Kitty time

With Blondie in kindergarten now, that leaves me at home with just Kitty and Baby K in the mornings. I was a little concerned at first that Kitty would have a hard time with Blondie gone but the more I thought about it, the more I came to the conclusion that Kitty was going to love having some time to play by herself and some more one on one time with me.

On Tuesday (Blondie's first day), we needed to go to the grocery store. When we were getting ready to leave, Kitty kept saying (with a big smile on her face), "It'll just be you, me and Baby K. Is that right?"

We went to Macey's because they were having a really good sale on some bulk items and I wanted to get a couple more things before the sale ended. When we got to the store I was debating whether to get just a regular cart or one of the carts with a play car for Kitty to sit in. Then I remembered that I have seen little kids in the past pushing around mini-size shopping carts in the store. So I went over to the customer service desk and behind the desk they have these mini carts that you can "check-out" for your kids to use. So I asked Kitty if she would like to push her own cart and her whole face lit up. We got a cart for her and she had the best time pushing it around the store. Whenever I picked up an item that I needed I would ask her if she wanted it in her cart or in my cart. By the time I was ready to check out she had her little mini-cart completely full. When we went up to the check stand to start unloading the carts I tried to unload some things from her cart and she didn't want me to touch anything in it. She wanted to unload everything from it herself.

Before we went out to the parking lot we had to turn the cart back in and when we did so the lady behind the service desk handed Kitty a helium balloon. She was so excited and happy! She was pretty much on cloud 9 by the time we got home and was very excited to tell everyone about her day.

**Now whenever I tell her we need to go to the store she wants to know what store we are going to and if they have little carts there.

Feel the pain...

Yesterday Luke had his expander removed, adjusted and then put back in his mouth so he was a little sore when dinnertime came around. We were discussing Luke's sore mouth and DH asked the kids if we should have braces put on my teeth (he likes to bring this up periodically because my teeth are a little crooked and I have never had braces). A couple of the kids said "no", a couple said "yes", but Luke's answer was the best. He said, "Yeah! Then she can feel the pain of soreness."

Say what?? We all got a big kick out of that for the rest of dinnertime.

The HUGE impact of bloggers

There was a small plane crash a couple of weeks ago in Arizona involving an LDS couple by the names of Christian & Stephanie Nielson. The pilot died in the crash and Christian & Stephanie were both severely burned. Family & friends of theirs are hosting hundreds of fundraising auctions today and through the weekend to help raise money for their medical bills and care of their four small children. The button above is a link to a website devoted to fundraising for the family. There are also more links for info on the family and the accident. Stephanie grew up in Provo and her dad is a member of the Utah State House of Representatives. Stephanie has a blog entitled NieNie Dialogues that has a huge following of faithful readers. To read info on their progress you can visit her sister's blog: C Jane Enjoy It

While I don't know the family personally, I know that her blog has touched many people. Plus, who can resist someone with such an awesome name?!? She actually found my blog a couple of years ago through a sister of a sister-in-law and emailed me about the name connection. It's been amazing to see the huge outpouring of love and support for this family that most of us only know through the blogging world.

A lot of the auctions are listed at this site:
Design Mom

Blondie starts kindergarten!

Today was Blondie's first day of kindergarten! She was 2 weeks old when we moved into this house and M&M started kindergarten. I can't believe that it's Blondie's turn now! She has been super excited and nervous all at the same time. This morning M&M woke her up at 6:45 to start getting ready for school (probably a little earlier than Blondie needs to get up). She got right up though and got herself dressed and then ran upstairs to get on her shoes and backpack (which we had gotten ready the night before). I was on the couch with Baby K and told her that she could take her backpack off and eat some breakfast first. The kids don't have to leave for the bus stop until 8:00.

After seeing her off to the bus stop and waiting for the bus to come, I hopped in the car with Kitty and we drove to school to help Blondie find where to line up and wait for her teacher. Blondie said that she sat next to M&M on the bus and kept sliding off the seat. :)

At school we found where her class was supposed to line up and then her teacher came out and was saying "hi" to the kids. Then when the bell rang the teacher started counting the kids and wanted to wait a few extra minutes for the few kids that were missing. I started looking around at the class and noticed that there were very few boys lined up. I only counted 4 boys there and there are 24 kids in the class! I asked the teacher if the class was mostly girls and she said that it was. (Luke's kindergarten class had almost 3 girls for every boy and this class looks like it's 4 girls for every boy!) Blondie certainly doesn't mind though being from a family with mostly girls - she thinks boys are stinky!

