The kids have something to say...

My mom told me that she had a surprise for me.  I thought the surprise would be a fun treat or maybe that we were going to eat somewhere yummy.

Instead, she took me to a building that looked like a hostibal  (hospital).  We had to sit on these chairs for awhile.  It didn't seem like a very fun surprise.  So I read my book while we waited.

Then we went to a big room with a TV on the wall and I sat down while my mom laid down on a funny chair.  But it wasn't really a TV that you watch movies on.  They pulled up my mom's shirt and squirted toothpaste on her tummy.  I thought that was weird.  Then they took a little thingy and poked it on my mom's tummy.

My mom told me to look at the tv screen.  All I could see was this weird skeleton moving around.  My mom told me it was a baby.  Then they moved the thingy around and I saw its toes.  Remember, mom those toes were so cute?  And it was in a big bubble.  

And it was moving around a bunch.  I saw its head.  I got to see its tummy and I saw the heart and its lungs and they looked good.  

I didn't see if it was a boy or a girl because it's gonna be a surprise.

I saw its legs and they were moving and kicking all around.  And I saw its fingers.  It has 10 fingers, like its supposed it.

I felt nervous when I saw the pictures because I didn't know what they were doing until they told me it was a baby.  Then I felt really happy because I wanted to have a sister or brother.

After we saw the baby, my mom took me to Dunkin Donuts for a morning treat and that was really yummy.  I got a pink donut.  I hope the baby is a girl because there's three boys in our family and I want there to be three girls so there is the same amount.

If it's a girl, I want to name the baby June, or Jemical, or Sparkle, or Kwanzaa.  

If it's a boy, I want to name the baby Ryan or Noah.

When my mom asks me to, I don't like to tell people she is having a baby because I like that it is a surprise.  Rhode really likes to tell people, though.

Rhode:

My mom and dad took us to eat at a restaurant.  The food was Chinese or Korea I think (it was Thai).  

Scarlet whispered in my ear, "We're having a baby." I felt really happy.  My mom says my face made a really big smile and my eyes got really wide.  

My mom says the baby is going to come right after my birthday.  My birthday is on September 13th and this baby is going to come on September 20th.  I told my mom that night that I didn't care if the baby was a boy or a girl because I was going to love it so much.  I would like whatever it is.

But if I got to pick I would choose a girl because I like girls.  I think the best name is Sparkle or Gwenny.

And if it's a boy, I think Rhode, or Toad or Black or Box or Blue.

Asher:

Mommy (point to tummy) beebee

They are so darn cute, why not add another?  

This would be a great moment to add those ultrasound photos on that CD that was here just a minute ago...  I give up.  

Easter 2013

Easter can be divided into two parts this year.  The part where I was there, and the part where I wasn't.  Jon and I had the bad timing of leaving our children on the weekend of Easter with my dear friend, Mindy who agreed to watch all six of our combined children, including her 6 week old daughter.  That sounds like she would have somehow had the option of not watching her daughter... but mostly it just needed to be pointed out how awesome she is for agreeing to this crazy situation.

Not only did Mindy handle the vast load of children we have somehow collected over the years, but she went above and beyond the call.

They went on outings... several outings.

Six kids under six at Winco...

They even took the whole crew out to eat.... twice.

Then... she tackled all of the Bunny traditions for all of the children.  I contributed a few items for the baskets but didn't even have time to do anything but put them in a pathetic pile for her.  She turned them into baskets, hid them around the house, made the kids wait at the door before going searching so she could take an "anticipation" picture for my enjoyment,

then took a picture once they succeeded in finding their treasure,

and then took the whole crew to the park to enjoy their new treasures.

And here's the real kicker. 

The day before I left on my trip, I tried desperately to whip out two grey ties for my boys so they would have matching Easter ties with Scarlet's dress that I had previously made.  I couldn't find the fabric ANYWHERE!  It was driving me crazy, but I just gave up and moved on.

I get a text on Saturday saying that Mindy had not only found my fabric but had then whipped out two ties for me so they would be ready for my boys when I got home for Easter Sunday.

Seriously.

So not only did my family have a fantastic time in my absence with fun and friends galore, but I was able to wake up Sunday morning and dress all of my kids in their matching Easter wear.  Which totally made my day.

