Hannah is four!

Our little sweetie Hannah Beverly turned 4 a couple of weeks ago on November 30th.  It was an off year for her so we didn’t have a friend birthday party, but we were able to do a fun combined family party with my niece, Allie, who turned one on the 24th. Hannah was so cute blowing out the candles. I love seeing how special a kid feels on their birthday. Really when they’re this young it doesn’t take much, but we enjoy every single tiny festivity.

 

 

Blowing like a champ.

 

The two birthday girls. It’d be fun to take one every year huh? This was the end of the night and poor little miss Allie was so tired but she obliged and we got this one non-blurry shot!

 

I made these scrum-diddly-umptious cupcakes that are totally vegan. They aren’t healthy, but all plant based.  They are made like hostess cupcakes with the blob of delicious creamy frosting inside. Now I have found a cupcake recipe that yields normal looking cupcakes that taste “real.”  Hooray!

I also took the girls out to lunch at Liberty Market, where the birthday person gets $10 towards their meal. I got a yummy sandwich and the kids shared a plate of spaghetti with extra bread. They gobbled it up and all wanted more. Guess I will have to buy two plates next time!

 

We also went to Party City and bought a bunch of balloons to put around our house to make it seem festive. Hannah loved choosing all the colors and chose mostly typical girl colors but surprised me by also choosing brown. Hannah felt so special wearing her “birthday girl” t-shirt and told everyone we saw that day that it was her birthday.

 

Hannah’s stats at age 4:

Weight: 33.2 lbs (25%)

Height: 40 3/4in (75%)

She got 4 shots the other day and did NOT like them. I mean, what kid does, but man. I have not heard her scream like that in a LONG time! She is still wearing her band-aids three days later.

Some things I want to remember about Hannah at this stage:

• She almost always ends up in our bed each night.
• She is sensitive to dairy and gluten
• She can write her name, but with the letters in random order
• She can skip, hop on one foot, and do a somersault
• She loves the park, especially swinging
• She is pretty confident trying new things, but acts shy and bashful as she goes about it
• She loves to hear the same books over and over as well as the same songs in the car over and over
• Hannah loves to cuddle and still likes to be carried around once in while. She is only just starting to get too long for that.
• Hannah loves any type of sweet or candy. She will not even hesitate to pop something in her mouth if it looks brightly colored and candy-like
• She is a little sneaky sometimes. I’ll catch her hiding in the living room eating chocolate chips sometimes, among other things.
• She likes to toe the line. Where Natalie is my rule follower, Hannah is my rule tester.

 

We love our little sweetie. She adds much laughter to our day and I love her more and more with each one that passes.

Halloween 2012

Halloween was so fun this year!  We had looked forward to it with such anticipation. Hannah was Rapunzel again this year so her costume was easy, Natalie was Strawberry Shortcake and Melanie helped me make her costume. Her wig was on loan from a friend after the red hair spray paint was such a huge mess at the ward party previously. I found Emily’s ballerina costume at Goodwill for a few dollars, and Mark’s and my costumes were borrowed. So all in all a good show! Mark is Vector from Despicable Me and I am a pirate. Arrr!

 

We had such a blast at the Albrecht Halloween party. It’s their 9th annual party and I have been at the past 7. We have so many good memories from these parties! This is Natalie with Mark’s cuz Shayla. She’s a freshman and a very talented flutist! She is my student and the girls are tickled to get to see her when she comes for lessons. Shayla and Natalie competed against each other in the donut eating contest.

These girls were so cute. Emily’s costume was so cute because she is in a run-on-tiptoes phase so she really looked like a ballerina tiptoeing across a stage. She felt so frilly and grown up, we could tell by the way she carefully moved about and her little bashful smile whenever we looked at her.

Emily and Vector playing with the Albrecht’s fun yard toys. I love that we live in a warm place where my kids can be in short sleeves for Halloween!

 

Emily slid down this slide over and over again and laughed so hard every time she landed on her bum at the bottom. It was awesome.

 

The girls were thrilled about the pinata. They have seen them on many of their shows so they were so excited to whack one themselves! I’m not sure which was best: the whacking or the candy!

We trick-or-treated at my parents’ house  as usual with all the cousins. Tommy was the keeper of the glow necklaces that my parents were handing out with the candy.

On the couch are all the cousins: L-R Emily, Hannah, Brooklyn, Allie (a turtle), Natalie, Charlie (a bird character from Curious George, can’t remember the name), Chloe (Plum Pudding), and Tommy (Curious George).

They really got into the trick-or-treating. Emily finally figured out what was going on and said “tee tee tee!” with the rest of the kids at each house.