After waiting for a few minutes the teacher started to take the class into the school (and found that the door was locked). So she sent someone around to open up the door for them. Then Kitty and I waved one last time to Blondie and she went off into the school.

So far I have only gotten teary-eyed when M&M started kindergarten. Luke didn't faze me at all because socially he was very ready for it and then it wasn't too bad watching Blondie go off into the school either. I will probably get a little more emotional when I send our last one though. One thing that definitely helps is knowing that she has two older siblings on the bus and at school with her if she needs help. I realized the other day that this is the first time in our family life that I have had more then half of our kids in school. It is a nice break in the mornings that goes by rather fast.

At around 11:30 we went out to the corner to wait for the bus and I crossed my fingers hoping that Blondie would be on it - and she was. She had a great first day and didn't even seem particularly tired - but she was hungry!

Daddy & Baby K

This is the usual sight at our house at dinnertime - Baby K sitting on her dad's lap. Almost without fail Baby K wants to eat right around dinnertime and I really would rather eat before I feed her. So she usually ends up in the exersaucer in the kitchen next to the table while I get everyone their food and then try and eat as fast as I can. Baby K usually ends up starting to fuss and then after a few minutes her dad will go over and pick her up and she is perfectly content to sit on his lap until dinner is over. This is pretty much the routine now, so I thought that the shirt below was perfect for her (and him):

Sleeping arrangements

I decided yesterday that it was about time to start putting Baby K to bed in the crib in Kitty's room. I'm a little sad with this move but there's really no reason for her to be in my room anymore since she is consistently sleeping through the night. She started out sleeping in bed with me and then we alternated between my bed and her car seat and once she started sleeping through the night she didn't need to sleep with me anymore. I know sleeping in a car seat sounds pretty weird, but I love it because I can put the car seat right next to my bed and the baby feels nice and secure wrapped in a blanket. I used to think people were weird who did it, but I love the fact that it keeps the baby in a semi-reclined position in case they are stuffed up or spit up a little in their sleep. Blondie slept in her car seat off and on and then Kitty slept in it all the time for the first few months - she and I did not sleep well together for some reason. Luke slept with me all the time and M&M slept in a bassinet attachment that goes to our Pack 'n Play.

I have always loved sleeping with my babies because they are so warm and cuddly and they are only little for a short time. When I had Luke, my husband was not too crazy about the idea of having the baby in bed with me, but Luke and I both slept so much better when we did. I have always slept with my arm under the baby's head and on the side away from my husband. Over the years DH has really warmed up to the idea because he realizes how short the time is as well. (I think that at first he thought that it would become a habit that I would have a hard time breaking the baby & myself of.) Once the babies start to get bigger and mobile, I start to not sleep as well and know that it's time for them to move out. DH gets a little sad for me when that time comes because it's a sign that our baby is growing up (and way too fast).

At this point Baby K is too big for the bassinet and getting too mobile for the car seat - plus like I mentioned before she is sleeping through the night without any problems - my first baby to do this before 1 year!! So last night after she fell asleep I laid her down in the crib and hooked up the baby monitor. I woke up at about 6:20 this morning and she was still sound asleep in the position I had laid her down in. About 10 minutes later I heard her making some noises and went in to check on her. She was wide awake and when she saw me broke into a huge grin and started flapping her arms and legs. Her first night in the crib was a success!

Rolling like crazy!

Now that Baby K has figured out how to roll from her back to her stomach she won't quit doing it! Not more than 30 seconds after laying her down she immediately flips to her stomach and then starts making sounds of frustration after a couple of minutes because she doesn't know what to do next. Now she just needs to learn how to roll back to her back and she'll be all set.

Hit the jackpot!

Blondie was complaining at the pool the other day that her swimsuit was too tight and I come to find out that it is a size too small and very tight on her. So I went looking through M&M's old clothes for a bigger swimsuit for Blondie and couldn't find one the next size up. I think that when I was putting away that size clothes I decided to get rid of the swimsuit because it was looking pretty worn. I also can't find the next size up for Baby K and I think that I ended up doing the same thing with that one.

