Out with the old, in with the new

Yesterday Blondie lost her first tooth! She has been really anxious to pull it out ever since the dental assistant told her that it was a little bit loose back in late January. The last week or two it has been getting much looser and finally at school yesterday she pulled it out. She was so excited to show it to her teacher and then the first thing she said when she walked in the door after school was, "Where's Mom?" So she could show me her tooth. And then she couldn't wait for M&M and Luke to come home from school so she could show it to them as well. She was excited for the tooth fairy to come and woke up at about 3:00 in the morning distraught because she couldn't find her tooth. After some searching we found it under her bed near the wall where it had apparently fallen while she was sleeping. And then she was super excited to tell everyone what the tooth fairy left her this morning!

Then on the other hand Baby K is finally getting in her 4th tooth. I have been trying to get a good picture of the four teeth together, but not much luck so far. Here's the best one I was able to get:And here she is trying to get the camera while I'm trying to get a picture of her teeth:

Garden!!

The last couple of weeks I have spent hours upon hours getting our garden ready for planting. This has been a huge task because we didn't do anything with it last year because of Baby K. The garden this spring was completely full of huge weeds and it has fallen mostly on my shoulders to get the work done. I unfortunately didn't take a picture of it full of weeds but here is one with most of it cleared out before I planted anything:
This is what I have planted this year:
Strawberry plants, tomato plants, green pepper plants, cucumbers, pumpkins, corn, onions, carrots, potatoes and green beans. Hopefully we will have a lot of success this year!!

Egg drop

While DH was on his biking trip, the kids' elementary school sponsored an egg drop contest. The kids at the school met their reading goal for the year and so the principal and vice-principal had to spend the day on the school roof. To help pass the time they decided to hold the egg drop contest. So the Monday before the contest the kids brought home fliers about it and had a list of rules to follow. We briefly discussed if the kids wanted to participate in it and then we completely forgot about it until Thursday after school (the day before the contest). Unfortunately, that was the day that my husband left for his bike trip and then after school Luke had soccer practice and then I had a food storage cooking class that I was attending that same evening. So, I pulled out a bunch of shoe boxes and materials for the kids to use in constructing their egg holders and then left them on their own (I took Baby K with me). The kids had to design a container for a raw egg to be put in that would be dropped/thrown/kicked from the school roof. When I came home, M&M and Blondie were pretty much done with theirs and Luke was still deciding on a design for his. So I suggested a few things and then he made it himself. Out of all of the designs I thought that M&M's egg had the best chance of surviving the drop. Well, the next day when the kids got home from school I found out that Blondie and Luke's eggs had survived and M&M's didn't! Apparently we didn't secure the lid good enough on M&M's box and so as soon as it hit the ground, the lid popped off and the egg bounced out and broke! It was a good experience for them all though and I'm glad that they were able to work on them on their own and help each other out without my help.

Baby K update

Baby K is still not walking and still only has 3 teeth. It looks like the 4th one is finally starting to cut through on top so maybe she will be evened out here soon. She really doesn't have much desire to walk and freaks out when you try to get her to take a couple of steps on her own. She definitely has a temper that is starting to show through. She loves to walk around the house with someone holding her hands (and don't even think of trying to walk her around with your hands under her armpits - definitely not allowed!). When we try to get her to walk she'll just stand there clinging on to you and bounce up and down throwing a fit. Her favorite word is "hi" and she says it to just about anyone. She'll say it very clearly and wave at the same time. She especially likes to say it when she sees her dad though.

A couple of weeks ago her dad was trying to get her to say dad and would pat his chest with his hand saying "dad". So now whenever anyone says "dad", Baby K will pat herself on the chest and say "da-da". It's quite funny to watch and then she'll start laughing because we're all laughing. She's starting to imitate animal sounds and loves seeing any kind of animal, whether it's a picture in a book or the real thing. She also still hasn't figured out how to start herself down the stairs and will sit at the top and holler until someone comes to help her. She certainly loves to climb though and can sometimes pull herself up on the couch; and then that leads to the arm of the couch which is right next to the piano which she likes to pull things down off of...

