Emerging from the Woods

Celebrate! Lingering colds and fussiness aside, we're eating again, starting to sleep again, breathing easier, and best of all, smiling again. And the babies are doing better too, badumpbump. An added bonus is that YW New Beginnings was finally last night. Celebrate some more! I could sure use a nap.

Here's Logan, happy and talking after days and days of sad, sad, sad...and 3 happy boys!

Our Prophet

Katy & Tyler posted this on their blog and I had to share it too--thanks for the happy tears. We will never forget him, will we. We are better people for having had him as our prophet.

Remembering

I love that President Hinckley's passing has made top news nationwide. Here in Utah, the flags are being flown at half mast until after his funeral, but the neatest thing I've seen so far is that yesterday, teens at various schools around the valley went to school in their best Sunday dress in honor of the prophet. I loved hearing that.

Church Online Newsroom: http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/

Local Utah news: http://www.ksl.com/

President Hinckley

We love you. You have strengthened us and taught us for as long as we remember. We honor you and thank you deeply for your presence in our lives and your humble service. We have been blessed by your revelation on behalf of the Church and have felt your genuine love for us. We will keep trying to 'be a little better' so that someday our heavenly reunion might be as joyful as yours is today. We can only imagine. We will miss you dearly, but we know you are home.

Dropping Like Flies

Brayden was awarded his Arrow of Light at pack meeting Tuesday night. In case that wouldn't have been memorable enough, Connor made it more memorable by throwing up a few times during the meeting, the last of which was exactly during the Arrow of Light ceremony. Connor seems to have a knack for these unexpected moments. I've got more than one "suddenly sick" story about him, the absolute worst of which involved me being completely and utterly coated by him while we were meeting Maddie's 1st grade teacher a few years ago. It wasn't a pretty first impression. It wasn't a pretty anything.

So the bug started with Fisher during the night Sunday, hit Connor Tuesday night, Logan Wednesday morning, me Wednesday night, and Brayden Friday morning. Miraculously, Maddie escaped with a big cold and Rick is fine. The big people are feeling much better now, but the two little guys have RSV, plus Fisher has ear infections. Poor Logan is in the saddest shape. Needless to say, it's been a ROUGH week and I am SO glad this doesn't happen very often. A glimpse:

Brayden, the veteran Webelo. He and Rick are ending 2 1/2 years of scouting together since Brayden's been tagging along since he was a wolf scout. They've had a great time.

My good ol' Dad, helping with the Connor clean up. Some things never change.

And, the pathetic and humorously evolving hospice that has been our family room:

I never did get a picture with all 5 of them at the same time, nor did I care to take one when I was on the couch with them, but YIKES.

I am extremely happy to report that thanks to Lysol, 409, Rick, and untold loads of laundry, things around here no longer resemble a hospital wing. I am just as happy to report that thanks to Rick being home today, I was able to escape for a few hours and get something done. I feel like a new person. Now maybe I can pull off YW New Beginnings on Wed. What a week.

Rails, Rockets & Ralphing

Brayden is doing a history fair project on the Transcontinental Railroad. So, after all his research we took a little trip last Saturday up to Promontory, UT to see the railroad and Golden Spike site for ourselves.

Where the spike was spiked

Standing on the line where the trains met on May 10, 1869

Golden Spike replica

This is America, Charlie Brown!


It was an informative day in the middle of nowhere. Driving away, we saw an owl fittingly perched on a bird santuary sign and this:

And down the road, surprisingly, this:

I think we spanned the scope of transportation technology all in one day. Not bad for an afternoon! Here's Brayden with his project:

...

You're not mistaken, there's no picture. I wrote this post a few days ago and have been waiting to add a picture of Brayden at school with his project. Sadly enough, Brayden woke up with the stomach flu yesterday morning. A frighteningly potent stomach flu, I might add. And on the very day of the History Fair. His project is already at school so we'll have to take a picture when he brings it back home. He was pretty bummed.

Snow Day?

Yesterday we woke up to major snow! This is always a very happy way to wake up at our house. We LOVE snow! While we were out in the storm shoveling the 9 inches that had already fallen, the kids wondered if it wasn't already MLK Jr Day, if it would have been a snow day? I can't remember ever having a snow day in Utah, but maybe this would have done it. Regardless, they were thrilled to be home for it and had a great time sledding at the park. One of these days (years) we'll actually hit the slopes together. Poor Fisher was too sick to join in the fun so we drove over and watched for a minute. Seeing the crazy happy dog jumping around made his day. You can see us bundled in the car.