So today I went to ShopKo to look for a swimsuit for Blondie and Baby K and ended up stocking up on some spring/summer clothes and swimsuits for next year for the girls. They had some 2 piece outfits for Baby K with long pants & short sleeve shirts for less than $2.50 for the set! I couldn't believe it! That is cheaper even than the D.I. where most items are at least $2-3 each. All the swimsuits I got were $5-7 each which is much cheaper than you can ever find at the beginning of the season. All along I have been thinking that in some ways it's nice to have all of these girls because then we can just hand down all of the clothes, but I am finding that a lot of clothes just do not last through 2 or 3 kids.

I ended up buying 6 swimsuits (thinking ahead for the next year or two), 2 complete outfits plus a shirt for Baby K, 1 outfit plus a skort for Kitty and short sleeve shirts for M&M and Blondie - all for less than $70! Kitty was really getting into the clothes searching and found a really cute Disney Princess swimsuit for Baby K and she was so excited! I also got some shirts for myself at ShopKo last week for $2-3 each and some great clothes at J.C. Penneys on clearance for less than $5 each. I love end of the season sales!

Rolling again!!

Halfway there!
The lower half is over, just the arms are in the way now!
So close!
Look at the concentration on that face!
Phew!! Taking a break!
Trying again...
Made it!!
So PROUD!!
The last week or so Baby K has been getting much better at rolling. At first she would just stick her legs straight up in the air and then use her weight to roll to her side and then she's been rapidly progressing since then. Baby K rolled over once on Monday (without anyone watching) and then twice on Tuesday (with no one watching the first time and Kitty watching the second time). Then today she has been rolling like crazy! Every time I put her down on the floor on her back, within a couple of minutes she is on her tummy! Then she immediately starts looking around for something that she can grab at. It's really cute to watch her progressing! She still isn't completely content on her stomach but she's getting much better with her arm and neck strength.

Back to school again!

M&M and Luke went back to school on Monday! Blondie doesn't start until next Tuesday, but we went to the school yesterday to meet her teacher and have some testing to see what she knows. Her teacher is the same one that M&M had for kindergarten and she is super nice! Blondie was very excited to go and meet her but was very shy once she finally did. I don't think we know any of the kids in her class but I know she will do just fine and will quickly make friends.

M&M is in 5th grade and told me after the first day that she loves her teacher because she is super nice. Hopefully she will still feel that way at the end of the year. I don't know much about M&M's teacher other than she has been teaching at the school for several years and is really nice. Luke is in 2nd grade and has a new teacher - that can be good or bad. Luke has a few friends from church in his class this year. We will have the opportunity to meet all of their teachers at Back to School Night tomorrow.

Anniversary

Our wedding anniversary was on Sunday (12 years!), but as you can probably guess we didn't celebrate it this weekend because of DH's illness. We were planning on going out to dinner and a movie on Saturday but have had to postpone the celebration indefinitely. My parents were going to watch the kids for us and there isn't a time this weekend that we can go and then my parents are going to be out of town for next two weekends. So we'll either have to find another sitter for the kids or wait until next month sometime... :(

Going solo

DH came home from work Friday not feeling too well and things just got progressively worse on Saturday. He had some extremely intense pain in his abdomen that peaked Saturday night. He thinks that it may be in the appendix area where he had inflammation previously a couple of years ago (they almost performed an appendectomy but the surgeon talked him out of it). On Saturday he tried to work through the pain and managed to get some work done on a woodworking project (making shelves for our food storage). By nighttime though he was in some pretty intense pain and thought it unlikely that he would make it to church the next day. So I started trying to figure out how I would juggle all 5 kids at church since leaving any of them home with a sick dad is just not an option - the biggest problem being what to do with Baby K while I play the piano in primary.

Sunday morning came and I got all the kids ready for 9 a.m. church and we even got there a few minutes early. (I even had them in their nice dresses from my sister's wedding with their hair curled!) I had decided that I would just bring Baby K with me to primary and lay her down on some blankets behind me at the piano. Once I got to church I realized that Kitty hasn't been going to nursery lately and what would I do if she didn't go today? That would be one more kid to manage while I'm trying to play the piano. We stopped at the primary room first and dropped off all my stuff and I left Baby K there with M&M so I could take Luke and Blondie to their classes. As I started to leave, Kitty decided that she would stay with M&M too and climbed up on the seat next to her.