 

The girls with their spoils. We let them eat some candy, then the next morning surprised them with a new toy to trade for the candy. It worked and we were all happy!

Whew. Halloween is fun, but it takes so much energy! lol. This year was even more fun because Mark actually enjoyed wearing his costume. Score!

Fall has arrived

Folks, we’ve got big news. The water coming out of the tap is….COLD! Yes, we are as shocked and relieved as you. We thought the summer would never end. That is not to say that the hot weather is gone. The 100s are gone, but we still get into the upper 90s most days. But still, that is such a relief from the continuous heat. The kids and I bade fall break farewell by visiting a pumpkin patch in north Mesa. Yeah, I didn’t realize how far away it was when I bought the Groupon. It took like 30 minutes to drive there! Sheesh. But it was really fun and well worth the trip. If it were closer I’d make this an annual tradition. We’ll have to stick to a pumpkin patch closer to home next time.

Amazingly, they all looked through this thing and smiled. For a few seconds while I fumbled for my cell phone. Yes, I forgot to grab my camera (forehead smack). Thankfully I got a few cell phone pics before the battery died (just my luck).

Bounce houses are always a favorite of ours. Emily tried it for 3 seconds then decided she wanted off. My kids jumped for a while, then got out to get slathered with sunscreen (I DID remember that). As we were lotioning up, the bounce house motor thingy ran out of gas and it collapsed! Really quickly. The kids still inside were like, “hey, what’s happening!?” and a bunch of adults ran over to help them out. It was hilarious but my kids were very concerned for the ones left behind. I pointed out that they would be safe and then tried to help them see the humor in the situation. In reality if my kids were in there and it collapsed, they would probably freak out and scream. That would not have been so hilarious.

Pony rides! They chose the smallest, cutest little pony. Emily wasn’t such a big fan, and was more entertained by putting a penny in and out of her pocket than by the fact that she was riding a horse. No picture of her because I had to hold her on while she rode.

 

Natalie looks almost too big for this pony! lol

They also had this cute little hay bale maze set up. The kids got a kick out of it. Even Emily walked around and around. I could tell she felt like one of the big kids.

 

Barrel train. I plopped Emily down in one by herself and they drove off before I realized, hey, she’s all alone in her little car. What if she starts crying? What if she bonks her head? My baby! I should have put her in the car with Natalie. They went down this little road barely out of my sight but I was so worried! But all was good. They returned with smiling, dusty little faces.

Here is Emily running through this huge tire half buried in the ground. There were several in a row to play around with.

After we had our fill of previously mentioned activities, we hopped on a hay ride that took us down to a little petting zoo. It was fun as all petting zoos are, but the coolest thing was this peacock in the tree. It was so beautiful! The kids were more interested in the incredibly soft little bunny. Natalie held it but it scratched her arm as it was trying to escape her grasp. She was about to be sad, but then I was like, “wow! A real bunny scratch! What a cool story to go along with that owie!” and then she was all proud. It’s all about the reaction, folks.

Anyway, after we petted all the animals and washed our hands (with real soap and water set out for our use, isn’t that nice?) we got back on the hay ride and went a little further down the road to the “pumpkin patch.” It was as much of a pumpkin patch as the local grocery store is, but the kids thought it was neat. The big girls each picked out a small pumpkin (for the same price as a grocery store big pumpkin, sheesh) and took it back to the original area to decorate with stickers and paint.

They had a really good time and before we knew it, we had been there for over two hours! We were covered in dirt and other unpleasant outdoor/animal stuff but raced home to get dinner fixed for the sister missionaries. Whew. The timing worked out perfectly even though we got red lights the whole way home. I was praying for greens because we were running late, but Heavenly Father must have known that I would be able to get it done even with red lights and sure enough, I was. Lesson in trusting in the Lord’s timing.

Hooray for Fall. Next up, Halloween!

Lil’ Sweetie

Can you believe this little girl is 19 months old now? {ignore the messy mirror in the following photos}

I know every parent says this, but seriously, the time has flown.  This was her first real hair do.

She goes to nursery at church now, and does really well. As long as I’m in there with her.

She seems like such a baby still! Especially compared to the big year olds.

Emily loves books. She could probably sit for a straight thirty minutes and be read to. It’s the first thing she does when she wakes up. “Books!” She also loves going outside (“ousss”).  The stroller (“lo-lo”) is a source of great excitement especially if we’re going to the park (“paht”).