Meanwhile, Rick & I were left to wonder why we don't own a snowblower. Usually I love shoveling, but this was a workout! At the end of the job we were relieved to let our neighbor snowblow the sidewalk and our other neighbor clear the deeper snowplowed snow from the front of the driveway with his tractor. Gotta love neighbors with real power.

Buried and LOVING IT!!! And more snow in the forecast later this week! Oh happy days. :)

Maddie of the Dance

Maddie is a clogger--and I have yet to capture it in decent, non-blurry pictures! Thanks to Tyler (my bro), these shots from her Christmas recital turned out cute. Not only can we tell it's her, we can actually see her cute face! Hooray!

Mom, I Need a Boost!

These were Connor's excited words when we were walking through Costco and he saw the enormous new swingset on display. The one on display twelve feet above the ground.

Me (looking around): "What? What do you need a boost---a boost to up there?!"

Connor (standing in the cart): "Yeah, c'mon!"

Me (laughing): "If I gave you a boost to up there, we'd get kicked out of Costco!"

Connor (visibly deflated): "Oh, man...I thought I could try it out."

Oh, to be 5 years old. The options must feel endless. Until you suggest them to mom, that is.

Regressing

This doesn't look nearly as unnatural in the pictures as it does in real life:

In case you can't tell, and contrary to what Fisher himself thinks, he is TOO BIG. Apparently that is his regression face and apparently he only regresses when I don't do his hair. He also likes to "try out" the baby's pacifier when I'm not looking, despite the fact that he still has 5 of his own to choose from. When he sees that I see him, he raises his eyebrows and gives me a mischievious side-long smile, then quickly hands it over. I guess the grass is always greener, even when you're 20 months old.

Maximus Who?

Last night after scripture reading, we got into a little discussion about how/why the righteous Nephites could forget their covenants and become so wicked in just a few short years. And why it's important for us to know this part of the story--so we can make sure to remember our covenants with the Lord, despite Satan's desire to get us to get us off track. Connor came over to me later and asked, "So...is Maximus real? Or just pretend?" Who?? we asked. "Maximus. You know, that guy who doesn't want us to choose the right."

The Wind Between My Ears

Last night I told Rick something really funny that had happened earlier in the day. It made us both laugh and I thought to myself--ooh, I've got to jot that one down in the morning. Think I can remember what in the world it is today? Nope, not even a little bit. I'm thinking resurrection day will be very exciting (probably for more reasons than the one I'm about to say) since I'll suddenly recall so many great (forgotten) moments of my life. It'll be just like watching a great movie for the second time--I can never remember what happens in the movie or even how it ends, so it's just as exciting to watch the second time as it was the first. Maybe I'm lucky to have such a smooth brain. I guess I'll never know, what with the smoothness.

Rocking the Boat

Lest we find ourselves holding still in our living situation for any length of time, Rick and I are opening up that can of worms...again. We can't seem to leave it alone! After the attempt at moving last summer and all the feelings associated with leaving an area we totally love to gain more space and live within the boundaries of the school we commute to, we felt relieved to stay put in our home awhile longer and just keep commuting. We figured the feeling of limbo would remain, but planned not to approach the subject again for a year or two. We lasted 4 whole months.

NOW, we are seriously considering an addition! For those of you interested and familiar with our house, I've drawn up plans that include a new second family room, 5th bedroom, and bathroom in an expanded basement, thus creating a larger kitchen, dining room, living room and new laundry/project room on the main floor (our current laundry/mudroom would become a generous mudroom with lockers and an exterior french door), a 6-foot bump out to our current bowling alley of a family room (it's 12x27 right now), and a deep 3rd car garage stall.


It all looks good so far and we've been talking to contractors and working on financing, all while trying to figure out if this feels like the right thing to do. We could truly get the home space we need (plus some) at a better cost than moving (150K+ less), while staying in a neighborhood and ward of down-to-earth people. This is so important to us. It all feels perfect until we bring in the school factor. Do we transfer the kids back to local schools (with a negative junior high situation--this is the big issue) since we're committing to the area long-term? It's exciting to think of staying here, but a big decision school-wise. We're thankful to have so many options and are hoping to make a decision in the next week or two...what to do???

Wii Wish You a Merry Christmas

We had such a fun Christmas day! We only took a few pics...I promise I was there too!

We could hardly wait for this one since Rick bought it back in October...I wish I could get the video on here of their screams! They were TOTALLY surprised and our ears were ringing.