After dropping off Luke and Blondie I went back to the primary room to ask Kitty if I could take her to nursery - to which she agreed! So I took her to the nursery room and said goodbye to her and she was totally fine with me leaving - YEA!! I had M&M continue to hold Baby K during opening exercises and then I went and sat with her in the back of the primary room. I was considering having M&M hold Baby K again during singing time or laying her down behind the piano, but after talking a little with the primary president I decided to lay Baby K down in the back of the room with a few toys and if she started fussing someone in the presidency would take care of her - since I can't really do anything with her while I'm playing. So I laid her back in the corner on some blankets and then went back to play the piano for singing time. I had a little bit of a hard time doing this because I couldn't really see her at all while I was at the piano. If I moved to the side a little I could see her legs so I knew that when she was kicking them around she was alright.

After Senior primary was done, Junior primary came in. Luke's class sits in the back near where I laid Baby K so I told Luke to help keep an eye on her for me. During sharing time for junior primary I took Baby K to the mother's room and fed her and then I looked in on Kitty in nursery - she looked fine. Then I went back to the primary room and laid Baby K back down in the the back of the room again and she ended up falling asleep while junior primary was having singing time.

During Sacrament Meeting I had to go out and feed Baby K again and I just had Kitty come with me. Other than that Sacrament Meeting was pretty uneventful (at least as uneventful as can be expected with 5 young kids).

So we made it and the kids for the most part were awesome! It is definitely nice though having DH at church with us - he was definitely missed! And I'm definitely glad I'm not a single parent...

DH stayed home from work on Monday but was feeling well enough to go back on Tuesday. He still has some pain in his abdomen but nowhere near the degree it was on Saturday and Sunday.

Back in business

I can finally launch the FamilySearch Indexing program again! Back to arbitrating...

Diving board

Yesterday we met my sister-in-law Jay and her 2 boys, Con-man and T-Rex, at my parents' house so we could go to the pool together (they are visiting from Idaho for a few days). We went with my parents to the pool down the street from them. It was pretty crazy because Baby K was awake the whole time and it was VERY sunny. I was very concerned about Baby K's fair skin and didn't want her in the sun very much because it is so easy to get sunburned here. My mom mostly took charge of Baby K and my dad and I had Kitty and Blondie most of the time. M&M swam around with her cousins and aunt Jay and Luke played some with them and spent some time by himself in the shallower part of the pool.
When we were first getting everyone situated I was trying to find M&M and found her in line with her cousins at the diving board! She has never been off the diving board before so I left my mom with the three little ones and quickly went over to the diving board area with my camera. I went over to talk with M&M and asked her if she was going to be okay jumping off the diving board. She told me that she was fine but was wondering when she would know when to jump off. I told her that usually you have to wait until the person before you has jumped and then swam off to the side of the pool and then you can go. Jay and my dad were in the water at the side of the pool in case she needed help so I felt fine with letting her jump. I went over to the side and got ready with the camera.

Here she is jumping off for the first time.
After jumping off a couple of times M&M played in the pool with her cousins for a little while. Later she went back to the diving board and I came over to take some pictures of her cousins going off the high dive and M&M asked me if she could do a front flip off of the dive! She has had some practice doing front flips at tumbling class and so she wanted to try it off the diving board. I think it also helps that our neighbors have a trampoline that they jump on a lot. I told her that she could do it if she wanted to so I got some pictures of her doing front flips off the diving board! M&M ended up doing a flip off the diving board 4 times. I just got a picture of the tail end of it the first time around so I asked if she felt comfortable enough to do it again. The second time someone walked in front of me just as I was taking the picture.
I got some good shots though of the 3rd and 4th times. M&M is definitely more daring than I was at that age!Baby K and M&M have matching suits. Baby K's suit I bought 3 years ago when Kitty was a baby and M&M's suit we bought this summer. We didn't realize how closely they matched until they both wore them to M&M's swim party.

Testimony

On Fast Sunday this month, Luke and M&M bore their testimonies in Sacrament Meeting for the first time. Last month during testimony meeting, DH said that Luke turned to him and asked how you bear a testimony and what you have to say. Luke and then M&M wanted to go up and bear their testimonies and wanted to know how to do it. (I was out in the mother's room feeding Baby K.) DH told them a little about it but said that we would discuss it in Family Home Evening that month and that they should practice it at home first. Then DH got up and bore his testimony to set an example for the kids.

