have a game so many people could play at once.

Then came present time...

{...Lovely photobomb from the girls...}

{...Group photobomb was awesome...}

{...Someone needs to lock those girls up...}

It was a crazy, fun night and somehow it's almost more exhausting hosting a birthday party for teenagers than little kids.

What Happens Next...