Finally! House Pictures!

Living room (Love the tree? We do! It rocks living in a place where you can go cut our own tree! Don't get that in the southwest!)

Family/Dining Room

Kitchen

View from upstairs

Boy's room

Girls' room

Master Bedroom


Master Bathroom

The carnage which is the playroom. (downstairs)


Someday I hope to actually have stuff on the walls. The kids rooms have wallpaper borders that will someday be put up...someday...
There is another bedroom (white walls, lots of boxes) a full bathroom and a half bath with the laundry room as well as a few closets I didn't take pictures of. I figured this would be good enough.

Broken Arm Update

I took A to the Pediatric Orthopedic today. He was great. He took X-rays and determined that yes, her arm is still broken but is healing nicely. He said we no longer have to keep it bound down to her side with ACE Bandages. She is lucky she's a baby because babies heal quickly. Everything is lined up nicely and we don't have to go back again.
Whew! That's great. Now I just have to keep the K from pulling, twisting or otherwise re-injuring that arm. That's the hard part!

Our Trip

It comes to a close tomorrow. I always think I'm taking so many pictures, but I didn't. I didn't take pictures with the Great Grandparents. I didn't take pictures with Grandma and Grandpa B or Uncle Justin. No pics from the sandbox, walking the dog, driving the tractor (a small feet-propelled bit of plastic) or various other insignificant but fun activities. Below are the ones I did manage to take though. Enjoy!

Just a quick blurp

One of my favorite blogs, Mormon Mommy Blogs is doing a giveaway a day. Today they showcasing Sweet Cake Bake Shop which is 100% gluten free sweets! I love this for my dear friend Emily. I would love to try some of their stuff and see if it is as good as they promise. Anyway, check it out!

Now this day is over.

To finish out my day, I made rolls that didn't rise and cinnamon rolls that we never even bothered baking. I discovered that this is actually my 100th post. I went to the emergency roomand saw the terrible xray proving just how very very wrong I was about A's arm not being broken. Got a hot fudge brownie shake that wasn't properly mixed and stayed up until 2 am talking with an old friend. Good night.

Is this day over yet?

This is my 100th post! I was going to do something awesome like 100 ways I am amazing or some other equally fascinating something. I'm too tired. Plus I want to share my day with you.

*Sigh*

This morning K wanted to help roll A over. So she did. It is awkward and rough but A takes it like a trooper. Really, the girl is tough. Not long after, A was on her tummy and D wanted to help her roll over. (A can roll from her back to her tummy but then she is stuck :)
In his overzealous, loving way D rolled her over and this time A's shoulder and arm got pinned under her. This too has happened before. However, when I freed A's arm it was very limp and at an odd angle....
She didn't break it (I'm pretty sure but I didn't actually take her out for X-rays). Across the street from Mom and Dad's house is the "neighborhood nurse". I've known Cindy for as long as I can remember and we headed over there for a preliminary medical opinion. After some discussion, prodding, wiggling and much crying (not by me thankyouverymuch!) we determined to let A take a nap and see how things go.
After her nap, A seemed to be better. Her arm still hurts but we pinned it down with an ace bandage. This interfers with her thumb/other thumb/back to the first thumb sucking pattern. Mostly she is okay but very sad and sensitive. An old high school friend is coming over tonight. She is an Occupational Therapist at Primary Children's Hospital. I totally plan on exploiting her skills for free!

Also, it is snowing. And windy. Snow breeds excitement and wanting to play. Wind breeds cold cold cold! So now I have squirrely kids bouncing off walls and annoying people.

Oh, and it's BYU football today. Uh, I don't know how many of you follow BYU football but it usually involves much yelling, grumping and possibly throwing of objects at this house. Especially when BYU is playing poorly, as they were today.

Um, what else? Oh yea, D came in with two snowballs to make "snowball shakes". In a fit of "I'm gonna be the cool mom who lets her kids experience things" I threw it in the Magic Bullet, added some sugar, vanilla and Nesquick powder. D loved it. I'm still having waves of heebie-geebies...

