Baby Birds

So everyone has the picture of the mama bird coming back with the worm to her nest and all the little baby birds sitting there with wide mouths going crazy to eat.  Almost every single time I sit down to eat something, I am immediately surrounded by at least two children, if not four.  It is so funny!  It doesn’t matter that they were given the same thing 10 minutes ago, by me, and they didn’t eat it.  It also doesn’t matter what it is—I could be gnawing on a huge piece of raw broccolli and they would all surround me and beg for some.  Crazy, huh, although I haven’t had my full meal in 6 years, I don’t really mind--I love that my kids surround me and that I can finally get them to eat something—.

Happy Birthday Reagan!

 

Our sweet little ray-ray had her birthday on Wednesday!  She is five years old!!  It has been a week’s worth of celebrations!  She started out by spending friday night with her grandparents.  They went to color me mine and she made a beautiful princess crown bank.  She also got to go out to dinner and did a ton of other things were her grandma and grandpa sage.  On Tuesday she got to see Spy Kids 4 and have dinner with her Grandma Burnett (she loves spy kids!).    On Wed at school she got to be the Star of the Day!  She has been waiting for two months and comes home every day, disappointed that it wasn’t her.  She had a doughnut in her backpack for snack and she passed out treat bags to all her school friends. 

  She has been telling us for months that all she wanted to do was go to Downtown Disney and get a lollipop—so last minute we were able to take her there.  We had so much fun!!  We went to the rainforest café for dinner (a small fortune and almost as much as throwing a birthday party for her, but well worth their excited faces!).  She had fairy dust sprinkled in her hair and then got her lollipop.  She danced around that place with her lollipop, badge announcing her birthday, fairy dust, and a smile on her face so big that everyone kept asking her how old she was turning. We hope you had a wonderful birthday ray and we sure love your fiery spirit and creative take on life!

Grateful

The other day my kids and I had a discussion on being grateful for the things Heavenly Father has given us.  We talked about how there are many children that don’t have toys or food or a house to live in. They seemed really upset by the idea that there were children out there that didn’t have any toys (I guess food and housing is not as big of a deal to a 5 yr old and 7 yr old).  I used this to get them to pack up the toys they don’t use to give to little boys and girls out there who need toys (D.I. here we come).  Reagan was the most excited and brought me some of her best toys. 

Then, in Jackson’s prayer last night he started praying for “all the kids that don’t have toys or food that someone rich would come and give it to them.” Love the humble, sincere prayers of a little child.

I love it when an important life lesson actually sticks to my kids’ brains longer than one day…

and I am grateful to a father in heaven who loaned me these four sweet little souls to humble me and to teach me about what it  really means to be grateful…

Three More Years…

 

Conversation last night with Jackson at bedtime:

Jackson: “Mom, you don’t need to tuck me into bed at night any more.  I am seven and should be able to tuck myself in” (he said this all very sweetly, so as not to hurt my feelings).

Mom:  “How about I tuck you in for just awhile longer.”

Jackson:  “Three weeks?”

Mom:  “How about three years.”

Jackson:  “Ok.  When I am ten you can stop, that should be good.”

This conversation made me sad to think how fast my little boy is growing up.  Next year he will be baptized. It also made me think on how I need to cherish these little moments, for they only last so long, but luckily I have three more years ….

Swinging

So, I think this little guy is one of the most adorable babies, ever.  Not biased at all, and I said that about his brother and sisters, but just take a look… Here he is in his first swing ride (at least the first documented with pictures ). 

So cute…

 

Everything….

 

goes in this kid’s mouth!!  It is that crazy stage where I either have to keep him in his exersaucer or chase him all around the house pulling all sorts of things out of his mouth—the lastest was a magnet!  I know what you are all thinking…just vaccuum your floor…but, I can’t decide which is more exhausting…chasing him around or cleaning my house…hmmm…  Here are some cute pictures:

Reagan

Here is our feisty and sweet little Ray-Ray!  Its hard to believe she will be 5 in two weeks! 

First Manicure

We had a girls day out on Labor Day, so the boys could play computer.  I took the girls to get their first manicures.  Ray chose bright green with flowers (her new favorite color) and Madie chose purple with flowers.  I wasn’t sure how Madie would do, since she can hardly sit still and she is only two, but she loved it and did everything they told her to do (how did they do that!).  We also got chocolate milk shakes—in total I think we were gone 45 minutes, but I loved being with my girls!  Here are some pictures:

First Day of School

On August 15th, 2011, Jackson started 2nd grade and Ray started kinder!  Wow, how the time is just flying by!  I got to spend the first day of kindergarten with Reagan—they had a little scavenger hunt and we scoped out the kinder scene together—she was so excited they had swings and she had so much fun wearing her new twinkle toe shoes and having a snack at her new school. 

Jackson is a pro and barely gave me a hug as he ran to see all his friends.  So excited for them, but sad that summer had to end so quickly—will miss them here during the day!

Here is a picture of the three of them:

75 percentile!!

 

So we finally have a baby that is on the charts!  Lincoln is 8 months, 29 inches and 21 pounds! Wow—that puts him at the 96 percentile for height and 75 percentile for weight.  Is this my baby?  At 8 months Jackson weighed 33lbs and was almost tall enough to ride the Matterhorn at Disneyland (not quite, but you see what I am getting at…). 

He is also our first baby to crawl…he started moving at 7 months…

What in the world?

This picture sums up our little Madie.  At the beginning of this year, right after Lincoln was born, the kids were with their grandma while I went to get my hair done.  Denni turned around for one second and in the next second when she found Madie, she had colored her eyes bright green.  Our wild child…