So later that month we talked about testimonies and let the kids each take a turn bearing theirs for the family if they wanted to. Then on August 3rd M&M asked me before church if she had to bear her testimony that day. I told her that she could if she wanted to but that we weren't going to force her to. So after the Sacrament a couple of people got up and then Luke asked me if he could go up to the front. I let him go and he bore a nice testimony and then Emily went up a couple of people later.

It was really neat seeing the desire in them to share their testimonies and it was nice because they weren't memorized or told to them. The testimonies that they shared were their own words and came from their hearts. It was a neat experience for the whole family and DH and I were very proud of them.

Adventures at the Dr's office

Since the kids haven't started school yet (they start Monday) I had to take them all with me to Baby K's doctor's appointment on Monday and it was quite the scene. On the way there I heard Baby K filling up her diaper so I changed her in the parking lot before we went inside. Once in there things were fine until we got back into the examining room. Luke would not sit still to save his life and kept getting in the way and was driving me up the wall. Aside from that things were fine until they were done with Baby K.

Next Blondie had to get some final immunizations for kindergarten and she was not happy about it at all. So we were discussing what treat she wanted to get afterwards (ice cream or donuts) and Luke almost broke out into tears because Blondie picked donuts and Luke really wanted ice cream instead. I told him that if he was getting the shots then he could pick, but to him everything is just so unfair if the world doesn't revolve around him...

When the nurse came in and Blondie started out by hiding under my chair and didn't want to come out. I finally was able to get her out and sat her on my lap and she started freaking out and then Kitty wanted to sit on my lap as well. I told Kitty to go sit with M&M so I could concentrate on Blondie - which she didn't do. So I was holding Blondie on my lap while Kitty was standing next to us watching in horror. Blondie absolutely screamed when the nurse stuck the first needle into her arm. I kept telling her not to watch but she couldn't keep her eyes off those needles. :( Blondie got two shots in each arm and was pretty traumatized.

After she settled down a little she was able to go out and pick a prize from the prize drawer as well as a sticker. Kitty then got very upset because she wasn't able to pick out a prize as well and wanted me to carry her. I was carrying Baby K in her car carrier and didn't want to have to carry Kitty as well. So I told her that I would hold her hand but she just started screaming and threw herself on the floor. I finally picked her up so we could at least make it out to the reception area and there I had to make the next appointment for Baby K.

Then we left and tried to make our way out to the elevator and Kitty still wanted me to carry her. I finally convinced Kitty to get on the elevator with us but she was still screaming and throwing herself around. Once we got to the main floor and out of the elevator Kitty would walk a couple of steps and then drop to her knees on the hard tile floor, screaming and crying. Finally I just picked her up in a football carry and held her tight so it was uncomfortable for her until we got to the car. By the time we made it to the store to buy donuts Kitty had finally settled down but she was sent to her room once we got home (and so was Luke for not obeying me in the examining room).

Tumbling

I have been deliberating the last couple of months as to whether or not to enroll M&M in tumbling this year. I had pretty much decided to take a year off from it when I got a card in the mail from the place she attended last year and then a friend in the ward called to see if M&M was going to do it again. The class that they want to put M&M in is on Tuesday evenings from 7:30-9 p.m. That just seems SO late to me since we try to have the kids in bed by 9:00. So I told her that no we weren't interested but to let me know if her daughter (M&M's friend) was going to do it or not.

Well, my friend called the lady in charge of the classes and found out that M&M is already signed up for the class so she signed her daughter up and now the class is full. She told me this on Sunday and I thought some more about it and decided that maybe it wouldn't be so bad to have M&M in the class because we shouldn't have any conflicts with soccer practices this time around and it's not in the middle of dinner time like last year. Plus we would be able to car pool because this friend just lives a block away. So I said that would discuss it with my husband and M&M and we would let her know before class time on Tuesday. DH isn't too crazy about the late time because that's usually when we read scriptures but we think we can figure out a workaround for one night a week so we left it up to M&M to decide if she wants to do it. After much coaxing and prodding M&M finally said that yes she would like to continue with tumbling so I think we'll try it out tonight. I know that she will enjoy being in the same class as her friend - we tried to get them in the same class last year but because of different family schedules we signed up for different ones.

