Happy Birthday Matt!!

I gave Matt perhaps the best birthday present anyone could ask for. I don't mean to toot my own horn here, but I think I did a great job. I provided him with the opportunity to watch the kids all week long while I took a trip to Reno. How many other people would have given such a thoughtful gift? So on the blessed day when Matt turned 34, he started out by not sleeping in and making his own breakfast, then proceeded to take care of any and all kid issues, feed them lunch (provided by Jen and Ben - thanks a bunch guys!) take the kids to the park and make his own meatballs for dinner. He got a little break with a man-date with our friend Aaron. Rachelle watched all the kids and those two went to see the new James Bond movie. What a day! So happy birthday Matt, you are the best! I really owe you :)

Christmas 2008

Family picture overload

So even though Kim was getting ready to close on their new house and even though she was getting ready to go out of town, she was so nice to take our pictures for us. I know there are a ton here, but all I can say is deal with it.

Christmas clothes

For some reason (me) we all wore "Christmas clothes" to church yesterday. Nina got a fancy new dress from Pam, the boys have their same outfits from last year(thank you to my friend for supplying them), Matt inherited his grandpa's pants and tie, and Cameron and I rummaged through our closets and drawers.

Nina has only opened 3 presents so far. Not too bad.


Howie was an obliging camera man.



We're in the process of replacing our family picture which normally sits under that little thing of berries. We're leaning towards the first shot, Matt's backside pretty much sealed the deal.

Driving me crazy

So here's the scene. Nina comes up the stairs with no pants or underwear on.

Me - Nina, where are your pants?
Nina - Um, I don't know.
Me - Did you go pee in your underwear?
Nina - Nope, I didn't.
Me - Why did you take your pants off?
Nina - I don't know.
Me - Go get your pants and underwear and put them back on.
Nina - Okay mom

Nina goes downstairs. I check up on her after a minute or so, still a naked bum.

Me - Why didn't you put your pants on?
Nina - A ghost took them.
Me - Nina, it's not good to tell lies.
Nina - Okay, sorry mom.
Me - Now where are your clothes?
Nina - I don't know.
Me - You can't run around naked, let's put some clothes on.
Nina - I already did.
Me - No, you are still naked.
Nina - No I'm not. I put my underwear on already mom. See?

I did not see anything.

Visiting Santa

We stopped by the mall over the weekend so the kids could talk to Santa. It was a pretty routine visit; nothing unusual, no weird reactions, no off-the-wall comments, no crying and it appears that everyone still believes. I guess that would make it a successful trip.

Welcome home dear

I'm surprised it hasn't happened sooner.

Some snowy fun

It has finally snowed out here! It seems like we usually get our first big snowfall before Halloween, but this year it didn't come until Thanksgiving. Everyone was excited to see the ground covered in snow and our kids wasted no time getting out and playing in it. Donovan was in charge of the activity for our Family Home Evening and he chose to have a snowball fight. The actual snowball fight lasted maybe 1 minute, then it evolved into snow soccer.

Howie was using a lacrosse stick to launch snowballs



A nice slide tackle by Donovan



The kids attacking Matt



Nina guarding their ammunition



Howie and his snow fort



Nina and our snowman



Now a couple of separate items. My brothers and I ran in a Turkey Trot in Highlands Ranch. We all finished the race, some faster than others.



And I love Rock Band. Our band was awesome, okay not really, but we had a lot of fun. I think the drums are HARD!

Howie turns 5

I am a little late with this post, but better late than never. While many were celebrating Black Friday, we were celebrating Howie's 5th birthday. Well, to be honest, after Matt and I celebrated Black Friday with our early morning shopping excursions, we celebrated Howie's birthday. He was asleep so he didn't know. For some reason, big birthday parties don't appeal to our kids. Howie opted for a day of family activities like:

eating Krispy Kreme for breakfast
going to Chuck E. Cheese for lunch
going to Cici's for dinner
renting a Mario movie from Redbox

We usually do a little scavenger hunt with presents, but Howie decided he wanted to open his at Chuck E. Cheese. I don't know if I should feel bad that our kids never have "real" birthday parties or if I should milk this for as long as I can. I'll ponder that. Here are a couple of pictures, I'm realizing that I didn't take very many. Happy Birthday Howie!





