Memorial Day...

This has been the ongoing birthday week for Paul, and he has loved it! We got together with family for Memorial Day/Paul's birthday celebration, and had a fun pizza making contest. It was funny that most of us chose the same pizza toppings, except Andrew - he and Cara cheated and brought a pizza from the "Pie", which was chicken bacon ranch! The rest of us basically had sun dried tomatoes, artichokes, and spinach. It was funny how different they all tasted. Looking at the pictures makes me hungry for more!

Paul's favorite breakfast is Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Pancakes. We all benefited from that one!

Paul is so lucky to have lots of aunts, uncles, and grandparents who wanted to celebrate turning 5 with him!

Poppy and Grandma Ce-Ce gave him this Star Wars helmet. James and a couple of the uncles were a little jealous- I'm sure Paul will share though :) Paul's favorite thing to do is to take his one of his uncles i-phones or i-pods to watch Phineas and Ferb. He has been saving up for his own i-pod, so Caleb gave him some money to put in the bank for his fund. We got him some very, very tacky Phineas and Ferb pj's, and of course he wanted to wear them as clothes today - didn't happen :) He wanted a chocolate mousse cake, again for his birthday. I got our friend April Fear's recipe, and it was awesome!

Milestones...

Paul graduated from preschool this past week. He participated in a cute alligator program and sang songs about the alphabet, vowel sounds, days of the week, etc. I don't know if it has really hit him that preschool is all over, but he has been excited to start kindergarten. It is hard to believe that he is already 5!!! We have loved his teacher, Miss Lisa, and Alanna is so excited to start preschool in the fall.

Alanna is potty trained! She just decided she was going to do it, and that was that. Watching your child choose to consistently use the potty has to be one of the most satisfying experiences as a parent! We are beyond thrilled to have 3 out of the 4 kids potty trained.

It's so fun to watch Alanna's personality develop more and more as she grows and wants to be a big girl. She has so much fun playing with friends, and she lines up play dates for herself. I have fun "spying" on her as she plays with her dolls or stuffed animals and sings songs to herself. She still really misses Pyper, and once in a while looks out the front window and asks if she can go across the street. Soon we will go see Pyper and the cows though!

The other day we were out and a teenager was talking to Blaze getting him to smile and coo. This teenager had a colorful Mohawk and was wearing androgynous clothing, and Alanna blurted out " Mommy , is that a boy or a girl?" Truth be told I really couldn't tell, and wondered the same thing myself, but I was horrified that she said that and the teenager heard her! She just quickly replied, "I'm a girl, honey, I just have crazy hair!" That's not the first awkward moment I've had with my kids blurting things out, but Alanna is usually a little more shy. I think she is outgrowing that though :)

Paul's PiRRRRate PaRRRRty !

We celebrated Paul's friend B-day party one week early since his real B-day will fall on Memorial Day weekend. He wanted to go with the Pirate theme - so easy these days. His guests were his preschool class, and a couple of neighborhood friends. This was one of the many situations where it would have been helpful to have 8 arms, like an octopus, rather than only two like a human mom. Since that will never happen, I think next time I will have one of my very perceptive female friends help out, rather than my software programming male partner who must be given step by step instructions for each task :) It just gets a little crazy entertaining with 10 kids (plus my own)! So, I missed taking pictures for the first half of the party. We had a treasure hunt where they had to "walk the plank" and "shoot cannons" and "swash buckle" to earn clues for the treasure. They ended up at the clown pinata. I know - lame - didn't go with our pirate theme. I called a store the day before the party to make sure they had the pirate ship pinata I wanted, and of course when I got there they didn't have it. Paul really liked the clown though.
It was so fun to watch Alanna run around with the group of older kids and act like a pirate. Each kid had quite a loot bag full of candy from the pinata.

I just had the kids decorate their own cupcake

and ice cream sundae since they like to do that sort of thing.

Paul got a couple of unsuspecting kisses from the two little girls at the party. Earlier that day we had been at the temple grounds for Alanna's school field trip. According to his little friend M.'s mom, she said she wants to marry Paul in the temple some day! So cute!

That's 1 down, 3 to go for the parties this summer. Even though they are so much work, it's worth it to see how excited the kids get. I hope it will be a good memory for Paul!

Uncle Andrew's B-day!

