A budding artist...

Today was kind of an exciting day....actually really exciting for Luke! He was chosen as one of two artists of the week at school. It was he and a 2nd grader. So this morning Matt and the kids and I went to the school and he was on the Sunrise Morning News (the school has the cutest morning news broadcast with 2 anchors, a weather report etc.). I was very impressed with the set up they had. Luke drew a "self portrait". I've attached 2 pictures, one is of the t.v. screen during the broadcast, and the second is his work of art so maybe you can see the drawing of himself. The blue things all around are clouds....there is a robot, a mountain, a balloon, and a monkey in a tree. They framed it and it is hanging up right next to the principal's office! I was so excited for him! He was the first artist of the week for this year!




Luke is doing so great at school. I got to go and help with the Kindergarten Fall Festival last Friday. I helped the kids frost and decorate cookies. Luke was so excited to have me there helping, and I loved it even more seeing him interact at school. He is such a good little boy, he has really learned to make his own choices and not follow the crowd....going on yellow a couple of times helped him learn that lesson quickly. He is now learning to read and he is trying to spell everything. He loves to spell things out to me, kind of like Matt and I do to each other so Luke and Emma don't know what we are talking about. Luke likes to do it to Emma. He'll say "Mom after dinner can we B-O-O-K?" Meaning can we read a book.... And Emma gets all bugged because she doesn't know what he is saying, and Luke is beaming because he spelled, but most importantly because he knows he got to Emma! Oh the joys of sibling rivalry! It's a good thing I never bugged Kim when I was little!!!!!! I was an angel! :)

Emma is my little helper. She picks up Gavin CONSTANTLY! Which drives me crazy! But sometimes she can be helpful. Like when Gavin has his daily treat of toilet paper in his mouth, then she goes and squeezes his cheeks and he spits it out for her! :) Our new thing that has been fun is that my friend who lives about 1.5 miles up the road rides her bike and meets us with her little girl in the trailer behind and then I ride my bike with Gavin and Emma in the trailer and we ride to the grocery store and the girls get a free cookie from the bakery and then we ride home and they play with each other at either our house or our friend's house. It is so fun! The girls like to stick their little hands out of the trailer and wave to each other.

Gavin is my little Energizer Bunny! He is into EVERYTHING! And he is quick! He now has eight teeth! He is so happy and fun. His new thing is that he shakes his head no. The kids laugh so hard at him. His other new thing that cracks me up is that he loves when we go into a public restroom because it echoes! So as soon as I walk in he starts with these funny little screams so he can hear himself! It never fails...he did it Sunday in the church restroom and again today at the Library! Funny kid!

Well that's about it folks

Happy Halloween

My First Triathlon!!!!

Yesterday was my very first triathlon and I lived through it!!!!!! It's all I can think about and talk about! There were 9 ladies from our ward who did it together. And we totally bonded through the whole experience. We have been riding our bikes together at times, we did a couple of mock triathlons a couple of Saturdays, and we even went this last week and swam in the lake where the triathlon was located just to get us over the fear of the lake. You should have seen us....9 moms with about 12 children (including 4 babies). We decided to go in two waves so that half of us could watch the kids while the other half swam, and then switch. Swimming in the lake that day really helped us all feel a lot more confident. So yesterday came and it was a BLAST! The triathlon was a sprint triathlon so it was a 1/2 mile swim first, a 12 mile bike, and a 2.75 mile run. My friend Amy and I have been teasing each other that we wanted to beat each other. (very friendly competition). So we started, I did the swim in 11:45 and beat Amy out of the water. But by the time I got to the transition area and was putting on my shoes she had caught up to me....I took off on my bike first, but about 4 miles into the bike she passed me, saying "on your left missy" as she went :) I tried the whole time on the bike to catch up to her but couldn't. I did the bike section in 39:08. Then by the run I was so anxious to catch her but my legs weren't working right and I couldn't get them to move any faster. I did the run in 25:02. So my total time was 1 hour and 20 minutes!!!!! Amy came in 4th place in the novice category (with a time of 1 hour and 18 minutes) and I came in 7th!!!! There were about 62 novice competitors! So it was such a fun day! It meant so much to me to have Matt and the kids there yelling for me along the way! We had a crazy moment when they first posted the times we all ran over to see the results and poor Emma lost sight of us. Soon the announcer was saying "we have a little lost girl named Emma if her parents could come to the announcers area to pick her up!" YIKES! She was heart broken and I felt so bad for her. She didn't care that I was soaking wet, I scooped her up and held on to her tight! :)
OH! I forgot the most exciting part of the triathlon!!!!!! One of the 9 ladies from our ward is a major runner, and she swam for BYU in college. So we knew she would do well. SHE WON FIRST PLACE OVERALL!!!!!! She was in second most of the race, in fact the girl in first was ahead of Larrell by 3 minutes going into the run. But Larrell pulled ahead and beat her by about 50 seconds! She is amazing! She did the whole thing in 1 hour and 6 minutes. I was so proud of her!

This is all of us with our millions of kids the day before when we practiced in the lake.

Amy and I setting up our transition area.

Stefanie Dowdy, Jessica Martinez, Amy Lopez, Andrea Rediske, Beckie Lowe, Marie Winchester, Tracy Bosch, Me, and our winner Laurel Lockard

Life is good, busy but good :)

Well life is as busy as ever and things are going good. Here are just a few highlights:


At Luke's school they let the parents come and have lunch with their child. Luke was dying to have me come, but the problem is that they don't let the younger siblings come...so I had to arrange a babysitter, etc. I finally made it and it was soooo fun! You have to sit in an outside courtyard with your child. I was a few minutes late and so Luke had already gone to the lunchroom. When I poked my head in his face lit up. It was so fun to just be sitting their with Luke. I can't remember the last time it was just he and myself without the other two! It was fun to just sit and chat. I was glad I went too because lunch time is a little stressful for Luke. He doesn't like it because neither his teacher nor I are there. And then when the teacher comes to pick up the class he tries to get all of his garbage in his little hands and take it to the garbage can. He was always talking about how lunch stressed him because he had "full hands". So when we ate together I showed him that he can load it into his lunch box and then go and dump it all at the same time. He seemed relieved! :) What a fun day!


Emma's big news this week is that she can swim without her water wings on! We meet at the pool every Tuesday with all our friends. Usually I sit and chat and Emma runs around with her friends. I decided she needed some one on one and so we took off her water wings and she swims sooooo gracefully! I am so proud of her. She can even do the most graceful dives! She is very excited about her new talent! :)


Gavin is thinking he is so big. He is ALL over the place and pulling himself up on anything. He seems to be doing better for babysitters too...Matt and I ran a 5K on Saturday and he was good all morning for the babysitter! It is just when he sees me that he wigs out and wants to be in my arms.


Like I said Matt and I ran a 5K on Saturday. We took Luke with us because the neighbor down the street has a little boy in Luke's class and when they found out we were going to be running in the same 5K they told us that we should bring Luke and that he could hang out with the little boys dad. Well the little boy Austin is also a twin and they all three had grey shirts on and they looked like triplets!!!! It was fun to have Luke there cheering us on. There were about 1200 people running and I took 512th place or 188th in the women's or 24th for my age group with the time of 29:20. Matt took 36th in his age bracket, 305th place overall and 225th for the men. His time was 26:03. And then Luke did the kids run with his little buddies Austin and Kyle and took third place behind Austin and Kyle. He was a little bummed to take 3rd but it was a good lesson in sportsmanship. :)


Matt was out of town all week. He usually just travels a day or two and so it was weird to have him gone 4 days! He'll learn his lesson quick because when he is gone that long it gives me more time to realize all the home projects we need to get to....we will be painting the walls this week :)


At Luke's class at school they have a little stop light and if you are good you stay on green, but if you get in trouble you go to yellow and have a 5 min. time out and then if you get in more trouble it's red, and then blue....everyday Luke is proud to report that he is on green. Friday I picked him up and he had his head down and looked like he was about to cry. He burst into tears and told me he was on yellow! He felt so bad about it. I guess he and his friends were talking during a fire drill. I didn't know what to do....of course it's not ok for him to be on yellow, but he was punishing himself already enough and I didn't have the heart to make him come home and get more punishment. I really think he learned his lesson, the worst part for him was the phone call he had to make to tell Matt...he was so scared! :)


Every morning this week Emma will come in my room around 6:30 a.m. and wake me up and say "Is Grandma here yet?" She can't wait to have Grandma and Grandpa come into town! She doesn't have any concept of time and so it has been very hard for her. She has shed many tears and thrown many tantrums this week because Grandma is not here yet. Finally we made a paper chain to count down for Grandma and Grandpa's arrival! Each day she looks forward to tearing off a link. But even that is difficult for her because a couple of hours later she wants to take off ANOTHER link!


Well not much else is going on around here. I am still training for my triathlon and now have the goggles and swim cap. The kids think it is hilarious to see...it is pretty comical when I have it all on :)

Beach Bums

Here's our news this week...

Emma is still missing all of our family...we will be riding in the car and Emma will say "let's go to Grandma's house today". She says it like we live just down the street! (I wish!) Then she cries and says "then let her come to our house". How sad!

Anyway, this is going to be short and sweet because it is late.
I finally got a bike for my upcoming triathlon that I have been training for. It was so funny because Friday night we got it at Target. Then we go walking out to the van and realized that we couldn't fit the bike and all the kids in the van too. So here I am in my cute little high heel flip flops, jewelry, little ruffled shirt, and helmet on the bike, riding home at 9:30 at night! Talk about a funny site! My neighbor laughed at me and told me when she sees people like me riding around on their bikes she thinks "Oh how sad, she must have gotten her license taken away due to a DUI!" :) It was actually really fun! Matt and the kids kind of followed me, the kids thought that was a riot!


I am LOVING the new piano! I have now taught myself to play 3 hymns. Luke keeps asking "Why do you play so much"....little does he know that when he starts taking piano lessons he will be playing just as much! :)


Today Gavin pulled himself up to standing on the couch! I can't believe how fast he is growing. The poor kid, I took him to the doctor on Friday because he has had a cold, and come to find out he not only has a cold but double ear infections, and he was wheezing. So I am having to give him some of Luke's asthma medicine. Poor baby!


Luke's friend Nicholas and his sister Brooke stay after school in the "Extended Day" program. The day care program. Luke and Nicholas both have been trying to get me to get a job so that Luke can go to Extended day too! So much for appreciating the stay-at-home mom! :)


We have a little after school tradition that when we get home the kids hop up on the barstools and I give them a little snack as we take turns telling each other about our day. I asked Luke if he was on green (the teacher has a stop light and if they get on yellow or red they have to have a time out). Luke replied "Yes mom I'm ALWAYS on green, remember" as he points to his CTR ring. He acts like there is no way for him to choose wrong with the ring on. Hmmm, I sure hope he doesn't ever lose the ring! Are tattoos bad if it is just around the finger and it says CTR? :)

Emma's first day back to dance with Ms. Lori

Luke's first day of Kindergarten with Mrs. Balasis!!!!

Back to reality

Here we are on the eve of Luke going for his first day of Kindergarten....Yes I am freaking out! We went to the "Meet your teacher" and met Ms. Balasis and she is wonderful! Everyone I saw that knew of her said that we truly got the best kindergarten teacher in the school! So that made us very happy. Ms. Balasis gave us a little packet and inside it had a picture of her with a little welcome note. Luke thought this was the greatest thing and made sure he showed everyone we talked to. Now he has it sitting on his dresser. We had a great time...Ms. Balasis had a clipboard for us when we first walked in and it had a little scavenger hunt around the room so we could get familiar with the room. We had to find the bathrooms, the drinking fountain, the class rules, Luke's place at his table, his cubby hole, etc. It really made him feel comfortable by the end. Then his favorite part of the night was getting his "spirit shirt" that he gets to wear every Friday and on field trips. He wouldn't take it off for 2 days! So he is very excited.

We have really been missing our family now that we are back from vacation. I think we are finally getting back into reality. We had such a great trip! Luke and Emma can't stop talking about it to their friends. They love to tell them all about their cousins. Since we've been back there are 2 new things for me to report on....first and foremost....we bought a PIANO!!!!!!!! I am so excited!!!! I have always kept my eye open for one in the wanted ads, but usually I am too late, or they are too expensive. Well this time the price was right and I was the first to call. So we went and checked it out and decided to get it. We picked it up on a Monday night, we didn't want to take any men away from their families to help us move it, and it was also too expensive to hire a piano mover (it was almost as much as the cost of the piano)....so instead we rented a small moving truck. They had a little device that would tie around the piano and then pop it off the ground with easy to hold handles. So Matt and I moved it ourselves!!!!! And it still works after we did so :) The lady was so cool and gave us a box of over 30 piano books and sheet music!!!!! That alone probably cost as much as the piano. It was the ladies daughter who owned the piano and then she moved to Maine and left the piano in this ladies entryway. She just wanted it gone, and I was happy to take it! So I am addicted to practicing. I haven't taken piano since I was about 10 and so I am trying to re-teach myself. I've started with Popcorn Popping and I am now working on "I know My Father Lives" It is so fun but very addicting and I find myself not wanting to cook dinner or pick up the house :) (Not that I am always loving doing housework anyway lol).

The other thing that I am excited about is that my friends and I are signed up to participate in a triathlon coming up in October! Now all I have to do is buy a bike :). I started training this week and so I have been running, swimming and doing the stationary bike. I think it is going to be really fun. It is not a full triathlon, but a mini one, so the run is 2.7 miles, the swim is .5 miles, and the bike is 10 miles. So I will let you know if I live through it! :)

One more funny thing...Monday we talked about missionary work and we let the kids know that our ward has a goal of handing out 97 Books of Mormon to commemorate President Hinckley's 97th birthday. We asked the kids who they thought we should give one to...Luke of course said our next door neighbor, and his best friend Nicholaus. Emma of course said her best buddy Brooke and they said that we should give one to Liz and George, the kids parents. Well the next day we were over at Liz's house swimming and Luke says "Hey Liz we want to give you a Book of Mormon"! That wasn't exactly the way I had pictured doing it, but it worked! So I told Liz that yes we wanted to share one with her and she said that would be fine! So tomorrow we are going to write our testimony in it and give it to her! Thanks to our little missionary Luke!!!!

Gavin is getting another new tooth, and so he has been a little crankier then usual. But he is pretty close now to crawling on all fours instead of the army style. He is constantly getting up on his knees and then after about 2 crawls he drops down to his belly again.

I think it will be good for Emma to have Luke at school to get a little more of my attention. Usually she plays so well by herself, but lately she BEGS me to play Barbies with her non-stop! I am having flashbacks of when we were little and Kim would beg me to play Barbies, just after I decided I was too mature for Barbies. I am really no good at imagining things anymore and so it is hard for me! :)