K burned her arm last night. We made cookies and she tried to get a cookie off the pan that just came out of the oven. It is okay. She cried for a while and has mostly recovered. So today I thought I would take the gauze off. I did. She needed more. Couldn't live with out more gauze. Oh her owwie. Get the gauze. So I did.

K also has taken to going downstairs on her stomach. She does okay but biffed it and flipped over and hit the wall the last time. Good thing kids have soft bones. If I did that I would probably be in traction.

Oh yes, my personal favorite from today. Dutchess, mom and dad's black lab/mutt dog, was sitting in the living room. She turned her head to go out of the room just as D came flying up the stairs like a bat out of the basement. Crack. They headbutted each other. We all laughed, except D who now has a goose egg right in the middle of his head. And Dutchess.

On the upside, no one has been to the hospital -- yet. (pray for me) No one has totally snapped and been carried away to the loony bin -- yet. BYU is done playing, and they won. Barely.

Should that picture have even been there?

I was just on Facebook and someone had sent me a cause to join. It was against child abuse. I am very against child abuse so I clicked to join the cause--even though I usually don't join causes on Facebook because I really don't see the point. Anyway, I joined. After clicking the join or support or whatever button, my browser went to the "Thanks for joining our cause" screen. As it was a child abuse related cause, there was a picture of a child. This was a young child who had been terribly beaten on her face. I honestly nearly started crying.
Here's my issue. I abhor child abuse. The thought of children hurting nearly kills me. Honestly, I cry when I take my kids to get their shots. This picture sent chills down me and will probably stick with me for the rest of my life. I know there is abuse out there. I am not shutting my mind to it. I would take any child in a heartbeat. But I do not need to see the pictures to prove there are children hurting. Now I am wishing I hadn't joined the cause. Especially because I don't see how my clicking a button in Facebook helps any child anywhere.
What do you think?

Time Out for Women

Last weekend, I went to an awesome conference with some of the wonderful women in my life. The conference is called Time Out for Women and it is put on by Deseret Book. It really was great. I went to TOFW with a couple of goals. One of the biggest things I was hoping to get was a recharge from being around so many women who have the same goals, concerns, challenges, hopes as I do. I was feeling down about some of the things going on in the world and our country. I wanted to feel the spirit and companionship that comes from being with nearly 3,000 LDS women.

It is really hard to pick my favorite presenter. Mary Ellen Edmunds is just hilarious. She is able to convey a message of assurance and hope while making herself and everyone else laugh. The same was true of Emily Watts. The one that made me cry the most was Emily Freeman as she shared personal experiences of trials and depression. The one I took the most notes on was Jill C. Manning who talked about Pornography and teaching our children about pronography. She talked about teaching our children truth relating to our bodies, our home and our sacred sexuality. Really good talk.

Chieko Okazaki helped me with the concept of teaching children correct principles then letting them govern themselves as taught by the Prophet Joseph Smith. And Carolyn Rasmus spoke of the Atonement as a cover to protect and help us through this life.

The two musical presenters were very good. Who knew Hilary Weeks was so hilarious?!

The wonderful women who went with me:

my MIL, (me), my mom, Aunt Sue, her daughter Haylee (holding A), Aunt Linda, Grandma and Aunt Jewel Not pictured is Sue's SIL who insisted on taking the picture.

If any of you get a chance to go to a TOFW event, I would strongly recommend it. It is so great to go and be spiritually fed in a relaxed environment with a bunch of women with the same values!

Anecdotes

This weekend we spent some time at my Grandma and Grandpa's house. I want to record some stories from the kids. Feel free to read and enjoy.