This is Uncle Andrew with the crazy hair. He says his girlfriend, Cara, really like is - so he won't be cutting it anytime soon :) He came over on Sunday for dinner and cake to celebrate his birthday which was on Friday, May 13. We have always given him a hard time about that since he was actually born on Friday the 13th! My brother Paul and I used to tell Andrew that he would turn into a ware wolf when it was a full moon and he would get hairy and out of control. We also had him convinced that he was adopted. Poor guy - I am much nicer to him now. Coincidental, he and Jackson have both been incorporating "contour lines" in their artwork lately. Jackson gave Andrew a b-day card all decorated in contour lines that Andrew loved. I'm glad a have a couple of artistic brothers who can relate to Jackson's interest in art. I wish I was good at drawing, painting, sculpting... something artsy! Maybe in my next life I'll have time to master one of those skills. We're so glad we could celebrate with Andrew, and it was a great excuse for me to make this chocolate cake I have been wanting to try :)

Mother's Day Loot...

We had my parents over for dinner to celebrate Mother's day. James offered to "help" cook dinner, but I'd rather do it all myself. If you know James very well, you have probably heard about his cooking "skills"! It was so fun to see what my kids made in school and nursery for Mother's day. They were SOOOO excited to give me their cards and presents - it was the best! My parents brought these bright yellow daffodils, some huge Tootsie Rolls (one of my favs), and some elephant ears to plant in our yard.

Paul made this beautiful card in preschool that had a removable magnet with his picture on it. Inside was a questionnaire where he answered things like "What does my mom like to do?" and "How much does my dad weigh?" Those are always fun to see.

Alanna has the best nursery teachers. She loves them because they completely spoil her - the same treatment she gets at home. Every time I go into nursery she is in Sister Schmitt's lap being cuddled. They always tell us what an angel Alanna is , and they gush about how pretty her hair and clothes are. We haven't ever had a problem leaving her there! She loved her card so much that she wanted it back after she gave it to me! She is very into tracing her hand on all of her papers. I guess it's her signature for now.

Jackson worked so hard on his presents at school for weeks. It was killing him to keep them a secret - he just kept telling me had had a special surprise. The silhouette just cracks me up because his teacher got a very distinctive feature of Jackson - the unruly hair in the front of his head! It was a cover of a book filled with a couple of poems and sweet things he thought about me. He also made these beautiful paper flowers with chores written on each one that he is going to do for us. He has actually been asking me when I am going to use the "coupons"! I love how excited he is to give.

Now...this was my favorite -from James of course. He found the most disgusting picture of Steven Tyler caught in an awkward moment for the front. I'm telling you - he is really trying to break my crush! The inside of the card was filled with awkward pictures of himself practically kissing the camera! I think he had as much fun making the card as we all had looking at it. I love the cards he makes - so creative! I've had lots of fun clothes shopping lately, so I told him I'd get my own Mother's day present! A card like this is much better anyway!

Being a mom isn't the most glamorous job, but it is the most rewarding thing I have ever done. I am so thankful for 4 beautiful, smart, loveable children - and a supportive, fun loving husband who appreciates me. This is the life for me!

Winter time blues..

Blaze is really into neck kisses right now. Just about every time I pick him up he throws his head back and smiles in anticipation of kisses and raspberries on his tender little neck. I LOVE it! What could be sweeter than that?

Alanna insists on "fixing" her own hair some days. She had it in a braid the previous day, and so she just undid the braid and tossed it about. She was so proud of her hair!

For some reason Grandpa Joe did not want us to

get his picture sporting his granddaughter's bunny ears! Jackson and I conspired against him to get a quick shot - we had to act fast, that's why it's blurry!

Apparently, Blaze loves nibbles on his ears too! He'll take any affection he can get! James used to make fun of me for kissing Jackson so much when he was first born. Look who's loving it now though!

The kids had fun playing with their cousins this weekend. Kaia is just about as crazy and fun loving as our boys are. She was so good about sharing all of her toys with all of the cousins.

This is why I need some photo shop skills! Try taking a group picture of 6 kids ages 6 and under! This was the best "unedited" photo I captured! In a way it's perfect though. This was moment in time for us all to remember how crazy life once was! Please tell me it does calm down... a little!

Blaze and cousin Cruz are about two months apart. I will say that Blaze outweighs him a bit though! It's so fun that they happened to be color coordinated for these pictures!

Do you think if I change my blog background to a summer theme, wear my summer clothes, and hang out at the indoor pool... summer will finally come??? The answer is NO! I will just be disappointed each day when the weather report says it is going to be a whopping 70 degrees, and at 1pm when I have told my kids we could have lunch at the park we wimp out because it's only 60 degrees and very windy outside! UGGGG! Maybe if I finally take down my winter door wreath and put out my summer one - that will work right! Why don't I live in CA? Many reasons, but I would take their weather any day. We have had some indoor fun lately though.