A freshly cut tree...

The day before Thanksgiving, we headed out to cut down a Christmas tree. Anticipating being out of town for the whole Thanksgiving weekend, we wanted to get our tree cut down early. Then we could decorate it after we got back. (I'm against putting up Christmas stuff before Thanksgiving, a curse from a guy I dated.) So we headed out with our snow gear. It was quite pleasant outside, but the kids still got decked out in full gear. They were so happy to play in the snow.




Merril found a fabulous tree and cut it down. It was located at the bottom of a hill and the Tahoe was at the top. So I helped him drag it up the steep parts and then let him do the rest. It was the first year we've tied the tree to the top of the car. (We've always had a truck or trailer or something.)

I was there too, sipping hot chocolate. This picture is wiggy, but everything else the kids took was out of focus or too dark to enhance.

After cutting and playing, we sipped hot chocolate or apple cider and ate ginger spice cookies. It was a wonderful time!

The kids wanted me to take a picture of them sleeping. FYI: They're all awake and posing for a picture.

On the way home, we had to make a quick fix because the wind gusted and blew the tree sideways on the roof. Luckily it didn't fall off, just turned sideways.

It was righted and we continued on our way. During this trip, I thought about the tradition of cutting down a fresh tree for Christmas. Merril only started cutting trees when we got married, but I can't remember a single Christmas in my whole life that I didn't go cut a tree. I thought that was pretty darn great.

Loving technology...

I love YouTube.

I spend more time than I should there. I watch old movies broken into 9 minute segments, trailers, music videos, etc. I think YouTube is great. However, I've lately come to despise the comments people make about videos. If people don't like the video, they can swear in the comment and it rarely gets removed. So I turned to my old friend, the internet, to see what could be done to rid myself of expletive-ridden comments. :)

We use Google Chrome for our internet browser and an extension for Chrome can be downloaded to simply eliminate YouTube comments. Can you believe that awesomeness??! After downloading the extension, my YouTube pages load totally void of annoying comments replaced by beautiful blank white space. I love techology.

Wahoo we didn't all die!

So today is November 11, 2011, otherwise known as 11.11.11. It's pretty catchy. If I could've planned it, I would've had our 4th kid today. (I don't need it to come 3 months early so we're just going to let it cook a little bit longer.) I'm glad I wasn't in Egypt today because the great pyramid of Giza was closed because of 11-11-11. (Because of the crazy people) Merril and I were just glad that bombs didn't drop and the world didn't come to an end. Merril did, however, go to the Verizon store, which opened at 11:11 a.m., to purchase a new phone. Maybe it'll be good luck and he won't go through this phone in a matter of months. (He's hard on phones.)

We should've done something fun but we just went through the whole day doing normal Friday things. Tomorrow I'm making blueberry muffins for breakfast. Doesn't that sound good?

Isn't that a lot of oatmeal?

Jack really likes oatmeal for breakfast. He probably eats it almost every single day, something that I think is nuts but whatever. I used to buy oatmeal at places like Wal-Mart but in the last year or so, I decided to buy it at the LDS cannery in 25 lbs. bags.

(This is not my picture, nor my kitchen.)

It's cheaper to buy it at the cannery but I feel silly with so much oatmeal for some reason. In my pantry, I have a 5-gallon bucket of flour, sugar, and oatmeal. Who keeps oatmeal in a 5-gallon container in their pantry? It just seems ridiculously excessive. However, the amount of oatmeal diminishes in the bucket at such an alarming rate, I really can't see any other alternative. I just think it's weird.

P.S. Less than 100 days to go until bambino...yikes!

Jack lost his first tooth...

So Jack lost his first tooth on Wednesday! He was really excited to get a gold dollar coin from the tooth fairy!

Unrelated: I'm 25 weeks along. Only 3 1/2 months to go!

Storytelling Festival...

Maxine's school holds a storytelling festival for grades 3-5. Kids compete in 4 different categories: adventure, mystery, folk tale, and fairy tale. Maxine competed with kids in the upper grades but still placed 1st in the folk tale category! She was really excited to get a trophy.

