Crazy Us!

Saturday, February 20th--So the baby shower was over, everyone left, house was cleaned up and everything put back in place but we were still having camera fun!

Here's Elise realizing she doesn't tolerate sour lemons like she use to!

And Nate and I being silly! Elise takes good pics!

A Party for Baby Chandler!

Saturday, February 20th--Baby Chandler is not quite born yet (4 weeks to go!) but we threw a baby shower for him and, WOW, did he make out! This little guy will have clothes GALORE, toys GALORE and everything else GALORE! Chandler is due to be born to Carly & Nathan Bates. Carly is my cousin and she's about to make her parents, Alan & Manya, first-time grandparents! Of course, they are MUCHO excited and this kid is already proving to be quite spoiled--since that's what first-time grandparents do! Uncle Alan is already dreaming of the time he can get "Lord Chandler" (as he calls him) on a little motor-bike. I couldn't help but hint to Carly to take grandpa along to Toys R Us when Chandler is old enough to want a little kid-sized Escalade! Yep, I'm full of great ideas! he he he

As most baby showers go, we had lunch, yummy white chocolate fountain, cakes courtesy of Carly, and my, favorite bakery, Dippidee, and games. We discovered you can make A LOT of words from "Chandler", including "nerd"........hmmmm........he he he. Then it was present opening time. Like I said above, he got lots of things. He got a lot of trendy looking outfits--we want this little guy to be looking quite schnazzy! As with my own kids, I LOVE baby shoes so Chandy got some shoes to match his trendy outfit. Yeah, shoes make no sense with a little baby but they are just so darn cute! I went overboard on shoes with Elise and Brady but really enjoyed it and it looks like Carly is planning to do the same......awesome!

It was so nice to be able to visit with my other cousins and aunts too, as well as my sis, Alishia and niece, Sammy. Elise dressed in a purple dress for the occassion, something from her dress-up chest so she was looking quite fancy.

As for Nate and I and our baby making process.....I went in for a check-up and the doctors opinion is that Nate and I both need some testing done to see what's going on. Starting with Nate we're going to figure things out and then go from there. Hopefully it's a simple fix. Time will tell! Shopping for baby Chandler just made me hunger even more for a baby!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Sunday, February 14th--We had a GREAT Valentine's weekend! The night before, Nate and I dropped the chillins off at Bret & Marissa's house and then we were off for a wonderful date night. First we went to a movie. We saw "Sherlock Holmes" and loved it. From there we were off to find the impossible, a restaurant without a 1 1/2 hour wait! We actually got lucky when we passed a Chili's and I noticed no one was in the lobby waiting. Nate pulled us in to their parking lot and we were delighted to find only a 5 minute wait! WAHOO! Chili's was perfect, everything was delicious and we ended our yummy steak and taters dinner with a white chocolate molten lava cake. Heavenly!

Valentine's Day we got the kids a few little gifts. The day before we went to the Disney store andeach of them picked out some figurine sets. Elise picked out "Bambi" and Brady "Wall-E". We also got them some treats and bubbles. And since we were at the mall, I stopped into my favorite chocolate shop, Kara Chocolates, to get their most-amazing mint chocolate truffles. As Valentine's gifts, Nate and I have a tradition of buying season tickets for Desert Star Theater but Nate also got me some beautiful pink roses and Brady got me a balloon. Elise made some very cute home-made cards. For dinner, I told Nate he could pick whatever he wanted and I would make it. He chose a roast and mashed taters. It all turned out great!

Valentine's night, Brady's "girlfriend" Kerri-berry dropped by to deliver him a special Valentine. He had brought Kerri a HUGE soft stuffed caterpillar a few days before. Brady was pretty excited about his Valentine from her!

What a WONDERFUL Valentine's! I'm so thankful for my special Valentines!

Happy Birthday Kerri!