On the mend

Last Wednesday I took Luke in to the doctor's office for a follow-up visit for his ringworm. We think that his head is on the mend and it appears that his hair is already starting to grow back in the bald spot so the doctor told us to just finish off the medicine that we had and to call the office if it looks like it is getting worse again. Luke has had a real struggle with taking this medicine because he doesn't like it and was happy to hear the doctor's verdict. His response was, "So I don't have to take the medicine anymore?!?" "Well, yes you have to finish off what we have but then you're done." His reply, "YES!!" He has been really good about taking it though and has reminded me a few times to give it to him and took it diligently on the father/son campout. And he had to tell everyone what the medicine is for! (How do you think it sounds to hear someone is taking medicine for ringworm?? Even though it really isn't as bad as the name makes it sound...) Hopefully soon I will be able to cut his hair again and then maybe we can get in for family pictures finally!! We are definitely overdue for some!

R.I.P.

I have had quite a few things bite the dust recently and I have been feeling the effects. The first casualty was my electric hand mixer that DH and I got for our wedding. I never realized how often I used it until it broke on me. The gear wheels are stripped and I don't think it is fixable. It is a WestBend brand and has lasted us almost 13 years! It has been a really useful tool in the kitchen and I sorely miss it. I do have the nice big Bosch kitchen mixer now, but I don't like pulling it out for little jobs and there is only one bowl that I have to go with it so it's hard when I need it for multiple things.

The second casualty was my glass measuring cup. I can't remember if I got that for our wedding or if I received it later, but a couple of weeks ago I was working in the kitchen, holding Baby K and she grabbed for it and knocked it on the floor. It shattered and made a mess everywhere - I hate it when glass breaks! I miss that for measuring just about everything! I do have a couple of other measuring cups, but they are not quite as handy as that one was.

My last casualty is a pair of sandals that I have had for longer than I care to admit. They have been on their last leg for several years now but I have had an incredibly hard time finding a suitable replacement for them. A couple of weeks ago I finally found a replacement pair that I think I can live with, but I'm still having a hard time actually throwing the old sandals away. They have been so comfortable and useful that I hate to see them go! (I think I bought them when we lived down in Provo, so it has been way too long!!)

Father/Son Campout

Friday, May 15
So far my husband hasn't been able to take Luke to the annual Father/Son Campout because of scheduling conflicts and this year was no different. The campout always seems to fall on the weekend of the Reach the Beach bike ride that my husband has done for a few years now. The Saturday before the campout we were at one of the kids' soccer games and mentioned to my dad that Luke would be missing the Father/Son campout again and my dad offered to take him. So we thought about it and discussed it some more and decided to let him take Luke this year. This year the campout was run by the stake and was in cabins at the church's girls camp facilities in Heber Valley. The campground is open to other groups until school is out of session. The cabins are equipped with bunkbed frames and bathroom and shower facilities in neighboring buildings. Before Luke got home from school on Friday I made up a list for him of things to pack and he took it all very seriously and it was fun watching him go around with the list collecting the various items and packing them himself in a duffle bag. After we were all packed I took the kids with me over to my parents' house and Luke and my dad headed off to the campout.

It sounds like they had a good time and my dad was impressed with the other kids in the ward that are Luke's age because they're all pretty good kids. Luke is on a Harry Potter kick lately and he and a couple of other boys had a lot of fun staging some little battles at the campout. On Friday they made s'mores at the campfire and at one point my dad suggested to Luke that he should go in the cabin and change his shorts (it was getting pretty cold out). So Luke proceeded to go into the cabin and came out a few minutes later in a different pair of shorts! Apparently he just thought that he was supposed to change his shorts, not realizing that maybe he should change into LONG PANTS instead of another pair of shorts!
Saturday morning the stake provided breakfast and then the boys paired up to make bottle rockets out of 2-liter soda bottles. After that Luke and my dad tried out the paddle boats and canoes on the lake there. My dad took his camera and took a few pictures - but I wish I had a picture of Luke and my dad together...
While the boys were camping out, M&M, Blondie and Kitty spent the night with Grandma S. at her house. Baby K and I stayed for dinner and a movie and then we went home to sleep in our own beds. We met up with the rest of the girls again the next day at M&M's soccer game. And unfortunately I don't have any pictures because DH and my dad had the cameras!!