Halloween 2011...

It seems like last week was super busy. There was Halloween events and Red Ribbon Week at the school. Merril and I had Halloween parties on Friday. We dressed up as Napolean Dynamite and Pedro. I had originally wanted to be Napolean's girl friend but my hair is too short for the side ponytail and I'm too pregnant not to notice. I thought it'd just be weird.

Juliet was a black cat, Maxine was a mean witch, and Jack was a stitched up race car driver.

The kids went to Halloween parties, costume parades and trunk or treating before actually going house to house for real trick or treating.

They have soooo much candy.....that I'll be eating.

Odds and ends...

We went to a family reunion with Merril's family last weekend. I totally brought my camera in anticipation of taking pictures of all the cousins playing and all I snapped was this picture of a wagon train on the way to the cabin. It has nothing to do with our family but I still thought it was neat. I have never seen a reenactment wagon train so I pulled over so the kids and myself could get a better look. This is just a small section of the wagon train, it was quite long.


Other than that, I'm 23 weeks pregnant (5 months to anybody who needs a translation) and feeling great. We went for a hike on Saturday and I probably hiked a mile.

I know, I'm still small. I've gained 15 pounds so far and am feeling a little apprehensive as the end draws nearer. The only apprehension is that my easy life will become more difficult. My children are very self-sufficient and I do quite a lot without having to worry about diapers, wipes, extra food, baby toys, etc. The days of burp cloths, diaper rash ointment, and high chairs have been behind me for a while. So even though I smile when I feel bambino dance around my insides, I still sigh when I hear a crying infant and see its mother take him or her out because that reality is coming post haste. :)

Apple Orchard...

This is a little out of order but we went to a nearby apple orchard at the beginning of October and I didn't want to forget about it. (I haven't been as diligent about blogging lately and bothers me that our family history isn't as complete.)

So we as we started picking, it started raining. Luckily, we were in Grandma's car and she had a big umbrella.


Jack really liked the umbrella and kept trying to be a ninja.

Juliet disliked her sloshy flip flops and carried them after a while. This picture is a little blurry since I took it quickly as we ran back to the car. I love how Maxine is giving a thumbs up sign. Not quite sure why I was getting the thumbs up. Maybe the trip was a success.

Just a little hike...

So Dan M. thinks it'd be fun to go on a hike to some petroglyphs and talks some suckers into it. After 45 miles of dirt road (16 miles of it being crappy, muddy dirt road) we arrive at said hiking destination out on the Arizona Strip. "The road should be fine!" I should've known better. This coming from a guy who called 911 after getting dehydrated and lost on a mountain not 3 months ago. It's just who Dan is, no point in fighting it.

Seriously, we had a fun time I was just expecting to be back earlier in the day. The weather was perfect for hiking! See me bringing up the rear? I'm in the red shirt way up the hillside. Max and Merril are in the foreground.

The hike was 7 miles round trip, 3.5 miles in and the same back out. Since the whole family went, I anticipated turning around early. Juliet hung in there and hiked with a great attitude. Just over 2 miles, Juliet said she was getting tired. The 2 of us probably hiked around 4.5 miles total. Grandpa, Grandma and Jack probably turned around about the 2.5 mile mark.

Here's Max, cousin Lizzie, cousin Stephanie, Grandpa C. and Jack.

Maxine, after some tears and inner struggles, decided to hike the whole thing and wouldn't give up. She made it all the way to the petroglyphs at Shaman's Gallery.


Juliet and I hiked pleasantly back to the cars and got back about 45 minutes before everyone else. This view is from the top of the hike. It was the end of the day.

I hear the petroglyphs were amazing but I had fun just going for a hike. My calves are sore. Otherwise, I felt great during the hike. It's going to take several more days to get all the clay mud off the Tahoe. It's sooooo very muddy.

Healthy baby...

