The Mystery of the Missing Clothes

For the last week and a half Ally and Julia have been missing several pairs of pj's, pants and shirts. If I can't find something it usually means it's in the laundry so I washed, folded and put away everything that was in their hampers. The missing clothes still did not show up. I looked under their bed, under my bed, in Jack's room, etc. and I couldn't find them anywhere. Yesterday while I was helping Ally pick up her room she opened her little rolling Dora suitcase that she usually packs with stuffed animals and books. Lo and behold there were all of the missing clothes, hangers and all! I asked her why she put all of the clothes in her suitcase and she said that last week she had packed for the trip we are taking to Utah...which is in about two weeks from now. I guess she's so excited to see her cousins that she wants to be prepared!

February in review...

February's highlight for Ally was her date with her Daddy. Ally is a Daisy in Girl Scouts and last weekend they had a Daddy Daughter Ball. She wore her favorite nice dress which is one she inherited from her cousin Jordan. Daddy got all dressed up and came to the door with flowers for Ally. She was so excited about that. I thought it was so sweet that her first bouquet of flowers was from her Dad. They had a great time at the ball although Rich said he had to tone down her crazy dancing a little bit. She thinks she's a super star dancer since she won a dance contest at a ward party a year ago. She gets a bit hyper kicking her feet everywhere but she didn't kick anyone so they were good.

Julia's baby yarn hair is finally getting longer so I can put it in ponytails or clips now. Usually she takes anything out with in the first hour after I do her hair but on this day Cari, my friend who works in our office, did her hair and she put big flower clips in it and Julia left them in almost ALL day!
Ally and Jack came home from school with lots of Valentines from their parties at school. They were very good about sharing their stash with Julia. Ally insisted I take a picture of her with the heart chocolate...so here it is. Beautiful, I know.


Sometime during the month we went down to Ontario Mills so Gage could get some drum stuff at Sam Ash Music. We had to stop and get doughnuts at Krispy Kreme since their "hot now" light was on. The kids like to go in because they can watch them make the doughnuts and they get these awesome hats.






Julia's didn't last long.





What a fun month!

Not for the faint of heart...or stomach!

Warning: If you are squeamish at all you may want to skip this post.

Let me tell you a story. Last week Rich and I were going to go to lunch with Janet, my mother-in-law. All the kids were in school except for Julia, of course. Janet came with us in our car but we needed to stop first to get gas. We pulled into a Shell gas station, the same one Rich and a friend had just been to before we went to lunch. I went in to pay while Rich waited by the car. While I was paying I noticed little boxes on the counter for sale. They were dried and flavored larva and crickets. Ewwwww! After paying I walked out the door and up to the car and started to tell Rich about this disgusting thing that they were selling and I was going to say that I couldn't imagine anyone buying those except stupid boys who were drunk when I saw this...
I screamed, which I usually don't do in public unless something terrible has happened. There was my sweet, innocent little baby girl with nacho flavored LARVA in her mouth! I told her to spit it out and she refused, she liked it she said. Rich bought a box of the Larva when he was at the gas station earlier. He didn't tell me about it, he just waited until I was gone to give it to Julia. I gave Rich strict orders to NEVER give her anything so disgusting again, which he thought was funny. He's famous for paying the kids to try stuff like a spoonful of Horseradish or Tabasco sauce. He learned it from his Grandpa. Poor Julia didn't even get paid for this.
When the little kids got home from school Rich gave some to Ally without me knowing. She thought they were yummy until I showed her the box. She asked if they were bugs, I said yes, and she said she didn't like to eat bugs so she didn't want any more. A very calm reaction I thought. All of the boys were smart enough to decline trying them. Hopefully soon the girls will figure out they need to be very skeptical when Daddy offers them something for a snack!

We have a nudist in the family!

Julia has decided that she hates clothes. I have to put her in clothes, especially pj's, that are hard to get off of her little body. Onesies help. At least she only gets so far because she can't get those off. Zip up feety pj's are the easiest thing ever for her to get out of. The only ones she doesn't try to escape from are her pink bunny feet pj's so those get worn a lot! Yesterday when I got her dressed after a bath she immediately tried to take her clothes off, which I told her she couldn't do. The next five minutes she spent crying her little eyes out face down on the floor chanting "I don't like to be dressed!". As long as it wears off by the time she goes to school and she doesn't strip in public I guess it's okay. It's a good thing the nudist phase doesn't hit later in life. Although my grandpa...(just kidding!).

