Lauren

I dont even know where to start with My Lauren. She continually amazes me everyday. (do I sound like a broken record?) I just put her back in school and it has been wonderful for her and ME. I am glad I homeschooled her for the time I did....but she was ready to go back to school. She has a wonderful teacher that I dont think could be more perfect for her. Her teacher has made a great effort to help her get to know the kids in her class and she has already made some good friends.

She is an amazing reader, speller, and writer. She is a wonderful big sister and loves her siblings so much. The one thing she dosesnt like about school is missing out on playing with Miles and missing any "cute things" Isabelle does during the day.

She is always happy, bright and full of energy. Her testimony is amazing and I am so grateful for her desire to learn of her Heavenly Father and pray to him.

She is obsessed with anything Americian Girl and is saving her money so she can get the Mia doll. She is excited now for the polly recall so she can get money to save for Mia.

She is taking a class right now that is a mixture of ballet, tap, and gymnastics and is really enjoing it.

I just love her! Here are some pics......

Lauren and ME

With her cousin Bethany last weekend in Utah

With her Cousin Bryn in Utah

Lauren loves being with family, especially her cousins when we go to Utah, which we seem to be doing a lot lately.

Miles

I cant talk about Isabelle without talking about my other 2 amazing people that live with me! I will talk about Miles first....He is still the energetic Miles that he has always have been, but I must say he has calmed down quite a bit. I often have to remind myself about how he was when he was 2....I remember calling my mom on the phone and saying that he was every reason why I was afraid to have a boy. I love my Miles, he is my little boy and always will be. Their is something special between a mom and her son. He is an awesome brother (when he isnt teasing Isabelle) His new thing to say is "bull" when I say something he doesnt like, "thats unbelievable", "Incredible", "Freaken Amazing"(he gets that from his dad), and "Crap".

The other day I found him hiding behind corners and running around the house. I ran after him to see what he was doing as he was bookin it up the stairs. When he turned around he was mad at me and said "Mom I am a spy and you are not suppose to talk to me" I had to take a picture.

Miles loves his dad and thinks he can do anything (what little boy doesnt feel that way about their dad?) He and Lauren still love to play together, however as Lauren is getting older and more "mature" as she would put it, they tend to argue a bit more. Here are some pics of my boy that I am so in love with....

One of his favorite things to do....climb trees

When I tell him to say cheese for the camera

Holding his newest cousin....Landon

In his "spy" outfit

Isabelle

I am home from church with Isabelle today....she is sick. So while I have some quiet time without the other kids, I will try and catch up on my posting.

I just have to talk about my sweet little Isabelle. It is like Christmas every morning when she wakes up. We can't wait to see her. She is heavenly. So happy all the time. Days get more fun with her now that she is talking....one of her common things to say is "I dont know" when we ask her something, especially when we ask her where she put something. And her most favorite thing to say is "why" to everything we say to her. She is pure joy. We think she is the cutest thing alive on the earth today. She has become Miles little buddy and it is adorable to hear her say his name because she has a little lisp, she follows him around the house and adores him.

So I know we are her parents and are suppose to think that every little thing she does is adorable...but...she really is! Here are some recent pics of her....

With Miles guitar boots on

Wearing Miles hat

Little Buddies

My Dad

My dad with Lauren when she was a baby (Looks like Isabelle)

Tomorrow it will be 4 years since my father passed away. I cant believe it has been that long. I remember it like it was yesterday when I was by his bedside and he passed through the veil back to our Heavenly Father. He was only 54. I still have days where I think it was all a dream. Not a day goes by that I dont think about him. What I would do to hear his loud deep voice just one more time. Or see him singing in French or Italian(I think it was a mixture of both languages) while making some new creation in the kitchen...My dad was the most amazing cook and would just find whatever was in the fridge and make some amazing dish, that was never the same as the last dish he made. Or hear him say one more time "Girls, get in hear" to me and all my sisters. My dad is my hero...he worked so hard his whole life so I could have a roof over my head. He would work well into the night many times just to get a job done (he was a carpenter) so my mom would have money to buy us food. I love my dad and I cant wait for the day to see him again. He was such a spiritual giant and knew so much. I could always call him up to ask him a question and he would always know the answer. Thank you Dad for all you were to me and for being the best role model and example and for loving me and my sisters and brother and my mom so much!

The shoes we wear.......