We had an ultrasound today and the baby is healthy and measures perfectly. It's not twins, despite what my friend Val kept saying. Thankfully, it's just one baby and it looks great. The doctor was unable to tell the gender because the cord and its feet were in the way. Sorry people, even the doctor doesn't know the gender. And here is a generally fuzzy, you won't know what you're really looking at ultrasound pic. It's a picture of its nose and upper lip. Imagine you're looking at someone face to face and their head is tilted back so you can see the two nostrils, mouth open slightly, eyes are blacked out and in the shadow.

She had a hard time getting a look because its arms were both up by its face. All the other pictures look really skeletal. This is the only one that looks like a real face. So anyway, there it is. Factoid for the day: I learned the difference between a miscarriage and a stillborn is 20 weeks old. If you have it before 20 weeks-miscarriage, after 20 weeks-stillborn. And now you know.

Halfway there...

Last Thursday I hit the 20-week mark which means I'm halfway there! All right!! All I can report is that I have an ultrasound on the 6th of October and we won't be finding out the gender of the baby. :) Sorry. Other than that, I feel really good. Sleeping is hard with allergies and I'm not taking anything for the congestion besides saline nasal spray. But I often get a nap in so it all evens out. Ultrasound details to follow, hopefully nothing out of the ordinary.

IT LIVES!!!

My phone survived!! I'm using it again today (after disinfecting it of course)! YIPPEE!! Other than that, Jack had to have some dental work done this morning and he was sedated because he freaked out yesterday at the dentist. He has chewed his bottom lip so bad that it's swollen and seriously messed up. He's prone to cankers so I bet his whole bottom lip becomes one gigantic canker. He's on antibiotics to help with the infection.

He is sticking his bottom lip out a teeny bit but he really looks like Bubba from Forest Gump. (You think I'm kidding. I'm dead serious.) This is a profile, now that he's not trying to look sad and his face is relaxed.

I'm praying the antibiotics keep the cankers to a minimum. Yikes.

Feeling a little dumb...

I just dropped my phone in the toilet. Luckily the toilet just had water in it and nothing else so I grabbed it immediately. I pulled the battery and dried it off as well as I could. Currently the disassembled pieces of my phone are sitting outside drying out. If I'm lucky, I haven't done any huge damage and I'll be able to use my phone tomorrow. But for now, I won't be answering my texts or making any calls.

I miss you.

Crazy cookies...

Last night I went to the Relief Society General broadcast. The broadcast was great but a funny highlight were the refreshments. They were sugar cookies cut in half and folded over with pink icing and white marshmallow teeth. They look like smiles. :) I believe the acronym was SMILE: Spiritually Minded Is Life Eternal. All I could see is a blog post with funny smiley cookies.

Road vs. Face

The kids were playing in the water out in the front yard on Saturday. Maxine got her hair all wet and jumped on her bike with the intention of shaking water on the other kids. She closed her eyes and shook her head and fell off her bike. Her face hit the pavement; since her eyes were closed, she didn't even get a hand up to protect her face. She said she didn't even realize she was falling until she hit the ground.

Day 1: Red scratched face, says it really hurts

Day 2: Swollen eye and cheek, scratches have scabbed, still hurts

Day 3: Swollen purple eye, scratches are looking better, doesn't hurt

Her eye is very purple and green now and the scratches are continuing to heal. She seriously looks like Rocky Balboa when she first wakes up. This morning there was less swelling around her eye but she still looks pretty bad, very bruised. She also scratched up her knuckles, knee, and shoulder. My kids have been supremely lucky and this was the first scary accident for her and me. I told her it's too bad she didn't wreck her bike right before Halloween: we totally could've made it part of some gruesome costume. :)

Our little theatre...

Merril was out of town last week sometime and I told the kids I would redbox them a movie. I preordered it online and told the kids I was on my way to pick it up. Maxine wanted to come with me but Jack and Juliet asked to stay at the house. The redbox is 2 blocks from our house so I said ok. I came home 3 minutes later and found this:

Juliet told me that they had turned the living room into a theatre and we were now ready to watch a movie.

I thought it was very clever that the kids came up with it on their own and divided the microwave popcorn into 4 separate bowls.

Then I decided to show how big my belly is getting to be. This picture was taken a week ago (17 weeks) and somehow a pregnant belly looks bigger when it's on one's self. I tried different poses and angles but no matter what I did, it just didn't look very big. So instead, I'm showing how not big I am. :)
I had meant to blog all of this a week ago but every time I came downstairs to use the computer, I'd realize that my camera was still upstairs and the thought of dragging myself upstairs again was unappealing. So I apologize for the laziness.

Sand Dunes...

We met my family at some nearby sand dunes for a weekend of camping! I didn't take very many pictures. All the kids were filthy from head to toe from playing in the sand all day.

We had lunch! (Thrilling isn't it?)

Maxine, Juliet and their only girl cousin on my side of the family, JoLyn, made a sand castle city. Which I think looks pretty sweet.

But the star of the weekend was our 3-wheeler, a Honda 110 ATC. I had one like it as a kid and Merril gave me one just like it as a gift a few years back. That machine was running pretty much non-stop. Older cousins would take smaller cousins around camp. It's a great little ride. That's me and Juliet in the picture.

That's all the pictures. Other than that, I've started to feel the baby move this week. That's been exciting for me. I just turned 16 weeks. :)

New/old Tahoe...

We purchased a blue Chevy Tahoe, with seating for 7, air conditioning in the back, brand new tires with eagle alloy wheels and low miles. It was a bit dirty but I've since detailed the interior. Now that the upholstery has been scrubbed, it looks pretty fantastic in there. We got a sweet deal because it's broken, of course. Broken transfer case. See Merril's legs under there?

These are the new Nitto Terra Grapplers. The old Tahoe had Nitto Dune Grapplers with flame tread on the side walls. These, unfortunately, only have lightning bolts down the side wall. (Not that any of you care and can't even tell in this picture but I just wanted it out there.)

The outside of the Tahoe has a couple paint flaws but the body is straight. It needs to be washed so bad! Currently, the Tahoe is on jack stands in my garage without a transfer case. Until the new one gets here Wednesday, I can't wash it. It's not as cherry as my previous Tahoe, but it was also $15,000 less. Besides, a great deal always makes something prettier in my opinion.

Week after the first day of school...

I'm not great getting pictures of the first day of school so this is a week after, when Kindergarten actually started.

Max and Jack are running to pick up neighbor kids for the bus.

Down at the bus stop: Jack always poses with these "I'm looking cool" faces lately. Half smile, no teeth, eyebrows raised a bit. Maxine...did we brush you hair at all?

Juliet brought down her baby doll named Suzie (the doll's name comes from the movie Elf). I have high hopes for her and the new baby. She LOVES babies! I might not have to do anything at all.

Here is Jack getting off the Kindergarten bus so fast that I really didn't get a good shot.

Jack is loving school and tested well during his Kindergarten testing. He's reading and knew most everything except math concepts. Woops, should've worked on those more. He's had his reading tested and is ready to start the reading library at school so I'm pleased.

Juliet and I have been having fun hanging out just the two of us! I'm glad to have these months with her before the baby arrives in February. :)

The Falls...

There's a set of waterfalls that I've wanted to go to since I was around 17. They're in a town next to mine and I've rarely known anyone who knew where they were. A kid from my ward knew and when I asked him for directions he replied, "No one can be told where the falls are, they must be shown." (I think he was trying to get a date but I was dating someone else at the time so it didn't happen.)

Flash forward 14 years: We found out our neighbors across the street know the way to the elusive falls! I was so excited when he agreed to take us. It's probably a 20-25 minute drive on a crappy dirt road but we made it and they were everything I thought they would be!

There's a large pool down at the bottom and Merril and Maxine spent a lot of time swimming under the falls. Unfortunately, we got there as the sun was going down and I was not about to get all wet at 8 p.m. I think this place would be great in the sunshine!

Juliet was saying in a sing-song voice, "We're at the FAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLSSS!"