It's really hard to get M&M to tell us what she wants because she is so concerned about pleasing us. She knows we're concerned about how late the class is and about the time commitment and so she worries about that and doesn't want to tell us what she really would like to do. It's the same way with birthdays and Christmas. She is so concerned with how much things cost or whether or not DH and I would approve that we can never figure out what she really wants.

Bummed

I am totally bummed because I can't do any FamilySearch Indexing or Arbitrating. Lately whenever I sit down to feed Baby K I would sit at the computer and do some arbitrating while I nursed her. On Friday, however, I went to launch the program and it installed some updates and then gave me an error and wouldn't run. I finally emailed their online support after about a day of getting the error but I still haven't gotten any kind of response. So, if you have been wondering why I have been blogging a lot more than usual lately, that is why. I keep sitting down at the computer while I feed Baby K and since I still can't get the indexing program to run I have been using the time on the computer to blog instead.

4 month stats

I took Baby K to the pediatrician today for her well-baby checkup and she was 15 lbs 15.2 ozs (90%) and 25 inches tall (77%). She seems to be chunkier than my other kids were at this age - her legs are especially chubby. She is starting to wear 6-9 month clothes because she is growing out of some of her 3-6 month ones. She's a very fun and happy baby though! It's fun watching her get ready to roll over and to really start playing with toys. She loves to lay on the floor and kick and grab at her activity gym and she also loves the exersaucer. It's amazing (and sad) how quickly they grow and learn at this age!

Right now we are trying to get her used to sleeping in the crib. She usually sleeps in her car seat or with me at night but I am trying to get her to sleep in the crib for naps during the day. Usually for naps she has been sleeping in her car seat or in the middle of my bed. Now whenever I try and put her down in the crib she usually wakes right up or within a few minutes of being laid down. Just this morning though she slept for about an hour in the crib before I had to wake her up to get ready to leave for her doctor's appointment.

Double digits

The first thing M&M said on the morning of her birthday was, "I'll be double digits now for the rest of my life unless I live to be 100!"

Success... but will it last?

We have been having problems lately with getting Kitty to go to nursery during church. Since we have classes first I will usually take her and drop her off on my way to the primary room and lately she has been throwing a fit when I try to leave her there with the nursery leaders so I usually end up taking her into primary with me. Then after we are finished with opening exercises I will try and take her into the nursery room and stay with her for a few minutes until I have to get back for singing time. The last couple of weeks I have been able to take her in but she usually hasn't stayed the whole time until this week, finally! One week I even had Luke take her in and sit with her during junior primary's singing time because she was crying and screaming when I tried to take her into the primary room with me. I think that her biggest problem with nursery is that nothing there is hers. She has some personality issues where she has a hard time if she doesn't have control over things because she likes things to be in a particular way or order. There are a couple of kids in the nursery that are very controlling and try to take everything that anyone else has and Kitty has a hard time with that.

The other success today was that Kitty stayed in the chapel with the rest of the family when I went out to feed Baby K and she didn't scream and holler. In the past whenever I have left with Baby K to go out and feed her or change her diaper Kitty will scream and put on quite a show until she is allowed to follow me. Today though she actually stayed and was okay with it (after some coaxing from her dad). Hopefully we can keep this up and it won't just be a one time thing.

Warning!

I recently bought a hair flat iron to help make my hair a little bit easier to fix in the mornings. After I opened it I was reading through the instruction booklet to learn how to use it correctly. Just about the whole booklet was full of warnings on what not to do and how not to use the iron. In fact, there really weren't any instructions on how to use it other than how to plug it in and turn it on. This, though, was my favorite line of the booklet:

WARNING: Never use while sleeping!

That one statement dashed all of my hopes for getting a headstart on my day by fixing my hair in my sleep!!

Strawberry cake

I made this cake for my birthday this year and both DH and M&M loved it so much that they wanted seconds (and they are not normally cake lovers). M&M told me that she wanted that cake for her birthday so I made it for her party on Saturday. My parents both loved it as well so I am including the recipe here for anyone that would like to try it. It is a very light cake with a cream cheese icing. (I have only made it without the strawberries in the frosting because I was afraid that that would overdo it on the strawberry flavor for me.)