This girl is so brave. She thinks she’s a big kid sometimes and literally jumps right into whatever’s going on. All summer she just jumped right into the swimming pool. I had to constantly keep my eyes on her because she jumped in so fearlessly. I finally put floaties on her even though she’s  a little young, just to make sure she would bob and not sink if she jumped in while I was looking at one of the other kids.

She is learning her colors and gets them right about 25% of the time. She can do many body parts, including elbow, chest, knee, and neck. Here she is showing me her nose.

And her “mouf.” She can say so many words, seeming to add more each day. The one word we always chuckle at is how she says yes. “hum” is how she says it. We like to ask her a series of yes/no questions in a row to hear her say “hum” at every one.

Every time my injured finger  is mentioned, Emily always says “’dage” meaning “garage.” Our conversation always goes like this:

Me: Emily, did mommy hurt her finger?

Em: Dage! (pronounced dodge)

Me: the door of the garage?

Em: hum

Me: did mommy cry? "

Em: hum

Me: Was mommy sad?

Em: hum

She’s so funny.

I prefer “gracefully challenged.”

You would think that since part of my livelihood (not to mention a great source of enjoyment for me) is playing the flute, I would take better care of my fingers.

Back in June I smashed my left ring finger in my car door. I was at Walmart with the kids and after I got my crying under control, we quickly went straight in to the frozen section where I got a bag of frozen peas and held it to my finger the whole time. It was excruciatingly painful, and I don’t even know how I got through the shopping trip.  The bruising went away after a couple of weeks, then the black swollen nail grew out and fell off, then new nail grew in. It’s a little lumpy but it looks pretty much normal. Because the pain was virtually nonexistent so soon I knew it hadn’t been broken. Total recovery time: 4 months.

That morning, I had played my flute at a funeral. I said a thank-you prayer that this accident didn’t happen the day before because there’s NO WAY I could have played my flute. Then I only had to play at flute lessons, and I was able to avoid most playing while it was still in pain.

 

Fast forward to last week. I was trying to close my garage door (the outside automatic one) and it kept bouncing up after coming down. I was out in the car about to drive to exercise class with my two littler ones in their car seats. I decided to pull the red cord to be able to close it manually (can you see where this is going?). Went outside and put my fingers in the highest gap between panels that I could reach to get it to roll down. Sure enough, I didn’t get my left middle finger out in time and it got squished between panels. It HURT. SO. BAD!! I can’t even describe it. I panicked for a split second after a quick tug would not release it, but then kept my wits about me. I reached down with my right hand and rolled upward two feet or so until the crack opened and I was able to pull it out. Then I proceeded to cry and cry. My poor kids had no idea what was going on. I could not even speak. After a few minutes somehow I drove the car back into the garage and got the kids out. Plopped them in front of the TV and went to lie down in my bed because I was feeling weak and nauseous from the pain. After it subsided a little (ice made it feel worse) I tried to rinse it off with the tiniest trickle of water (it was dusty from the garage door). That small amount of water caused so much pain I started crying all over again. I remembered that lavender oil helps with bruising so I dripped some on my finger and the pain lessened quite a bit. Took some ibuprofen and basically had a “sick” day because I wasn’t able to do pretty much anything. The worst was trying to change Em’s diapers. She hates it and rolls and kicks and it is impossible to do it with one hand so I had to use my left hand. Oh, it hurt.

 

Anyway, I know there are worse pains to be had and I’m just having a pity party over here, but I wanted to record it. The finger doesn’t have as much pain as it did a week ago but it is swollen and the nail is black. There was obviously some nerve damage and I have no sensation in the tip of my finger. It was squashed as flat as a pancake when I got it out and some blood blisters formed instantly. The nail is black but I am anticipating the return of a regular nail by Valentine’s Day 2013. Thankfully I don’t have orchestra rehearsal until a week from Saturday. I’m hoping to have a little sensation back by then so I can tell if I’m covering the hole of my flute key. If not I’ll have to borrow a plug from one of  my students.

 

May the rest of my fingers stay whole and uninjured!

Growing up

On the first day of kindergarten, Natalie lost her first tooth! She had been wiggling it for a while and was asking me how she would know if it was ready to come out. I said, “try pulling it.” She did, and POP! It fell right out and onto the table. She was so surprised! It was hilarious. She and I made a little tooth pouch and put her tooth in it to leave for the tooth fairy. She woke up to a dollar the next day. It was so cute to watch her enjoy the magic of it all. Her adult teeth had already grown in behind the baby teeth before the baby teeth were even loose so we were relieved when we finally got rid of those baby ones. It would not have been fun to lose her first tooth in the dentist’s chair!