Thursday, February 4th--So the goddesses took our fellow goddess, Kerri, out for her 39th, er, I mean 21st birthday. This has become an incredibly fun tradition we do and it seems like each birthday celebration gets better and better! We decided to surprise Kerri, which drove her absolutely NUTS! Kerri is a HUGE Twilight fan and adores Jacob more than any other character. As we other three were trying to figure out what the heck to do for our night of fun, I realized my favorite theater, Desert Star Theater, was playing a Twilight spoof. PERFECT! We started the night by having Kerri's own personal Jacob greet her at the door. She was ecstatic! Then came various Twilight-themed gifts. Heather made us all custom shirts: Heather, "Team Emmett", Kerri, "Team Jacob", Dawn, "Team Edward" and, (the best of all!) mine, "Team Who the Hell Cares". It was a favorite among our spouses! he he he

Kerri got a custom-made pillow case with a pic of Edward on one side and Jacob on the other. Hmmm, who to lay her sleepy head next to? ha ha ha She also got some, um, things I won't mention but I think she loved all her gifts! When I booked the theater I had no idea they put us in the front row. The seats were so perfect. We even got some extra special attention by the MC and they mentioned Kerri's birthday at the end. The show "Twi-lite: I was a teenage vampire" was so funny! We chomped on pizza and breadsticks. After the show we headed to one of our favorite places, Cheesecake Factory. Each of us picked a yummy dessert--I tried the fresh banana cheesecake (SOOO yummy!).

From there it was time to head home, as much as we didn't wanna!

Jazz Reading Contest

Monday, January 28th--Elise has been working hard to win the school reading contest. The overall school winner gets a day spent with a Utah Jazz basketball player. Pony Express Elementary wins every year and I'm sure this year will be no exception. Each week students read as many minutes as they can and then turn in their minutes. There is a top reader for each grade. The winner of the week gets to wear a Jazz jersey the whole week and also gets a certificate. Elise won the first week and proudly wore her Jazz jersey ALL week (sorry, I spaced getting a pic!). She continues to read but hasn't been as diligent as the first week. She said the jersey seems "boy-ish" but I told her to still try and go for it. Her friend and neighbor, Adeline, is also competing and looking like she may be in the lead as well. We're rooting for both girls!
The student that wins the most minutes, in their grade, gets to keep a Jazz jersey and will get a certificate. Nate has also given Elise an incentive: if she wins then he'll take her to the local bookstore and she can pick out anything she wants (I'm encouraging the complete hardbound set of the Harry Potter series!).
Good luck Elise!

Happy 5th Birthday, My Sweet Brady-bear!

Monday, January 11th--Wow, I'm feeling emotional right now! I spent a chunk of the day going through blog posts and photos of Brady's life. What an amazing kid! I just love him so much! Like the saying goes: "To know him is to love him". That is this little guy. I say "little" and I'm sure a little laugh or smile comes because he's not so little. Brady is a huge kid! He wears size 8 clothes and his shoe size is 1-2. And as so many say, he's just solid--you can't pinch an inch. We don't know what's in store for him as far as size and height but it doesn't matter either. I look forward to all the wonderful things in store for Brady. He's talented, lively, tells a great story with expression and all, and just plain entertaining! He'll do something that makes you laugh and you laugh everytime you think of it from there on! I swear he needs an agent! I'm so thankful he's a "go with the flow" kind of kid. Very rarely do we deal with tantrums and even those are usually related to low or high glucose levels. Next month we register him for Kindergarten. He's so excited to start, he talks about it all the time. As I said in the last post, I'm intensely nervous but we're teaching him how to test himself and I know I have a lot of support from fellow parents who have small children with diabetes and the school system seems to be on the ball.

Saturday we invited all the Armstrongs over for a sledding party. It was SOOOO FUN! We have some great sledding hills in Eagle Mountain. The one at the amphitheater was frozen ice, making for great sledding. Off to the side of the hill was a small hill, perfect for little kids and not-so-brave adults (like me, even though I chose not to sled that day). It was almost like a turnpike, very cool! Nate and I made up some hot chocolate and we happily drank while everyone took a break from sledding. After sledding we came back to the house and had hot soup and rolls. I made baked potato soup. Nate made chicken noodle and Rosemary made taco soup. DELISH!

Brady opened gifts next. He got some fun things that he'll enjoy very much, along with some money he wants to put away for our next Disneyland trip. Brady chose a dinosaur themed party. He and I picked out some fun dinosaur items at Partyland. We ordered a dinosaur cake from Costco--yum! I'm not sure he wished for anything before he blew out his candles but I did for him. I wished for, simply, an amazing year full of happiness, adventure and excellent health.