My lovely lady

My tie bedecked boys

 

Nielsen Family Easter 2013

We made our resurrection rolls Sunday morning and had a chance to talk about the story of the Resurrection while they baked.  It is so fun to see them remembering the story on their own and answering questions.

As a small token of my appreciation, we hosted Easter Dinner.  We had our family tradition of Gyros and french fries along with some deviled eggs from the Warrens.  I ate so much it almost killed me.  And then I ate one more deviled egg for good measure.

Happy Easter everyone!

6 Years Older and Wiser Too

Scarlet has been planning her birthday party since Rhode's ended in September.  "I want to go to Chuck E Cheese too, mom."  I then made it very clear that the succession of events would go like this: Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentines Day, and THEN we would start talking about her birthday party.  

That didn't stop the frequent updates.  The cake changed, the guests changed, the birthday dinner changed but the Chuck E Cheese location never wavered.

Until a week before the final event.

"Mom, I don't really want to have a party at Chuck E Cheese anymore.  I want a party at the house with lots of games and a pinata."

Okay...

The details just kept pouring out of her mouth at an alarming rate.  I promised her my whole afternoon to discuss details if she would let me get a little work done in the meantime.  When I returned to her full attention, this is what she had created:

Front Page

Party Layout in Pictures

List of Activities

Games:

pin the tail on the unicorn

open the pinata

play outside

freeze dance

dance contest

ring around the rosie

find the unicorn

.........

Picture of items we needed to purchase

shopping list and guest list

Order of events leading up to party:

Walmart today

Library tomorrow

Winco after that

2 days later it's my birthday party.

And after admiring her tape bound homemade birthday book guide, I realized what Scarlet wanted more than anything was to plan her own party.  So I turned over the reigns and she took over.

The shopping schedule took a bad turn when Asher got the stomach flu on one of the days but she just rolled with the punches and we were able to get everything on her list.

One thing we had decided together early on was that we were not going to be doing any birthday presents this year.  After a very generous Christmas, Jon and I noticed a very negative reaction in our children.  Instead of enjoying their new items, they had so many they hardly cared about any of them.  When they were threatened with losing any of them, the response was usually, "That's okay.  I have more."  

It was not a reaction we appreciated nor a mess that was tolerable.  So, we decided to start something we have always planned on doing, turning away from gifts and encouraging experiences instead.

We asked all of our party guests to not bring gifts.  Many of them brought very sweet homemade cards that they had made and Scarlet loved them.  Coming off of this Christmas, the party was our only "experience" gift this year, but in future years we hope to give gifts like tickets to special events or fun things we can do as a family.

So, back to the party, her guests:

Scarlet, Bennett, Blaze, Rhode, Charlie, Jane & Simon.  Sofia and Ellie showed up a little later.

First on the list, the pinata.  I let her have full control but I should have insisted that pinata was not the first event.  I was the only adult at the party at that time and keeping a pinata afloat while keeping small children from whacking each other with a big stick is not an easy task.

Scarlet helped everyone get on their blindfolds and directed them to the pinata.

 
The pinata itself, what do you do when you can't find a unicorn pinata?  Give the donkey a horn of course.

Bennett was the strongest swinger of the bunch.  The pinata proved stubborn so we let Bennett go to town on it at the end and knocked that donkey... unicorn down to size.

And the rewards.  Our pinata was filled with a few treats, gummy snacks, rice krispy treats, and a few dollar store toys, one of each item for each person.  Scarlet was really stressed about the idea of people taking more than they should so the little kids didn't get any, so this was her solution.  The funny part is, she is usually the big kid at the party that takes all of the pinata candy....

Pin the tail on the unicorn was a big hit.  She designed the yarn tails herself and made enough for each guest, per her list.

Her lunch choice of the day was homemade pizzas so we let all of the party guests design their own.

They were exceptionally tasty, and sadly, for us adults, most of the kids finished their whole pizza.

She even made her own cake, after I did all of the baking, frosting and fondant-ing...

Food coloring markers, what a fun invention!

 Family members have been very supportive of our alternate gift ideas.  She received a lot of great cards in the mail from her aunts and uncles, including a gift card to Dairy Queen which she is dying to spend on all occasions.

Grammy and Grandpa Earl gave her and I a really fun experience, tickets to see Shrek the Musical at the new Smith Center in town.  The tickets were for a few weeks after her birthday on a Tuesday night.  So we got in our 'hit the town' finest and had an amazing evening.

