Kid talk

Just to give some background to this conversation, we have been having some family discussion lately about whether or not we will have any more kids.

A couple of weeks ago I was picking up Blondie from her tumbling class and she said that she thought we should to have another baby because Baby K isn't a baby anymore. So I asked her what we would do if we ended up having another girl instead of a boy. She responded that we would just keep her and love her. So I asked why we couldn't trade the girl in and get a boy in it's place. Blondie then responded, "What, is there a baby store?!?"

Talking!!

It is so cute to hear Baby K try and repeat what we say. We had a funny experience with Baby K on Saturday at M&M's soccer game. DH and I were sitting on the sideline with some other parents cheering on M&M's team as they were getting close to the goal and then all of a sudden Baby K yelled out, "GO!!" It was the funniest thing because she has never said that before and yet she said it so clearly and right at the perfect time. Another mom on the sideline heard her as well and got a good chuckle out of it too.

Last day of peace and quiet...

Today is the last day of some peace and quiet before the 3 older kids are out of school for 3 1/2 weeks!! I am trying to enjoy my time right now but it will end very shortly here (it is early closing today so the kids get out at 1:25).

We're hoping to take a short trip or two while the kids are off-track this time. We were hoping to go to Yellowstone, but we may be a little too late in the season for that - the forecast for the next 10 days is cold with highs in the 30s-40s and rain/snow! Our other option is to head down south to one of the National Parks such as Zions or Arches. The weather down there is supposed to be in the 70s!!

I'm also going to try and get the kids in some swim lessons while they are off-track to give them something to do.

Soccer

The season is halfway over already and both Luke & M&M's soccer teams are doing well. They both have 3 wins and 1 tie so far. It's definitely been a learning experience coaching Luke's team, but I am enjoying it. I have a pretty good group of kids on the team and a few of them have been playing together for a couple of seasons now. I also find that I get really engrossed into coaching at the games and there have been a couple of times where Baby K will come up to me and grab my legs and it takes me a minute or two before I realize who it is and what she wants...

I am really glad that we switched M&M to a coed team this year. It has been a much more enjoyable and positive experience for her. The only downside to the team is that they practice at a school across town and it takes us about 15-20 minutes to get there. Plus she has band practice after school on the same day as practice now so she ends up being about 15-20 minutes late to practice each week. There are 2 other girls on the team with her that go to her school and the coach is a friend of ours and lives just a few houses away from us.

Molly

My parents' dog, Molly, passed away a couple of days after my sister and her family left town. She was 15 years old. She wasn't doing very well at the end and had some pretty serious health problems. She had lost quite a bit of weight and couldn't hear much anymore in addition to other problems. She ended up lasting longer than any of us thought that she would. My parents got her my senior year of high school and she was always such a hyper, energetic dog that LOVED people. She was very patient with kids and loved to be petted. I know that Baby K has looked for her the last couple of times that we have been to my parents' house - she loved to pet her and chase her around the house.

Luke with Molly
Kitty with MollyBaby K

Too young...

I think my baby is too young to be making requests of what to watch on T.V... She is currently obsessed with Cookie Monster and will point at the T.V. and say "cookie" whenever she wants to watch the movie "Cookie Monster's Best Bites"... Thankfully it is a cute show and the other kids like it as well...

Finally gone!!

After sitting on the side of the road in front of our house for way too long, we finally put up a classified ad for our old red Ford Escort and sold it! DH posted the ad on Monday and someone came and drove away with it on Wednesday! It is nice to finally have that taken care of and I think our neighbors are all breathing a sigh of relief as well!! It was a good car for us but was finally starting to show it's age there at the end...

Strawberry jam

A couple of weeks ago I was at the grocery store and they had an AWESOME deal on strawberries that I just couldn't pass up. I decided to buy a whole flat of them which had 8 - 1 lb containers. My family loves jam and I decided that this would be the perfect opportunity for me to try and make my own homemade strawberry jam. Unfortunately I am very busy at this point in my life and I had no materials for canning anything with. So, with great intentions I found a recipe that I wanted to use, and then I finally made it back to the store to buy some jars and pectin. I still didn't have any canning supplies, such as a water bath canner, but I was able to figure out a way to do it without a special canner, just using a large pot that I already have. (I used some of the metal screw bands that I had to form a grid on the bottom of the pot so that I could set the jars on top of them and it would allow water to circulate underneath the jars during the boiling process.)

So a couple of days after buying the strawberries I finally took the time to make some strawberry jam and can it. Unfortunately, a few of the strawberries were starting to go bad by the time I got to canning them, but I had enough to make 8 - 1/2 pint jars with some leftover. There was a little bit of the jam leftover that wouldn't fill a whole jar so I put it in the fridge and my family gobbled it up that first day. One of these days I will get to making some homemade wheat bread to eat with the jam - that is my favorite!!