I was lucky to be in charge of a skit today for our visiting teaching conference at church(ok, not really lucky). I found a skit on the web and tailored it to our ward, It was about the different "shoes" we wear as Visiting Teachers. I asked a friend, Kimberly to be apart of it, and luck would have it she had done this skit previously and had the shoes to go with them. I about peed my pants when she pulled out these shoes yesterday at our practice. I was the lucky one to wear them, and I did almost fall over a couple of times. It was a great laugh and added great humor!

Thank you Kimberly(especially for the shoes), Melynda, Anna, Ginny and Elin for being good sports and making this a hit!

Another pair I wore......

My new favorite

Ladds sister visited us last weekend and introduced me to Havarti cheese with dill! Oh my goodness. If you are a cheese lover, you need to try this. I had it on thin crisp triscuits!

Yum Yum Yum!

Need to profess my love!

So Ladd left this morning for a seminar. He wont be back until Sunday night. I hate these seminars that he goes to because he is gone and I just dont like it. On the other hand, I love them because he always comes back smarter and with renewed energy for helping his patients and the practice. As I sit here tonight missing my man that I love so much, I felt the need to tell the whole world. How cheesy! But I am so in love 9 years later. Never knew I could be more in love with him today then I was on our wedding day.

Massage anyone?

Miles woke up with a sore neck this morning. Not sure what happen, But Ladd was already at work. I went back into my massage therapy days and started massaging his neck. When I left for a second to get bread out of the oven, I came back to this............

It made me realize how much our kids watch everything we do and are very AWARE of all the things we do during the day...good and bad!

Family Artists

So Lauren had this great idea for us as a family last night! After dinner she decided we needed to spend some time as a family making pictures of all of us playing in the snow or rain out of construction paper. When Ladd started his artwork, Lauren said "Oh no, Dad, I feel so bad for you, You just dont know how to do this. Did your mom teach you how to do crafts when you were little or not? This is so sad. " I was laughing so hard it made Ladd feel worse. Here are our masterpieces below....

Miles Masterpiece

Laurens Masterpiece

Sarah's Peeps

Ladds special picture :)

That blue part is our "silhouette".... the part Lauren was commenting on

I should make note of the artistic snow

The joy of Cupboards

Anyone ever have fun playing with cupboards? The kids had a great time keeping Isabelle occupied while I made dinner tonight! I dont know how they all fit.

Bowling

We went bowling on New Years Eve...the kids 1st time. We had fun, however I hate to admit that BOTH Lauren and Miles had higher scores than me. Or should I not even mention that part? No....I will, I am a proud Mama of my kiddies!

Circus Anyone?

We decided to get out of the house and enjoy the Seattle Center as a family on Saturday. They had a "Circus Show" that we went to see. Quite the show! Here are some pics of these amazing people doing things that I would never even begin to imagine trying. While I was taking my Sunday nap yesterday, Ladd and Miles decided to try one of the "acts" and surprised me when I woke up. They did pretty good....see the video after the pics.

It was only a matter of time that Ladd and Miles come up with the idea of trying to duplicate these circus people. I am just glad they didnt try other things :)

Christmas Present

Grandma Sue gave me the best Christmas present ever. When she watched our kids for our anniversary back in August, she had the kids make handprints for us out of paint and then turned them into flowers and framed the picture for us! What a wonderful present that I will always cherish!

Balconies

So tonight, while Ladd and I were talking about the people I had just interviewed for receptionist at the office, we had one of those moments where you say "um...I think we need to pay attention to our kids a little more". Miles came to us and said "Dad did you just see me fall down the stairs?" And he continued to tell us how he was climbing over the balcony of our stairs and accidently fell over them down a full flight of stairs, acutally not even down the stairs, fell over the railing of a split-level stairway...oh about 10 feet in mid air. Yikes...and the kid wasnt even crying! We asked him what he was thinking when he was falling and he just said "I dont know" and walked back up the stairs. I feel really blessed to not be at the ER tonight!

Santa just needs to bring boxes!

Ladd got a new filing cabinet for his office which left us with a HUGE box. He brought it home yesterday and I am amazed how long and how much our kids laughed while playing with it. Who needs toys. I dont think they have ever laughed and had so much fun playing with something!

Family Picture

We took our Christmas picture today after church. I now know why I rarely get pictures with all of us in them. I don't think we have taken a picture with all of us since Isabelle was born. How sad!