You'll notice the same Mario Brothers mushrooms that Donovan had for his birthday.

A change in Nina's schedule

I know this might come as a surprise to many of you, but I just wanted to inform you that Nina's schedule has suddenly become very, very open. She would really be able to accommodate a number of requests of her time. She is available every morning, noon and night. She will be permitted to do sleepovers - one night, one weekend, or the whole month of December - any of those would work. I can assure you that it has nothing to do with any of the following:
-making our babysitter cry last weekend
-dumping out a whole jar of coriander in the basement
-filling an entire couch cushion with an array of designs. Her medium was a black pen.
-unwinding the thread from all of my bobbins and wrapping the thread around Star Wars figures
-dumping out all of her hair clips, ribbons and rubberbands
-about 15 accidents in the past 3 days. (she takes a diaper off when we put one on her) When asked why she didn't go in the toilet: "Because I love you mom."
-a steady stream of "I hate you mom" or "my mom is stupid" comments
-unwinding 4 spools of new thread
-dumping cups of water out of her bath
-swirls of purple crayon on most walls in the basement and in the stairway

We only want to offer her many opportunities to socialize and share her love and talents with others. We know the demand for her presence will be high, so we will have to be fair and say first come, first served.

Week in review

On Monday, Donovan came home from school with the news that his friend Dino pulled out his loose tooth during class. That makes number 5 for Donovan. His school gave him this little plastic tooth for safekeeping.


On Tuesday Donovan had his Glee Club performance. They sang 4 songs and during most of them Donovan kept motioning for me to take a picture of him. The pictures turned out too dark since we were way in the back, but here is a nice blurry one of him afterwards.



On Wednesday we all watched the United States National Team play Guatemala in a World Cup Qualifier.




On Saturday we celebrated the November birthdays from my siblings' and our family. Howie and Cohen were our honorees. Howie was delighted to get a Bakugan battle arena. Don't ask me.

Sweet sibling conversation

Nina - Donovan, I had a yucky poop.

Donovan - I had one too.

Nina - Can I see your poop?

Donovan - yeah, can I see your poop?

Nina - Gross! We are twinners. We have twin gross poops.

Cameron is 6 months old

Cameron has accomplished a few things in his half a year of life:
-he can sit on his own
-he can roll out of "tummy time" position in record time
-he has visited 6 states
-he has attended numerous sporting events
-he smiles at anyone who will look at him
-he has survived his 3 older siblings

Cameron is still working on a few other things:
-sleeping through the night
-cutting his first tooth
-rolling to his stomach
-communicating to Nina that waffles, cookie dough and popcorn are not appropriate foods for him yet


GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Cougars!



We made the trip to Colorado Springs to watch BYU beat Air Force yesterday.

What do you do

when this shows up at your door?




Now before you answer, consider these factors:
-it is 9:40 pm
-you have already put your kids to bed
-a certain 6 month old hasn't slept more than 4 hours in a row in his entire life
-you are DEAD tired

It was a hard choice for me too.

Come and Gone

This past weekend was a whirlwind of fun as Grandma and Grandpa Marshall came to visit. The time flew by as Ben and Pam played with, hid, sought, tagged, hugged and kissed the kids. We were all sad to see them leave this morning and we can't wait to visit them in Virginia next summer!




Doing some early Christmas crafts. This is something the Virginia cousins get to do with Grandma and Grandpa at their house. We were lucky they brought the fun to share with us too.




Cameron has grown just a bit since the last time Pam saw him.



Bowling and Chuck E. Cheese were just a couple of fun activities. We also played mini golf, walked to the park, fished (surprise, surprise) and ate lots of great food.