We had great seats and enjoyed every minute of the play.  We brought along a few treats just for the fun of it and Scarlet and I got to sit and chat, munch on candy and just enjoy the night.  

I have so much I can say about Scarlet, I am so very proud of her and the amazing six year old she is. I'll save her academic accomplishments for her upcoming school project post.  But what I am most proud of is the sweet example she is to her brothers.  She has single handedly taught them how to be great sharers, to be considering to the people around her, to be excited about learning, and to try every food that comes in front of you, in case its secretly better than it looks.

She is sassy and silly and oh so very fancy.  But she is also very aware of right and wrong and is not afraid to be the girl that makes sure everyone else knows the rules.  I love her confidence.

Happy birthday sweet daughter!  It has been a wonderful six years.

Surprise!

My sweet friend Mindy Warren just had her third baby, a beautiful round cheeked little baby named Gwen.  She is precious.  

A lot of people love Mindy, and even though I totally agree that a person does not need a baby shower for every single baby, a good old rockin' luau is fun at any time!

I don't think I have ever documented my long relationship with Mindy that has formed into the bond we now have.  Mindy is my Las Vegas replacement sister.  The one I can turn to for literally anything without guilt and with the full knowledge that she will let me return the favor.  She is one of those friends that makes it survivable not to live by any family.  

***Backing Up*** When I met Jon he had two roommates, Sarah (whose relationship was recently documented in my Kauai post) and Dale Warren.  When we got married, we kicked Dale out of the apartment.  (Sarah caught on quickly that living with the newly married couple would not be an option, Dale had to be kicked out :)

He then moved to California, where he met his future wife, Mindy.  You're welcome, Dale.  I met Mindy at Sarah's reception.  Within the first minutes, she told me how excited she was that I was normal since she knew we would definitely be friends through our husbands.  Who knew I gave off such a normal first impression?

Mindy and Dale lived in California for a while, then moved to Utah where they had their first daughter just 6 months after Scarlet was born.  When they moved to Las Vegas, they took over our apartment.  They then followed us over to our new house neighborhood about five minutes down the road.  

And we are now caught up.  

So, anyway, everyone wanted to throw Mindy a party but Zannie Collette and I decided to take the ball and run with it.  We wanted to surprise her to make sure she didn't have to plan or think about anything.  As an excuse, I asked her to babysit my kids while Jon and I went to the temple.  Then, we had to change dates like three times.  And the final date was on a Monday...  I made up some incredibly horrific lie about having a business dinner with some client of Jon's, it was seriously bad.  But she totally bought it.  

And this is the look of surprise and wonderment that we were greeted with.

But look how happy we are to be throwing this party for her!

She cheered up dramatically when she learned there would be no baby games and we had all pitched in on a Joanns gift card instead of baby gifts.  Plus, we fed her.  And it was really good food.  I don't remember all of the delicious food people brought, but I remember what I made.  Yeah, I'm like that.  And my contributions were delicious.  These Kalua Pork sandwiches are easy and really really delicious.  I linked the picture for your eating pleasure.  You will not be disappointed.

My second contribution was our fun fruity drinks.  We went with pina coladas, a recipe from Sarah on our Kauai trip.

1 can Frozen Bacardi Pina Colada mix (found in the frozen concentrated juice section

A few scoops of vanilla ice cream

some milk so your blender doesn't explode

and then right before serving, squeeze a lime wedge on top of your glass.  

Obviously the ingredients do not leave room of non-deliciousness but really the lime just makes it phenomenal.

We played some awesome luau games including a great round backwards charades, but my favorite was the Luau Spelling game where teams had to spell Hawaiian words out with their rear, and Mindy had to guess the word.  The best part was our spellers were surprisingly good at making the letters clear and Mindy was great at guessing the letters.  What she was not good at was remember all of the letters she guessed and putting them into a word.  It was oh so very fun.

I hope everyone had as much fun as I did.  And if they didn't, at least I got to enjoy their company and good food anyway!  

Disaster Strikes in Threes

It has been a rough few months for Asher.  Really rough.  

He is doing some major toddler to kid transitioning and it has not necessarily been a smooth transition.  It's been fun on our end.  He has a renewed love for his brother and "sissy" and they are loving how fun and grown up he seems all of a sudden.  He talks to us all day long and we catch some of it.  He has a few phrases that totally crack us up, including but not limited to, "I did it!" "Give me that!" and "what's that?"