Anyways, here are some of our pics!

Mr Peeps

So Mr. Peeps started visiting our family every year after we saw him "visiting" our dear friends Nicole and Trevin Rasmussen in their home in Idaho. (Thanks Nicole for letting us steal him)

Mr Peeps joins us for the month of December. He is one of Santas helpers and "watches" the kids during the day and reports back to Santa at night. He is always in a different place in the morning and the kids love finding him in different places of our home. This year they started leaving him "treats" at night to eat and Mr Peeps loves eating them. I think the chocolate was his favorite so far. If Mr. Peeps is touched by one of the kids during the day, he doesnt come back for a while becuase he gets scared when he is touched.

You will often hear me say "Miles, Mr. Peeps is watching" It is amazing the miracles Mr Peeps does for me and how he keeps Miles in line ;)

My life with Miles.....

I have decided to think of Miles as "my son who is bright and has a lot of energy and does not let anything stop him" child. I tend to not be as upset with him when I think of him that way. I am grateful that he is creative and keeps himself busy, especially with homeschooling Lauren, it comes in handy. However, Yesterday he was on a roll.....first with taking the dining chairs upstairs to create a wall so Isabelle couldnt get to him (one of the many other small messes he made that day with his creativity) , then I caught him just in time climbing up the wall of the stairs.

And then to top it off, during that hour before Ladd came home (the hour that I call crazy when the kids are sick of me and Me kind of feeling the same (I hate to admit) and me trying to get dinner done, Isabelle screaming at me to hold her, you know that hour you moms all probably experience too), Miles was being way too quiet in the bathroom. I asked what he was doing and he said, just come see mom as he was giggling.....Here is what I opened the door too....

On top of the sink with water all over him AND the bathroom he said "I am spiking my hair and looking handsome mom"

How could I get mad? Or upset? Or anything but laugh. My kids make me laugh.....Life is more fun when you laugh at the things they do instead of being frustrated at them all day. That is what I have learned today!

Santa

We went to our ward Christmas breakfast last Saturday. The kids were excited to sit on Santas lap and Miles was upset that he didnt get to keep telling Santa his list of 100 things he wanted for Christmas. Isabelle wanted nothing to do with Santa ( I am still waiting to find a 1 year old that does)

Christmas Tree Adventure

Yesterday Ladd and I decided to forget Home Depot and go cut down a "REAL" tree in the wonderful mountains. So at 1:30 in the afternoon(after putting it off all morning, and not even eating lunch), we were off to the Rangers station to get a permit. We didnt think to look at the weather conditions or bring any food with us, we were just determined to find our Christmas tree.

The lady at the station told us that the road to the trees was icy and that we needed chains. We went anyways :) 15 miles up the pass, we got to our exit and to the icy road...we went about a foot up the road and turned around. We drove up some other roads and hiked in a ways and turned around. The kids were still happy at this point and enjoying being in the snow(not to mention the 20 degree weather)

We drove to the next exit and I told Ladd I was not hiking anymore, he went hiking into the forest for about 10 minutes while I envisioned him never coming back (by the way, it was snowing pretty hard at this point)and being one of those long lost hikers who didnt know what they were doing. (the kind you see on the news and you say, "duh, what were they thinking")

Ladd came back and told me he found some good trees, so off we all were into the woods. 10 minutes of bushwacking later, we got to these trees and they were not the perfect tree I was looking for. Our kids were still happy at this point except for Isabelle on the way back who was starting to lose her patience.

So back to the car we went and we were ready to throw in the towel when I told Ladd to stop and check out an area that I thought would be good and "ah hah" there it was!

We thought the hard part was over.....

This tree was HUGE! But it was the perfect tree. Miles hiked up the little hill with the saw and down our tree came. (did I mention it was snowing?) and "freakin freezing" as Miles put it.

Tying the tree down

The kids are done with the "Ultimate family experience"

1 hr later, our tree was on the car and tied down and Ladds hands were almost frozen off. The tree started on it's journey... What we didn't know was how bad the snow was affecting the roads while we were having the ultimate family experience - About 2 hours later(because of a jacknifed semi).....hungry kids....screaming Isabelle, Sarahs needing to go pee the WHOLE time... we made it home.(with a bird nest that we discovered while taking the tree inside the house!)

The birds nest

We finally got it in the house

The finished product