Easter 2019

We had a fun filled magical Easter this year and we really enjoyed celebrating the resurrection of our Savior together as a family. We took the time to read a little bit about the Holy week every night the week before Easter and learned a lot.

 The girls were all pretty excited about  the community Easter egg hunt this year and could not wait to participate. Brynlee and Annalyn kept talking about the giant bunny Brynlee won a few years ago and they could not wait to win some great prizes. I tried to prepare the kids that they might not win anything but in the end they all won several prizes and Brynlee won the grand prize of a brand new bike.

To start off the hunt I went with Summer and walked with her while she picked up some egg. She got a huge basket full of suckers because she was sure to pick up a lot of those as well. Then we watched Kyla and her friend Eden run off to go and get some eggs. They both got a big basket full of eggs. I am glad we found a friend there for Kyla to go with. (I accidentally put one of Summer's dresses on Kyla's side of the closet and she insisted on wearing it since it was on her side.) Joel went with the older girls. Summer was so excited to open up her eggs and find candy this year. It was fun to get to see her excitement. The bike Brynlee won was a smaller bike with training wheels so she was pretty excited to be the first place winner but not super thrilled with her prize. The bike ended up coming with a gift receipt so we were able to return it for a bigger bike a few weeks later and Brynlee was super excited. This was the first time she has ever had a brand new nice bike.

We also had fun decorating eggs together as a family. I love seeing the different ways each kids goes about decorating eggs. Summer was super fast and most of her eggs were green. She kept trying to take more eggs and tried to put the same egg in several different colors because she did not want to be done. Brynlee took the time to write on several of her eggs and she had a good variety of colors. Kyla's egg were almost all pink with a few purple ones in there. Annalyn also had a good variety of colors this year. They all loved this activity and have asked to do it again.

 On Easter Sunday the girls had a little egg hunt upstairs and got a few more Easter goodies and then we went to church. Annalyn gave a fantastic talk about Easter in Primary. I found some pictures to show while she read her talk but she read it so super fast that there was no time to show the pictures.

After Church we went and enjoyed visiting with family and ate a great dinner at grandma Verna's house. Then the kids had another egg hunt and got even more prizes and some of the kids even got money.

I really am so grateful for my Savior and his sacrifices for me and I am super grateful for my family and the chance to make these happy memories with them.

March 2019

I waited so long to write this post that I almost have no idea what happened back in March. I am going to do my best to remember what transpired during the month of March. I already wrote about Annalyn's birthday and about Spring break. The month started out with Kyla visiting the ENT doctor where it was decided that we needed to get Kyla's tonsils and adenoids out and that we would possibly need to put tubes in her ears as well. Before that appointment we all went to the girls school and ate a donut with them in their super crowded cafeteria.

On Sunday we went to a special meeting right after church where they rearranged most of the wards in our stake and gave us all a new ward name. We were in the Kuna 6th ward, now it is the Avalon ward. They also made a new ward and took half of our members and put them in a new ward and then added a few new people to our ward. It was a lot of changes. We all lost several friends and now have much smaller classes. We are still adjusting to everything but it has been a hard transition. 

We went to my nephew Jakobee's eighth birthday and we went to another party for a friend from church this month. We had a terrible time adjusting to the changes of daylight's savings time. We all wish they would change that practice here in this house. We also had stake conference. Since the YM president got moved into the new ward; Joel got released from his calling as the YM second counselor. He got to serve in that position until they called a new presidency so he still got to go on the camp out that they had planned with the boys and it sounds like they had a super fun time. He later got called to be the Sunday school second counselor which should take a lot less time. I was really excited about the change and the kids are excited that Joel doesn't have to go to mutual anymore. He had that calling for a good three years. 

My brother Brian's dog had puppies and we had fun getting to snuggle with new tiny little dogs. Kyla didn't want to hold one but Summer was brave and seemed to enjoy holding the dog when it was so little. 

Kyla was super excited about getting to go to speech for a thumb sucking evaluation. We got a referral from the ENT doctor to help with the way her mouth is developing by stopping the thumb sucking. Kyla has always wanted to go to speech and she was pretty excited about it until she learned that she couldn't suck her thumb anymore. When we got home she sat it my lap and cried because, "I really wanted to go to speech but I don't want to stop sucking my thumb. This was a really hard choice." The program she did required her to wear a thumb guard, make a phone call to her teacher, listen to a tape to fall asleep, and keep a giant sticker chart for 30 days. Honestly I am super impressed with how well she did. She didn't suck on her thumb at all. She was a little bit self conscious about the thumb guard at first but for the most part she wore it without complaining and did great. 