His new obsession is undies.  He loves to wear his big boy undies at every opportunity.  He thinks the idea of the potty is very fascinating and even appealing at moments, but he mostly likes cheering on the rest of us when we successfully keep our pants dry.  "Yay mom!  Bye bye pee pees!"  It is very strange to have a potty cheerleader but that is for sure what we have.  Hopefully this half effort on my part will just magically turned into a potty trained child....

His other love is shows.  He is going through a big TV phase.  The timing couldn't be more perfect for me, the extra time between nap time and picking up kids from school is still work time for me and he is  happy to let Leap Frog, Backyardigans, or Curious George fill those precious minutes.

The best part is he is one of those awesome kids who responds to the characters on TV.  It is the best.  When Mickey asks if Asher wants to come in his clubhouse, Asher responds with a very enthusiastic, "Yes!"  And when Diego can't find the baby elephant, Asher points and shouts with the best of them.  

He also now sleeps through the night!  Finally... the formula to a full night's sleep for this kid is threefold: 1) turn on white noise machine while sleeping 2) leak proof sippy filled with water in crib and  3) have your 18 month old suddenly decide he likes pacifiers.  Wouldn't bat his eye at the thing for the first year and a half of his life and now he can't live without one right at the age when most moms are weaning their kids off the plug.  Not this mom.  I figure I'll just put a dollar in the bank for every full night's sleep I'm getting to remember how much his future orthodontia bill will totally be worth it.

So, back to the bad month.  Warning, bloody pictures ahead, not for the faint of heart.

Seriously, they are pretty gnarly.  

Well, in his transition from baby to boy he is convinced he can do anything Scarlet and Rhode do.  They run outside, he runs too.  They go down the biggest slide at the playground, he's right behind them.  They turn my living room into their personal bounce house, he's flying past them.

His first major injury came from our backyard punching bag.  My kids aren't really strong enough to punch it, so they just push it around.  They all gave it a big push, and Asher missed the memo to move out of the way when it comes swinging back.

The black eye extended all the way across the bridge of his nose.  He got a lot of comments wherever we went.  But other than the initial double bloody nose, it didn't seem to bother him too much.  He just looked black and blue for weeks.  It seemed to take a long time to heal, especially when he added his second and most major injury.

We were home on a Sunday evening, everyone relaxing on the downstairs couches when we directed the kids upstairs to get their pajamas on.  Asher enthusiastically joined up in the trek upstairs, but instead of heading to the bathroom for teeth brushing, headed into Scarlet and Rhode's pitch black bedroom.

The lack of light did not seem to deter him from deciding it the perfect time to jump from twin bed to twin bed.  Downstairs, we heard bounce, bounce, bounce, CRASH! followed by SCREAM!  

He had taken a big tumble off their bed onto the wood tiled floor and bit his way cleanly through his bottom lip.

I warned you... bloody.

I am not sure how we were smiling here.  I'm gonna blame this one on shock but I was a total wreck.

We threw our pajama clad kids in the car and headed to the nearest quick care.  They agreed the outside cut needed stitches but they were not equipped to stitch a wiggly one year old so they shipped us off to UMC Childrens Emergency Room.  There they strapped him down in a towel/papoose combo and put four stitches through his front cut.  He retaliated from his tied down position by blowing raspberries with his mouth the whole time and splattering blood over everyone present.

At one point, the doctor noticed his yellowed eye bruise, wondering if it was related to the fall.  I had to admit that no, that was a completely unrelated serious injury.  Good mom moment for sure.

We all survived the night, headed straight to bed and got some sleep.

Literally the NEXT DAY, Asher was sitting on my lap at the kitchen table and decided to jump from my lap to dads without any kind of warning.  Instead of making it, he smacked his head on the side of our table and split the side of his eye.

 It was just gaping enough that we really thought we were going to have to go get stitches for that one too to keep it from making a big scar.  I was humiliated thinking I was going to have to bring my child in for a second set of stitches in two days... surely there was going to be a call to CPS.  Luckily, a well placed butterfly bandage held it in place.

So this is what my beautiful little guy looked like for the next few weeks.

And thankfully, his mood improved before the bruises.

Being third child sure looks rough.  Hope he survives it....