The kids even found some adorable teeny frogs.

And we sold the Jeep (cue the sad music.) I worked hard on the Jeep. It's been my project for a year and a half. Unfortunately, the Jeep simply won't seat all the people in our family soon. Merril put it on KSL on a whim and it sold almost the next day. We have our eye on a 1999 Tahoe. It's broken, of course, so it's a really great deal. So I'm sad but it had to be. Maxine burst into tears when she found out. I guess we all loved it.

Having another kid...

Okay, I said I was done having kids. And I meant it. I still mean it. However, the powers that be decided that we should have another one. I ignored the prompting for quite some time but let's just say that the Lord has all the time in the world and I flinched first. So we decided to have another baby. I'm not necessarily wanting to have another one, but I have to. Otherwise the voice in my head will be nagging until I die. So it took us a while, 8 months of trying. I had the Mirena and it kept things uninhabitable for months after it was taken out. I've heard the heartbeat and I'm almost 14 weeks along. Feeling pretty good, tired mostly and having to eat constantly but good. I don't think we'll find out if it's a boy or a girl, anticipation is a wonderful thing.

And the voice? Has it gone away? Thankfully yes. I've been so less torn since we decided to have another kid. I feel peace about our decision, something that eluded me every time I wanted to stop at 3 kids. There's going to be a large space, 4 3/4 years between this one and Juliet. That bugs me a little but I'm hoping the Lord will just make it work. And I'm due in February on my birthday. (FYI, I already have a child born on my anniversary and we are NOT having one on my birthday as well. My doctor agrees.) So there it is. I'll be the mother of 4 kids. One day, I'll know why.

The fancy plates...

I have a china set that I received as a graduation gift. My Mom had a set that my Dad had given to her and then a partial set that she received when her Mother died. As a teen, I remember eating on the china almost every Sunday. Fancy cloth napkins were used and folded in neat patterns. (I used to have a thing for folding napkins. I quit because I don't have a set of cloth napkins. Hmmmm....Christmas idea.) Anyways, I have fond memories of spending a really nice Sunday dinner together with my family, something that usually didn't happen so much during the week.

Fast forward**I don't know how my Mom ever let us use her china. I try not to be overly crazy with the kids but I like my china. It was expensive. It can't easily be replaced and I'm always a little afraid that something will get broken. However, every now and again Maxine pleads with me to use the fancy dishes and stemware for a Sunday dinner and I agree. I hold my breath while the kids help me set the table. I try not to faint during dinner while the kids use the utensils. And generally, everything is fine. (One time, the lid to the teapot broke but it was my fault. Go figure.) But what cracks me up is the fact that eating on the plates made in China brings out the British accents.

Happy Sunday to ya!

Okay, now I'm sick of peaches...

So I planted a peach tree 3 springs ago. This was its 3rd summer in the ground and we finally received a decent crop (last year I got 1 peach).

So since I was jealousy guarding my substantial crop from the birds this year, I might have gone a little overboard. I started by putting tin foil in the tree to help frighten the birds. This seemed to help but not enough. Next I covered the whole tree with netting to keep the birds out.

This worked wonderfully but my neighbors might think I'm a little overprotective of my fruit. I had 84 peaches. Glorious, wonderfully sweet, deep red peaches.

We bottled peaches, of course.

I made a peaches and creme tart with vanilla ice cream.

I made peach/jalapeno jam which is wonderful on cream cheese with crackers.

Merril likes it on peanut butter sandwiches but whatever.

And now I'm kind of sick of peaches. We ate a lot of them with lunch or for snacks and with half and half for breakfast. It made me think of pioneers and how they must have gorged themselves when fresh fruits and veggies were plentiful during the summer. How during the bleak winter months, they would dream of fresh melons, fresh corn on the cob, fresh tomatoes, carrots, apples, etc.

I'm hoping that next year I won't be so protective of my fruit because there should be more of it. But this year I wanted it, all of it. I didn't want the birds to nibble one bite of those peaches that took 3 years to grow. Sorry birds. Better luck next year.