Light Strawberry Cake
1 box white or yellow cake mix
1 small (4 servings) package sugar-free strawberry gelatin
3 tablespoons flour
1 cup strawberries, thawed if frozen, pureed if fresh
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
4 egg whites

Frosting:
2 tablespoons butter, softened
4 ounces fat-free cream cheese, softened
3 cups powdered sugar
Strawberries and juice to moisten (about 2 tablespoons) - or 1 1/2 T milk + 1 tsp vanilla

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Spray cake pan(s) with nonstick cooking spray and dust lightly with flour. Set aside

2. Place the cake mix, strawberry gelatin and flour in large bowl and mix together. In another bowl, combine the strawberries, water and oil. Pour wet ingredients all at once over dry ingredients and combine. Add the egg whites, one at a time, beating after each addition. This should take several minutes.

3. Pour batter into prepared pan(s) and bake for about 25 minutes. Remove from pan(s) and cool on rack.

4. For frosting: In a large bowl, mix together butter and cream cheese. Add powdered sugar and beat well. Add strawberries a little at a time until the icing is a good spreading consistency.

5. Frost the cake and then refrigerate.

Roller skating!

DH and I had quite the workout last night. M&M and Luke's orthodontist sponsored a family skating night at a local skating rink last night. They offered free admission to the rink, free skate rentals and free pizza and drinks. I thought that we might just take M&M and Luke with either DH or me but we decided to take the whole family. M&M brought her own roller blades and then the rest of us used skates from the skating rink. Kitty had to get the plastic kind that straps on over the shoes (and the velcro holding them together wouldn't stay fastened). It has been a LONG time since I've been roller skating so I was a little rusty but it was fun.At first DH wasn't planning on skating so I took Luke and then Blondie once around the rink. It was so hard trying to teach the kids how to skate and to try and keep them from falling and hurting themselves! After I took Blondie around we grabbed some pizza and then they had a prize drawing for the orthodontists' patients. Both M&M and Luke won something - M&M got a $20 gift card to Target and Luke won an ipod shuffle! Some of the other prizes were tickets to a Salt Lake Bees baseball game and electric toothbrushes. While the drawing was going on, DH went and got some skates for himself and took a few turns around the rink. Then he took Kitty and then Blondie around again. Luke took a few turns around the rink by himself and stuck to the carpet around the edge. He was very determined to try and learn how to do it and he was much better when I took him around again before we left. Blondie and Kitty also had a lot of fun and didn't like having to take turns - they wanted to keep going again and again!They did a fun partners game that M&M and I played at. Everyone had to have a partner and skate holding hands and every time we heard a siren noise we had to turn around without letting go of our partner's hand and skate in the opposite direction. That was a lot of fun! I was definitely worn out by the time we left! Baby K slept through a good portion of the evening which was nice. The only bad part about the evening was that they kept running out of pizza. I think the rink was supposed to be providing our pizzas and they just couldn't keep up with the demand. Finally the orthodontist went out to Little Caesars and picked up about 10 pizzas that he brought back for us. I only got one piece and DH only had two.

August trip to the zoo

I really don't care to go to the zoo in the summer because it is usually so hot! My mom called the other day and asked if I was interested in taking the kids to the zoo since they go back to school soon and we had a couple of cooler days this week. At first I said that no I didn't want to go - I have a hard time changing my plans last minute sometimes and had planned on doing laundry and grocery shopping today. After thinking about it some more I finally relented and decided to go if we could get there before it got too hot. The only benefit I see to visiting the zoo in the summer is that they usually have some animal shows that they don't have during the rest of the year - such as a pretty cool bird show.

So we met at the zoo around 9:30 a.m. and stayed there until around 2:30. By the time we left I was dying of the heat and looking forward to getting the kids and especially Baby K out of it as well. We took a train ride, saw the bird show, ate lunch and then saw a short big cats show with a leopard. The bird show was awesome! We saw some penguins that all took a swim together and we also had fun watching a 3-year old orangutan swing around in her play area. Baby K did great and took a good nap there.

One benefit to year-round school is that we can do fun things when it's cooler out and not just in the summer months. So I don't anticipate us going to the zoo again until October when the kids are off-track - and the weather is perfect! Now I just need to recover from my heat stroke...

M&M's pool party

M&M had a friend party this year and she wanted to go swimming. So after discussing our options with DH we decided to have the party Saturday afternoon at our local indoor pool. We decided to have everyone meet at our house for cake and ice cream and presents and then we would drive the girls over to the pool in our car. M&M invited 6 girls from school and church and my parents agreed to come and help as well. We only heard from three of the girls before the day of the party - 2 were yeses and 1 was a maybe - so we weren't sure how many girls we would have for sure. This was going to affect whether or not we were going to take everyone or leave some of the younger kids home with grandma.

