Teeth and Good Bye's

I am done Babysitting! It feels so nice that my schedule will not revolve around someone else's children, and that I will be able to take my own kids out to do some fun things. But lets be honest I almost cried. I have had the kids for almost a year, and they just moved to Newfoundland. I will never see them again, and I am really going to miss little Rachel, who by the way kept giving me these huge hugs which made it even harder.

We had a little birthday dinner for Rachel last night and her parents came for dinner. It was Rachels birthday on moving day, so she was missing out. My camera decided to go AWOL on me though so I have no pictures of the little princess party that we had, AND I lost all of my pictures that I had not taken off the card yet.

Today I had to say goodbye to President and Sister Priday our mission presidents because they are leaving to go home this afternoon. I have worked with them for over a year as mission cook, and I will miss them dearly. They have been soo good for the mission, and so fun to get to know. I loved all of the talks sister Priday and I would have at the mission home, in the kitchen.

On another unrelated topic Skyler had a bunch of dental work done today, and they put him out to do it. He had some really bad cavities that started 'chasing' meaning that they were spreading to every tooth in his mouth. He had all of his molars capped. I am soo grateful that I have not had to deal with having a child put under before, and pray that I will not have to deal with it again. Skyler took it really well, but it is still hard to watch your babies eyes roll back in their head as they lose conciousness, and have them wake up crying, dizzy, and disoriented. I am soo grateful for modern medicine though, and that he could safely be treated this way, because the alternative of about 10 1 hour appoitments at the dentist, likely each with a tantrum and crying is more daunting, and would be far more traumatic for him.

Preschool Graduation

I finally got some pictures of Skylers little preschool graduation that we did. This time I did not forget my camera, but it died after I got a picture of the first 2 kids (neither of which were My own by the way) so I was totally at the mercy of the other wonderful mothers who were more prepared than me. In my defense though, we have only had to charge the battery on our camera 4 times in the last almost 4 years.

The graduation was nothing fancy, but cute and the kids loved it. We went to Lake Chaparral and used one of their little huts to hold out 'ceremony' where each child got a certificate, graduation hat, and then got to throw their hat in the air, and have a snack. Tannis was the lucky mom planning this event, and made cute little graduation cupcakes for the kids which they loved. We then took a walk around under the water fall and ended at the lake right by the park where the kids got to play for quite a while with all of their school frinds. It is sad that some of the kids we won't see a ton of anymore not that anyone moved, but our ward boundaries changes, so we don't see them regularily anymore.

Skyler loved school, really loved the field trips, and I think it was really good for him, but next year he gets to go 3 days a week to a preschool that I am not teaching, and I know that he will love that too.

Father's Day 2009

I hope Jordan had a good Fathers Day, he is sure special to his kids!

We started the day off with a cop out for eggs Benedict in bed for daddy, and the boys insisted on eating upstairs, I am soo glad that I insisted that they not eat on my bed - wow what a mess. The boys helped me make a banner for Jordan that we put up to help celebrate. We have early church, so after breakfast we ran around getting everyone ready for church, and then Jordan got to open his presents. He got a new bathing suit, sandals, and a BBq and scrub brush. At church all of the dad's got caramilk bars, which they loved!

I spent the afternoon making burgers and fry's that I had seen on bakerella, and they turned out soo cute! What a dad food, and for dessert!

Barnyard Birthday Bash

We finally had Ethan's birthday party today. Nobody was sick, and the weather was beautiful. Ethan had a Barnyard Birthday Bash. I made the invitations to look like a barn, and then put Ethan in as an animal in the loft. The kids started off just playing with balloons, and in the barn that we made out of fridge boxes (they loved this, and kept detouring to it during other games) Then we had the kids do a search for old Macdonald's farm animals that he lost. The kids and I (ok maybe it was just me) sang old Macdonald using the pictures that they found as prompts for what animal we had at the barn next. Then I read a story by Robert Munsch called PIGS. It is all about a girl who lets all of the pigs out of the pen, and finds them throughout her day. We followed that one by coralling our own pigs into the pig pen. I made a bunch of pigs out of balloons, and the kids each had a fly swatter to 'corral with'. This was my favorite activity by far! We had piggies in a blanket for lunch, with some chicken feed (granola type snack) watermelon, and juice boxes. The tractor cake made it's debut with these adorable little barnyard candles. The kids went nuts with the pig pinata, and we finished up with gifts, and the treat bags which were tied hobo fashion in fabric, and had a little barn, and animals in each, and they of course took home candy from the pinata. It was cute and fun, but I think I like doing kids parties better when I am not pregnant.

Frozen Bananas

I have so many healthy, or somewhat healthy snack ideas for summer. Today for our activity/snack we were dipping bananas to make frozen bananas. Normally this is an easy process, and not too messy, but today it was HORRIBLE! Ethan promptly fell, and got chocolate all over the place which he tried to clean with his hands, which were then wiped on his chest to clean his hands off, and Skyler's Popsicle stick fell out. Then Ethan managed to knock over the bowl of almonds, and made a mess there. Oh well, they tasted good this afternoon when everyone got them for snack. Maybe I didn't freeze the bananas long enough first?

Ethan's Two

Today is Ethan's second Birthday, and it is amazing how fast the time has gone. We were going to have a big family BBQ for his birthday tonight and a barnyard bash birthday party tomorrow, but he woke up throwing up yesterday (and the nasty weather of course sealed the deal) so we postponed. His party will be in 2 weeks, so I will be sure to post fun barnyard pictures.

This little man is soo funny, and handsome if I do say so my self. He has attitude, and definite opinions of what he will and wont do, and I am sure that he will stir up some trouble as he gets older, but I LOVE being his mom. I feel so blessed that I was chosen to raise him here on earth, and I am soo excited to see what the future years with him will bring.

To celebrate his birthday today I decided last minute to make some cookie monster cupcakes since we were not having a BBQ and all of the ice cream sandwiches I made would not be put to use today, and I think they turned out super cute, and were really easy to do.

Happy Birthday Ethan, I love you!

who's cool?

Ethan Obviously!

New Patio

I though Jordan had taken a few more pictures of this project, but oh well. I LOVE the way it turned out. When we moved in, there was one of those sidewalk block patios in the yard, functional, but not pretty, and Jordan has wanted to replace it with interlocking stone for the last 2 years and this year he did it!

Moved 40+ sidewalk blocks, built a small retaining wall for the garden.Leveled off where he removed soil, layed interlocking stone, re-sodded where needed, and now we have a very pretty yard!on a side note, one night Ethan wouldn't go to bed, Jordan called me to the backyard about an hour after Ethan was put to bed, and this is what I found