St. Patrick's Day landed on a Sunday this year and it was the same day we had Stake Conference. We all pulled out our green Sunday clothes and then went to conference. After that we went to visit Jake and his family and went on a little walk around celebration park with him and his kids. It was fun to get out with our family to enjoy the nice weather. We had a good time. 

Brynlee decided she wanted short hair again so she got it cut short. She also had two cavities that she had to get filled. Brynlee was also the only kid that got to sing a solo in the third and fourth grade music program for her school. She got up and sang in front of all of those kids and grown ups and she rocked it! I was pretty proud of her. All of the third graders did a wax museum and Brynlee got to dress up like Elizabeth Blackwell (the first women in the US to become a graduate from medical school and become a doctor.) and she told a little bit of information about her. She did a great job at that and it was fun to get to see her in her class at school.  

In other news, Joel spent a lot of time helping my parents get their new preschool room ready. The weather started to get nice so I rearranged everyone's closets with all of the short sleeve stuff. That is a job! Miriam got her shots and I signed Brynlee and Annalyn up for soccer. The kids played outside as much as possible and we enjoyed spending time with our family.

Miriam at 8 Months!

Baby Miriam is crawling all over the place these days. She is pulling herself up to stand along all the furniture and loves to hold onto my hands and walk all around the house. She sure is getting big. I can't believe she is already eight months old. I know it is kind of cliche but I have to say that she is seriously growing up way too fast. 

Miriam loves to eat whatever everyone else is eating. She has never liked it when I try to feed her and constantly tries to steal the spoon when I try to put it in her mouth. She is much happier when I let her feed herself. She loves crackers, eggs, peaches, peanut butter and yogurt. I used to give her a lot of food in those applesauce pouches but then she decided she didn't like them. I keep giving them to her and she has been eating them again. There isn't a lot of things that she won't eat and she has had most of the things we eat. She has had olives, green beans, taco meat, cheese, avocados, carrots, pears, and sweet potatoes and likes all of those foods. 

 Miriam learned how to say "mama" this month and she says it all the time. She has also showed a particular favoritism toward her mama and will whine for me and follow me all around the house. If someone else is holding her she likes to keep a strict eye on me and will cry for me if she can't see me. When she gets excited she flaps her little arms up and down.

 Miriam still sticks her tongue out all of the time. She waves at people and will usually give anyone that talks to her a nice big smile. She has such big, bright, beautiful eyes and people are always commenting on how big and cute they are. They also like to comment about how cute her little bald head is. I am glad that at least for now she is fine with me putting a headband on her head.

 Miriam still constantly scratches her face and seems to constantly have some sort of scab on her face. She is also starting to fight letting me cut her fingernails. She loves to crawl over to where her sisters are so she can be a part of what they are doing. She got to play outside quite a bit and loved playing in the grass. She did not enjoy the ride in the swing. She cried until I got her out.

 Miriam has not been a super great sleeper this month. She likes to sleep in our bed with us and she sleeps well in her bed and in someone's arms but she is not liking her bed as much. She does sleep super well in her car seat but it is getting harder to transfer to for a nap into her bed. We are going to have to break her of this habit so she will start sleeping better. I do love cuddling her but it is becoming a problem.

Miriam is constantly putting things in her mouth. She crawls all over the place and is constantly finding little things to put in her mouth. We had one scary choking event. I don't know what she had in her mouth but I saw it for a second and it looked like a little white bead of some kind. She ended up swallowing it and then seemed to be just fine until a few days later when she started throwing up. She threw up all that night and into the morning. She was pretty miserable and it kind of freaked me out because I was worried whatever she had swallowed was stuck in her stomach. Especially after I did some research on the computer so I took her into the doctor where they said she looked just fine. Turns out she just had some kind of stomach virus that Kyla ended up getting later that day. As soon as Kyla got sick I felt much better. I still hated to see Miriam feel so miserable. She kept wanting to nurse but when then just throw everything right back up. She was back to her normal self the next day luckily.

Miriam is fascinated every time she sees an animal and likes to crawl after them and try to grab them. She likes to crawl in little tight places like in the girl's doll house and has gotten stuck in there a few times. She is getting busy and I love seeing her little personality shine through. Kyla asks to hold her the most but the other girls constantly ask to hold Miriam all the time. We all love holding and hanging out with this cute little baby. It is so fun to watch her learn and grow new things.