We ended up having 4 girls show up (and that included the maybe). I was able to fit all 6 girls in the van plus Baby K so we decided to take the whole family. Blondie and Kitty rode with Grandma & Grandpa and Luke rode with DH. Baby K fell asleep in the car and stayed asleep almost the whole time we were at the pool. Grandma kept watch over Baby K and then Kitty decided to hang out with her at the kiddie pool.

M&M and her friends are at the age where they can pretty much navigate the whole pool without any kind of adult help so it was a really nice age to take to the pool. The pool we went to has a huge slide, a lazy river area with a whirlpool and some water works that spray water. It is very kid friendly with most of the pool less than 4 ft deep. Luke hung around Grandpa most of the time but he is really close to not needing adult help too.

Baby K finally woke up the last 1/2 hour we were there and so I changed her into her swimsuit for the first time! She is so chubby! She wasn't quite sure what to think of the water (because she had just woken up) but she didn't cry once. (It definitely helped that the water wasn't too cold.) At first I put her in a bouncy seat/swing that they have in the kiddie pool that lets the kids bounce and get their feet wet. She didn't look too comfortable in it so I took her over to see her dad in the big pool. He took her and swam around with her in the big pool for a little bit. She just kept looking up at me with huge eyes!

We ended up staying at the pool for close to 2 hours and everyone had a lot of fun! It was really nice having my parents there to help with the younger kids so that I could walk around and take some pictures and not have to always worry about where everyone was. Overall the pool party was a great success!

Heat

We just returned from a HOT day at Utah's Hogle Zoo. It was nice to walk into our COOL, air conditioned house - thanks to my husband who fixed the air conditioner the other day and he also fixed our leaky dishwasher a couple of weeks ago. It's nice having a handyman around the house!

There's something different about Utah's heat that really zaps the energy from me. Growing up in Virginia with the high humidity I don't remember being so tired whenever I spent a day in the sun. I finally made it out to our garden the other day because it was overcast all day and felt great outside! Because Utah is closer to the sun you can definitely get burned quicker here and we go day after day after day with not a single cloud in the sky. I long for the days when it rains or when we even just have clouds in the sky! One benefit to low humidity though is that if you can find some shade it feels much cooler than being out in the sun.

Our garden has definitely been neglected this summer, mostly due to Baby K. I just didn't have the time or energy to plant anything this year. Because of that the garden has completely gone to the weeds. Some of the weeds are as tall as I am! I spent a good part of the day on Tuesday pulling weeds with the kids. I filled up the garbage can and we have probably another 2 garbage can size piles of weeds pulled that will have to wait until next week. And that's only about half of the garden...

Thumb sucker??

Baby K is 4 months old today and she has been trying really hard the last couple of days to get her thumb in her mouth to suck on. She is finally starting to succeed at a more consistent rate lately (even though it looks really awkward). Try as we might she still has not been able to catch on to pacifier sucking for some reason. She will still gag herself on them and get really frustrated because she gets no food from it.

Talker!

Baby K is turning in to quite a talker! On Sunday (July 27) we went to my parents' for dinner & to celebrate my dad's birthday. As we were getting ready to leave I was holding her on my lap, looking up at me and she just started babbling and cooing and went on for at least 5 minutes. We were all amazed that she just kept on talking for so long. I also kept kissing/eating her neck and she was laughing at that. Baby K definitely has a talkative period in the evening when things have settled down and she is ready for bed. I really enjoy being able to spend some time with her after the older kids have gone to bed. (I will try and get some video up of her talking shortly.)

Kids will be kids

DH was watching the older kids while I went to some stores yesterday evening with Baby K. When I got home he relayed this incident to me:

DH found a large moth-type bug that was lying dead on the sidewalk. DH called the kids over to look at it. M&M, Luke & Blondie were all completely grossed out by it and didn't want to go near it. Then Kitty came over and DH pointed it out to her. She promptly bent down and picked up the bug and held it in her hand to examine it! (The funny thing about this story is that sometimes Kitty will see a teeny, tiny bug in the house and she won't go anywhere near it until someone kills it for her...)