Friday Night Dinner

Today my husband stayed home from work not feeling well (sore throat, bad headache, tired). So when it came time for dinner I asked him what he felt like eating tonight and he said that he would probably just have some soup (but ended up having cereal instead). I love having breakfast foods for dinner so whenever DH is not home or not up to eating with the rest of us I usually elect to make some breakfast foods for me and the kids. So tonight we had pancakes. My kids are huge on keeping track of how many each person has eaten and tonight was no different. Blondie was asking how many each of us had had and the conversation went like this:

Blondie: Mom, how many have you had?
Me: This is my third.
Blondie: Luke, how many have you had?
Luke: I'm on my second.
Blondie: Kitty, how many for you?
Kitty: I'm eating my twoth. (Which sounded so funny that we all burst out laughing!!)

Quiet

It is almost 10:30 in the morning and my husband is asleep upstairs (home sick from work today), Baby K is taking an early nap and Kitty fell asleep on the couch in the living room. The other 3 kids are at school. It is very eerily quiet right now in my house. That is until Blondie comes home from kindergarten in a few minutes - Fridays are short days... :)

Reach the Beach 2009

My husband, his dad and brother rode in the Reach the Beach 100-mile bike ride again this year. Sometimes I think DH is a little crazy for doing it but it is a good experience for him to have with his dad and brother and a good goal to reach for each year. He left on Thursday to drive 12+ hours up to Washington, rode in the bike ride all day on Saturday and then drove back home again on Sunday. Unfortunately he left later than he was hoping to on Sunday and didn't get back home until around midnight so all of the kids were in bed - and I was half asleep as well trying to keep myself awake.

DH took our camera this year because he wanted more pictures of the ride than he has gotten in years past, so I was without a camera for the weekend and the other family activities that went on. I think we just need to buy a second camera - they're really not that expensive for a decent digital one nowadays. So, here are some pictures from the bike ride:
Before the race picture. There is always some drama involved on the morning of the ride. This year they had some trouble finding the starting location again and then there was some problem with their registration so they had to fill out some forms and register that morning before they could start on the ride.

Dad N. in action!
After the ride! They all made it! Look how happy they all are!
Lots of bikes at the finish point on the beach.

Health issues

The last few days that the kids were off-track, Baby K was cutting her upper two teeth and was super whiny! She wanted me to hold her all the time and if I put her down she would cry until I picked her up again. She also wasn't sleeping well at night. She is finally back to her normal happy self, but only one of the teeth has come through so we might be going through this again soon.

Then the kids went back to school last Monday and a couple of days later Blondie started complaining of a sore throat and was more whiny than usual. On Wednesday night she kept waking up and at one point I felt her forehead and realized that she had a slight fever as well. So I gave her some Tylenol and told her that she would not be going to school the next day (which brought tears to her eyes because she likes school). The next day she was fine as long as she was on some Tylenol but as soon as it wore off the fever came back and she started getting whiny again. I ended up keeping her home from school on Friday as well. At the end of the school day I took her to school so we could talk with her teacher to see if she needed to work on anything that she missed. Her teacher told us that there were 4 kids out from Blondie's class with strep throat so I'm hoping it doesn't develop into that. I'm thinking that the fever may have been a symptom of some molars coming in because the lower gums in the back of her mouth felt slightly swollen. We will see...

Also on Wednesday while we were at M&M's soccer practice I was sitting down on the grass with Baby K when I looked over at Luke and noticed a big bald spot on the side of his head, towards the top. I looked a little closer and noticed that the skin where the bald spot was was very scaly looking. Luke has very thick, straight hair and he combs it himself everyday and washes it himself when he showers so I usually don't look too closely at his head (except when I give him a haircut and I know the bald spot wasn't there the last time I cut his hair). I showed it to my husband that evening and did some looking online and thought that it might be tinea capitis, or ringworm of the scalp.

So the next morning I called the doctor's office and took Luke in that morning to get looked at. They decided that it was probably ringworm and so now he is on an anti-fungal medication and has to wash his hair a couple times a week with dandruff shampoo. The medicine can take up to 6 weeks to kill all the fungus but they want to follow up with him every 2 weeks to make sure he isn't having any adverse reactions to the medication. Ringworm of the scalp is caused by a fungus that is actually quite common, especially in boys between the ages of 3 and 10. It causes the hair to fall out usually in circular patches which can be infected and look quite gross. Luckily Luke's skin doesn't appear to be infected and his hair is long and thick enough to cover up the bald spot. It appears that the medication is working because the spot already looks smaller to me and it looks like the hair is already growing back.

Here is a good website on common hair loss causes in kids: http://www.kidsgrowth.com/resources/articledetail.cfm?id=236 Ringworm can be spread through the sharing of combs, brushes, hats, etc., but since Luke is on medication now he isn't supposed to be contagious anymore. Hopefully no one else in the family will catch it.

Off-track

The kids were off-track for two weeks from April 20 - May 1. While they were off-track we were thinking about going down to the St. George area to visit some of the national parks around there, but DH wasn't able to take the time off work with some deadlines he had coming up. The majority of the time off-track we just stuck close to home - did some much needed clothes and shoes shopping for a couple of the kids and spent a lot of time working out in our garden.

On the Friday before they had to go back to school I decided to try something new with the kids and I attempted to take them to the see new Disneynature movie, Earth, at the theater. I had heard good things about it and figured that it was a movie that wouldn't be too scary and that all of the kids would enjoy. I was also hoping that Baby K would take a nap during it. Luke had won a gift card to a local movie theater from his orthodontist's office and we had some money on another gift card that we have had for a while so in the end I only had to pay about $3 out of pocket for me plus 4 kids. The kids had a lot of fun going to the theater to see a movie and Kitty couldn't quit talking through the whole thing asking me questions. Luckily the theater was pretty empty, but I ended up having to spend about half of the movie out in the hall with Baby K. Thankfully M&M moved over next to Kitty when she got scared in one part and overall the kids enjoyed it. I think next time though I will leave Baby K at home!!

Happy Mother's Day!

Baby K gave me the best Mother's Day present yesterday: she slept through the night Saturday night and even slept in the next morning. And she woke up in a happy mood too! She was very cute and in a good mood all day and took a good nap as soon as we got home from church. Also in the morning she took her first 2 steps for her dad! We're going to have another walker here pretty soon!

Blondie gave me a plate that she made in school, Luke gave me a framed letter that he did at school, M&M gave me a picture frame that she painted with a mother's day poem in it from activity days, a flower pen that she made in her primary class and a coupon book that she made at school and Kitty decorated a card for me in primary.

Kitty's card - see the rainbow on the left?
After church we went over to my parents' house for dinner and made some homemade strawberry ice cream there with my new ice cream maker.

And for posterity's sake, here are the plates that M&M and Luke made when they were in kindergarten (this is a special project that the kindergarten classes do each year at our school).Apparently all of my girls like rainbows!

Oreos, yum!!

Baby K is having a hard time moving over to more solid foods and wasn't interested in eating her birthday cake at all. Last night I gave the kids some homemade Oreo ice cream for dessert and gave them each an Oreo to eat with it. Just for fun I decided to try giving Baby K an Oreo as well to see what she would do with it. Well, she loved it!! Check out these pictures!

Want some?!?

Tulips

On Sunday I had the girls go out front and cut some tulips from our yard to put in a vase for the kitchen table. Aren't they pretty?