The blessings of family

I was just overwhelmed this morning at how blessed I am to have five wonderful children and a sweet husband. When I was young I don't know what kind of family I thought I'd have. I always wanted at least one girl but after 10 years and 3 boys I was actually content to be the mom of a bunch of boys. Then came our little Ally Jane followed by sweet little Julia and our family was complete.

I don't think I really ever thought I'd have 5 kids, but I did always expect to easily have my own. It didn't cross my mind that I wouldn't. I have several friends and some family who have struggled with not having the children they thought would just naturally come along. It's been a trial for many people that I love and sometimes I feel slightly guilty that I got the family that I have so easily, but I also feel very blessed. It's hard when life doesn't go according to our plan. It's hard to watch when friends and relatives have to go through heartache and deal with the loss of not having children come so easily to them.

I first got a glimpse of it when I married Rich. He's adopted. He was 6 months old when my in-laws got him. I have talked to Janet (his Mom) about the experience and even though she's always pretty tough about things and I know it was a tremendous blessing to her to get Rich, it was also very difficult to not have any of her own. She said that sometimes she felt like she was different than other women, broken if you will. Maybe not that she really felt that way, but that the comments of others made her feel that way. That made me sad. When I was pregnant with our kids it was fun to see her curiosity and wonder to feel the baby kick in my stomach, or to hear about my weird cravings. She never got to experience that. If you ask her now she will tell you she's grateful she didn't have to experience many of the things that come with pregnancy, especially the delivery, but in a way it is a loss of an experience that all little girls think they will have. I know she is happy with the wonderful son she got and is fine with having only him. Of course for some reason she doesn't think 5 grand kids is enough but I keep telling her I'm done!

It's been beautiful to follow the experiences of the people I know who have had to work hard to get their children. It's been amazing and very emotional to see Rich's cousins finally get their twins through a surrogate after IVF failed for them several times. Their excitement of every little thing the babies do is just adorable but understandable since this is the first and only time they will have the newborn experience. It has helped me to appreciate all the things my kids do at all of their stages of life a little bit more. It's been great to see a friend finally be expecting through IVF after it failed the first time. It's been fantastic to see friends adopt kids taken from bad situations and be given a loving home. All of these are such amazing experiences and are a testimony to me about how important and sacred family is. However we get our family, however big or small it is, it's always a blessing to cherish.

I am just so grateful for my goofy, silly, weird and wonderful husband and for my goofy, silly, weird and wonderful kids. I adore my family, all of them, all my parents, my brothers , sister, their families, my aunts and uncles, cousins, and grand parents. They have all blessed my life beyond measure. It's what this great plan of our Father's is all about to bring us happiness. I am happy!

Little Drummer Boy...

Gage is our little drummer boy. His band teacher loves him because he can memorize his part so fast and just has a natural ability to keep time perfectly. He has earned a nice set of drums which take up most of his room and he's good so it's fun to listen to him. He tried out for Honor Band last week, which is a band made up of kids from all of the schools in the area which takes in 3 school districts I think. He made it! Rich is a very proud Dad about this so he videoed him playing for all to enjoy. I hope you do.



I had to edit the video due to the fact it was over 10 minutes long.

Running....I got a 12!

I have been running, or trying to run, for months now. On my run today I noticed there was a thing set up that lets cars know how fast they are going compared to the speed limit on the big long street I was running on. For those of you who watch The Office you may know what I was thinking. For those of you who don't, there was recently an episode of The Office where one of these was set up outside the office and they were running (in their suits) as fast as they could to see their speed. It was funny. Anyway, I decided to try it! Keep in mind I had already run about 2 miles at this point, which has been my recent accomplishment of non-stop running verses a run/walk situation. I got up to 12 mph! Rich suggested I try it tomorrow at the beginning of my run to see how fast I can go when I'm not so tired. It's just little stupid things like this that make me smile so I wanted to share. Maybe one of you will get a giggle out of it too!