Grandpa asked K if she was ready to lay down. Being 2 she said,"NO!" Being a worn out Grandpa, he laid down on her sleeping bag and promptly fell asleep. One thing you should know about my dad is that he tends to jump out of his skin when he gets woken up in even pleasant ways. So imagine how high he must have jumped with K jumped on top of him and woke him up! Great-Grandpa likes to tell this story and smiles when he tells how K just "laughed and laughed".


K woke up in the wee hours of the morning. She came to bed with me. About half an hour later I woke up to feed A. As I was feeding A, K was still awake and talking to me. She heard a noise and asked, "Issa cow?" (it's a cow?)
"No, its a rooster."
"Issa sooser?" she asked.
"Yes, a rooster."
Then she would lay there until the rooster crowed again. "Issa sooser."
She started asking me, "Dudin sleepy?"
"Yes, Uncle Justin is sleeping."
"D sleepy?"
"Yes, D's sleeping."
Silence for a moment then, "BUDDY SLEEPY?" (Very loud and excited like) (Buddy is Great-Grandpa's dog.)
"Yes, Buddy's sleeping."
It seems that everyone was sleeping but the 'soosers', K, her 'sisser' and me!

K was petting Great-Grandpa's dog. I asked, "Is that a dog?" Her response? "No, issa Buddy!"

Sunday, D slept in and stayed home with Great-Grandma while the rest of us went to church. When we got back, we started packing to head home. I asked if he was ready to go. He said, "No I want to stay for one more whole day!"

Great-Grandma asked Grandma, "How much does he read?" (referring to D). While D was staying with Great-Grandma, she got out a small box of cereal for him. He looked at it and told her, "I don't really want Banana-Nut Cheerios. I just want regular Cheerios." Great-Grandma was surprised at him knowing they were Banana-Nut Cheerios.

D is a particular child. He also loves trains. We took a train set down to Great-Grandma's house. While everyone was at church, D asked Great-Grandma to build a train track with him but she HAD to read the directions and do it right. (She couldn't read the directions so he waited until everyone got home.)

Saturday night we had a party for one of my uncle's at my grandma's house. My uncle has several kids who also have kids. One of the boy's is 10 years old. He was AWESOME with D. At first D was hiding under a table being shy. His cousin came and just kept playing with him until they were both running around like crazy, madmen. I love to see other kids being nice to my kid, ya know?

A was loved by all. I went to Time Out for Women (more to come on that later!) with 8 other wonderful women. Aunt Sue (who is practicing to become a grandma herself!) particularly enjoyed holding A. She would take A to the back and bounce her when she was fussy and snuggle her to put her to sleep. Grandma Pyatt snuggled her while she took a nap. Really, it's gotta be great to be a baby!

A postcard for my friends!

For those of you who have been here (or who still live here) you know what I'm talking about. Home Sweet Home!

I'm home visiting family for a few weeks. My mom drove up to pick us up last week. We spent the last two days driving south and here we are. *sigh* nothing like three kids in a car for two days :)

Actually they did great. Today we have just played and played. The kids jumped on the tramp, dug in the sandbox, swung (is that a word?) on the swings, built train tracks and teased their grandpa. Good times (noodle salad!).

Funny Kid Things:

"Well Grandma, if you are in a forest and it is raining, you must be in a rainforest!" -- D on the phone when grandma was driving to our house.

I dumped all of K's candy out of her pumpkin. I left D's candy in his Elmo bucket though. So tonight, K got a hold of D's Elmo and methodically transferred all his candy to her pumpkin so that her candy was no longer "all gone". The girl is a thinker, I tell you.

And sweet little A.......she is so big. Although she is not even four months old, we put her in the exersaucer and she kept herself upright and played. She thinks she is so big. Really, 4 months going on 8 months. Even the 6 month clothes are getting too small.... dang...

Last night grandma set up the Pack 'n Play for A to sleep in. K assumed it was for her and went to bed in it. Poor A was relegated to the floor. Tonight both D and K are sleeping down in the bunkbeds in Uncle Rick's room. (That's right Rick! D's on your bed. Hope he doesn't have an accident....)