Cub Scouts

When I was called to be a cub scout den leader almost a year ago now, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing and I was given a new partner that also was just called. We learned quickly together and then she had some family issues come up and asked to be released. Well, since then (back in March) I have been running my den solo and it has definitely been a lot of work. I have been surprised with this calling and how much time is involved because of the weekly den meetings that you are supposed to have. It is quite a challenge coming up with activities that will keep the boys busy and interested and at the same time accomplishing things that will get them closer to earning their rank and other, extra awards. The primary presidency has finally found a new partner for me but she has some other obligations to take care of before she will be joining me (she is partly in charge of our Relief Society Friday craft night that will take place on October 9th). The hardest part about being partnerless is that there have been activities where I need to have a second adult with me (such as field trips) and it has been hard to find a parent sometimes that can/is willing to step in and help us out. (And my husband has graciously helped out a few times when he has been able to.)

Cub Scouts has definitely been a learning experience for me and I'm glad that I've had this opportunity to serve. I have learned so much about the cub scout program and it has definitely helped in a good way for Luke because I know how the program works and what he needs to do to earn his awards as well. Plus Luke has benefited in earning a few extra awards that my den has worked on and I've allowed him to participate in as well - hey, since I'm doing the work I may as well let my own son earn some extra things too...

Right now our den is about to undergo a big change as I have just lost one of our really dependable scouts (he just turned 10) and I am gaining three new scouts in the next week! I'm not sure that I like how the church runs cub scouts because in most non-LDS packs, the dens stay together for the whole school year and then they move up as a den. In the church, the boys move up to the next level on their birthday so the dens are constantly losing and gaining scouts throughout the whole year. It makes it really hard to plan sometimes and try and remember what each boy still needs to work on since they are all at different spots in their advancements. It's also hard to do activities that some of the boys need when the others have already completed the requirements.

I can definitely say that I am not the best den leader out there, or the most gung-ho about the position, but I am doing the best that I can and I have had several parents approach me or my husband to let me know that they appreciate all that I do and that their boys really enjoy coming to scouts. And still, almost a year later, there are some things that I know nothing about - like pinewood derby which our pack is having next month!! Wish me luck!!

Vegetables galore!!

I have way too many green beans and tomatoes! Every time I visit my parents I bring over lots of tomatoes for them and today they just left with a ton of green beans that they picked while they were watching the younger two kids for me. I also have as many carrots as I want to pick and on Monday we harvested some of our potatoes. Most of them were red potatoes and some of them were HUGE!! I'm also super excited about our pumpkins. It looks like we are going to get at least 4 good size pumpkins this year! I just have to go out every couple of days and squash a couple of the squash bugs...Here is one full grocery bag of red potatoes and a few Yukon Gold potatoes in the other bag. There are still some more potatoes to harvest but I want to wait a couple more weeks.Kitty showing off some of the HUGE potatoes!Baby K loves to go and pick up a potato out of the bag and call it a ball. Thankfully she hasn't tried to bounce too many of them!Just a few of the green beans that I picked the other day.Some of our nice tomatoes I picked recently. I also have a ton of cherry tomatoes - the plant is as tall as I am!

Pasta lover

Baby K is finally getting more teeth so she is able to eat a larger variety of food (she has 4 teeth up top, 3 on the bottom and is cutting her first molars). Usually around dinner time she is starving and ready to eat. Last night was no different, except we couldn't figure out what she wanted to eat. We sat her in the high chair and started putting different foods on her plate, but she kept shaking her head and pointing at the table. We tried cantaloupe, bread with jam, a drink and then some pasta. Apparently none of it was right and she kept whining and pointing. So, my husband offered her my plate and she got excited. The only thing on my plate was the pasta that I was serving for dinner and I had already given her a few pieces. Well, apparently the pieces that I gave her were from the bottom of the dish and didn't have much sauce on it - she wanted pasta pieces with lots of sauce on them. Once we figured it out, she probably ended up eating more of the pasta than any of the other kids. Then this morning I was dishing some of it out into a container for DH to take to work for lunch and she started whining when I put the lid on the container. So I gave her the rest of the pasta for lunch and she wolfed it down again!

Singing in the rain

(or playing at least)...The kids had some fun playing outside yesterday during a rare rainy day here in Utah.

Garden update - 9/11/09

I finally made it back out to the garden today to try and pull some weeds - sadly they are taking over the place... I first went to my pumpkin plants to see how the squash bug problem was coming along and I was pleasantly surprised to see several new pumpkins growing! We have one small one that I've been watching for some time that is now almost completely orange, but there were several new ones growing finally and one that I noticed last week is getting really big and is dark green right now. I am so excited! In all I counted 6 pumpkins. I hope that they keep growing so we have at least one for each of our kids. :) It makes carving them a little more fun when you grow them in your own garden!