Today, his actual birth date, he brought some treat bags to preschool and handed them out. I put them together last night so he would be suprised by what was in them. There was 2 pieces of candy, sunglasses, a mini-flute and a rubber bouncy ball. Brady wore the sunglasses, along with a golden yellow crown he got from preschool, all day long. His teacher remembered his favorite color is orange and got him an orange helium-filled balloon. He was in heaven! After I picked him up he and I got some lunch and McDonalds and then headed home. I told him he could do whatever he wanted until it was time to meet up with my sister, in the evening. He chose to play in his room, with his toys, then clean up a little and finally, play Xbox.

In the late afternoon we got in the car and headed up to Chuck E. Cheese. We met my sister, Alishia, and her family there. Thank goodness for coupons! We got some good deals on dinner and tokens to play games. Brady and Elise loved earning coupons to exchange for prizes. We got one of their small cakes and Chuck E. Cheese, himself, brought it to Brady. He loved that! Alishia gave Brady a toy dog that walks, wags its tail and barks. He adores it! She also got one of those rolling balls with the furry tail attached to it. We turned it on and, at first, it creeped Brady out a bit but then he decided he liked it. And he got a furry Pez dispenser with Pez candy. It was a GREAT evening!

We are so very thankful to have Brady in our lives. The happiest 5th birthday, my sweet boy! Love always, mom

2010--Make It the BEST!

Friday, January 1st-- New Year's Eve was a blast! We went over to our neighbors, the Carmon's, house for some delicious mexican food and yummy treats. The adults played hilarious games all night while the kids played games and watched movies. We did a white elephant gift exchange. Nate and I chose the gift we brought-a variety of flash lights. We managed to keep all but 2 kids awake through to midnight! It was such a wonderful evening and we were thankful to be able to spend it with good friends. By midnight we were all ready to ring in the New Year and then head home to bed!
This year we pray for a much better year than last. 2009 brought too much loss, too much heartache and more family drama than I ever want to deal with again. We had some great moments too, I'm thankful for all the wonderful places we were able to travel too, the motivation to finally get some weight off, amazing milestones with our kids. To say 2009 was bittersweet is accurate.
Our 2010 already has some exciting things to look forward to. Nate and I will celebrate 10 years of marriage in March. Wow, I am so blessed I have Nate. I'm happy to know that we've been through so much and still remain strong and madly in love with each other. We don't have definite plans yet (please let us go on that cruise to Alaska, Nate!!!) but whatever we do will be wonderful just knowing I'm with the love of my life.
Elise turns 8 this year. She will be baptized and she's so excited for that. We talk about it often. She will get to wear the baptismal outfit I wore when I was 8. I can't tell you how touching that is for me, 26 years later.
Brady will start Kindergarten this year. How we're going to handle that, I have no clue. It means teaching him how to test himself. I'm intensely nervous. We have to let this little guy be in charge of his own diabetes---at 5! I know other families have made it happen and I have to rely on them for support and peace of mind. I've got time, I know that. And deep, down inside, I know things will work out. I have to trust that the school system knows what they're doing too.
February I go in to figure out what's going on with my body. In 2008 I made the announcement that we would like to try and get pregnant. Well, we've been trying but nothing for almost 1 1/2 years. I don't even know if it's me yet. It could be something minor or something major but the simple fact that it's anything makes me scared. I pray for, possibly, some good news come February.
I will be working on weight loss again, starting in the next week or two (I've maintained the 25 pound loss for 4 months!). For someone who's never known what it's like to be "skinny" I'm hopin' 2010 is the year to finally find out. I'm finding the thought actually freaks me out a little. I hope to succeed and am thankful for all the support I've already received.
We have our annual Disneyland trip scheduled for mid-April. Brady has been begging to go to Sea World so we're going to try to include a day or two there. Since Lego-Land is close by we may do a day there as well. We're excited! The kids have started saving.
I pray for happiness and optimism this year. I hope everyone has an amazing 2010! Make it the best year ever---not just for you, but help make 2010 the best for others too! Give a little more, serve more, help out more--do whatever it takes. Be more in tune with those you love and those around you. Happy 2010!!!

Sledding FUN!

Monday, December 28th--We decided to have a quiet family day. We picked an activity we could all have fun doing. Our little community has some areas with GREAT sledding hills. There's one with some hills that are a little more extreme, more for adults and teens. The other is much better for little kids. It's the same field we go to for soccer and baseball games. We had the hill all to ourselves. Someone had created a "lift" out of snow. Nate gave it a try and decided once was enough---he hurt his butt! he he he It was wonderful! Lots of fun!