On another note, my corn is not doing so hot this year and for some reason my cucumbers are struggling as well. The leaves are a really light green instead of dark green and I have only gotten one cucumber so far this year... My green beans are doing pretty well and so are the carrots. My cherry tomato plant is HUGE and I can pick tons of ripe ones every day. One of my bigger tomato plants keeps getting blossom end rot on the tomatoes and they are funny shapes. The other big tomato plant seems to be doing okay though.

While I was outside Baby K came over to the garden and tripped and fell hands first and immediately started crying. There was a little bit of blood on her hands and at first I thought that she had just landed on one of the prickly weeds, but then one of her hands started swelling up a little just below the thumb on her palm. There was a tiny black dot and the skin right around it turned a blue color - like a bruise. My guess is that she was stung by something, but I'm still not sure what. I tried putting an ice pack on her hand, but that didn't last long. She kept trying to take the ice bag off and bite on it instead. I then tried some otter pops and she ate 2 of those while holding them in her hand with the sting. I later went out to see if there was a bee or anything dead out where she landed, but I didn't find anything. Thankfully the swelling didn't get too bad and within an hour she was acting like nothing had happened. When I touch the spot she pulls her hand away, but I think she will be fine and thankfully she didn't have a serious reaction.

Labor Day Activities

This past Labor Day weekend there were no soccer games on Saturday so DH spent the morning changing the rear shocks on the van and then we had my parents over for dinner in the evening. We watched the BYU vs. Oklahoma football game and were blown away by the ending - BYU won with a score of 14-13!! Hopefully the rest of their season will be just as good!
On Monday we took a picnic lunch to the Uinta mountains with my parents. We drove to Mirror Lake and the parking lot was jam-packed - apparently we weren't the only ones with this idea!! We were able to get some parking off to the side of the rode and amazingly we found some open picnic tables where we ate our lunch. Baby K had tons of fun walking around our picnic area. We then hiked around the lake (about 1 1/2 miles). It was a beautiful location and the weather was perfect!

Baby K loved walking around the boardwalk that went partway around the lake.Bald Mountain - Apparently the hike to the top is relatively easy so we would like to try it sometime with just the older kids.

Almost nursery age!

I can't believe that Baby K has just one more month until she is the magical nursery age at church! (Actually, with all of the sicknesses going around and in the news lately I'm a little bit nervous about sending her...) She is at the cute age where she is learning to talk and quite often you will hear her chatting or singing to herself. We have also taught her a few baby signs and her favorite ones are "more" and "bye-bye" - she'll make the sign and say the word at the same time. She loves it when her dad comes home from work and now whenever I open the door from the kitchen to the garage she says "dada" because she thinks that means that he is home. She can't stand it when anyone goes outside without her. She absolutely LOVES being outside and running around. One time she was out in the front and started taking off along the sidewalk to the corner. I stood and watched her and she turned the corner and just kept going. I quickly caught up to her and she ended up walking almost the whole block on her own (and without shoes on I might add). Here are some of the words that she can say: mama, dada, more, bye-bye, shoe, book, apple, cracker, ball, hop-hop (when she sees a bunny), no, yes, hi and she is trying to say a couple of her siblings' names. She also loves putting anything and everything into her mouth and thinks it's funny to come to me with something in her mouth that she's knows shouldn't be there. Thankfully the dentist gave her this toothbrush that she loves to chew on as well - she is cutting several new teeth which I think has something to do with it.

Busy days are here again!

Well, now that school is fully in the swing of things, so are all of the extra-curricular activities. So here is a look at the activities going on throughout the week:

• Monday - I am helping out with Luke's class twice a month from 2-3. This is the one day where we don't have anything scheduled after school...


• Tuesday - M&M has band after school until 4:30, Luke has cub scouts from 4-5, and my cub scout group meets from 7-8.


• Wednesday - Kitty just started a ballet/tap class which meets from 10:15-11:15. Luke has soccer practice from 5-6 (and I am the coach).


• Thursday - I am helping out Blondie's class twice a month in the morning. M&M has band followed immediately by soccer practice until 5:45.


• Friday - Every other Friday M&M has activity days from 2:15-3:15, Blondie just started a tumbling class from 4:30-5:30 and I finally got M&M and Luke signed up for piano lessons which will be at 4:00 and 4:30.


• Saturday - Soccer games in the morning. Thankfully the latest games this season are at 12:30 so the games don't have to take up the whole day. The downside is that there are a couple of games scheduled at the same time so I go to Luke's game to coach while DH gets to take the rest of the family to M&M's game so I don't have the distraction of having them around.

9-11: Finding Hope

I thought this was a good message for the anniversary of 9-11: