February 2017

We started February with a quick trip to Utah. Bryson and Cheryl got married and we gained a wonderful sister-in-law and a nephew and niece. 

 Papa Dave and Boston

 The kids were excited to play in the snow. I was more than happy to stay indoors.

 Miss Brooklyn wasn't feeling well most of the trip.

 Cousins are the best!

 Ryan was a stinker. He kept it a secret that he was the one that was going to marry Bryson and Cheryl. I found out 5 minutes before the ceremony. It was pretty funny.

 The amazing couple!

Brooklyn had an eye exam and came out perfect.

 Sadie worked hard on her biology project.

 Boston started flag football in the winter. He had a lot of fun. His coach was awesome.

 Relaxing outside while Boston learned to ride a bike. Shame on me for not getting a picture of that. He was very determined to learn himself. I am proud to say that I didn't help other than emotional support. I told him that it would take 100 tries for him to be able to ride his bike, so don't get discouraged at 50 or 80 tries. We lost count after about 30 tries, but he definitely learned before 50 tries. I was very proud of his perseverance.

 Uncle Bryson, Aunt Cheryl, Brooklyn and Sawyer came for a quick visit. Here we are playing pictionary.

 9 o'clock. Sometimes your child is asleep. Sometimes your child is not.

Caution: now entering 2017...

Just look at that new Sunbeam! She was pretty excited to go to Primary until we got to the room and she instantly felt really shy.

 This little lady went to Senior Primary!

 We went to the children's museum in Phoenix.

 Boston giving a ride to Baby B.

 Working at the hot dog stand

 It was barefoot weather perfect

 Senoritas? Senors?

 El Guapo

 Happy 4th Birthday Brooklyn!

Brooklyn at 4 years old:

• She is hilarious. She makes jokes, teases, and laughs all day long.
• She is in size 4 clothes
• She can write her name, use scissors, and has known her numbers and alphabet a long time
• She is quite flexible even though we haven't worked on it at all. I have a feeling she will be a natural dancer
• She loves to tell stories. One day she began a story with: “So there I was...” – Ryan and I got such a kick out of that. Where did she get that phrase?
• She started Primary and is doing great.
• She is very artistic and spends a lot of time painting and coloring daily. She is pretty meticulous and stays within the lines
• She loves reading books as well as listening to short audio books in the car. Our ULTIMATE favorite audio book right now is “Skippy Jon Jones Snow What”. All of us love it (including me) and we've almost got it memorized.

 She wanted rainbow cupcakes

 This girl was excited to finally get her own set of tools like her siblings. 

 She loved her new jammies

 She also got a random bag of skinny balloons. None of us really know how to make animals or anything special, so we just kind of winged it. 

 Uncle Devin came over for a quick visit with Daphne. Brooklyn made herself comfortable really quickly.

 More silly balloon fun

 Brooklyn loves to work on her 'homework'. She is pretty proficient in writing her letters and numbers. 

 This is just a weird picture, but it reminds me to tell you about my calling at church. Remember that time when my husband was the Bishop and his wife had 3 callings? Yes, you read that correctly. THREE!!! I mean, I'm usually a pretty chill person who is always willing to serve, but really? REALLY? Yeah. I kinda kaboshed that pretty quickly. So at that time, I was a Relief Society Teacher and I was on the Relief Society Activities Committee. Then in September, I was called to be the Scout Committee Chairman over Cubs and Boy Scouts. 

That last calling came as a shocker. I have NEVER, EVER, EVER done anything with Scouts before, so I had positively no idea what I was doing. Oh yeah, and all the rechartering stuff was due later that month. Rad. Luckily I had the old committee chairwoman to help me step by step. She was amazing. She was in a different ward and still came to help me. Whew! 

I was released from the Relief Society teacher calling in December, so now I'm back down to two callings. 

I'll be honest, January 2017 was not my favorite. We had to say goodbye to Baby B. It was so hard. It was so, so, so hard. It was awful. Bleh. However, it did make me aware of the wonderful people around me. It made me aware that I have a network or support group of friends who I can turn to when I am struggling. It made me aware of how truly blessed I am. All my life I have had my needs met. I have never known poverty. I have lots of love in my life. That sure makes it easier to look forward to the many tomorrows!

I hardly ever post videos

These are the songs from Boston's Kindergarten Thanksgiving program. My favorite song he sings says: "5 fat turkeys are we. We slept all night in the tree. When the cooks came 'round, we couldn't be found. So that's why we're here, you see."

Dashing through December

Boston lost his first tooth!

 This is Ryan's passive-aggressive way of letting me know he hates flies in the house.

 We picked out our Christmas Tree!

 Our ward party had a 'live' nativity where you could ask each character about who they were and their feelings about the Savior.

 Holly and I were (a little too) delighted to perform for the ward party's 'floor show'. We learned the choreography from the 'Sister's' Song from White Christmas. We danced as we lip sang to the original music. But we were just the set up for the REAL show...

 Our hubbies, performed the parody that Bing Crosby and Danny Kay did in the movie. They were the real hit! Thanks you for giving into our crazy antics!

 There was dancing for all later at the party and Boston was a real ladie's man twirling the girls around the room.

 We skipped out on the ward party clean up to head straight to Jim Gaffigan! We laughed until our sides hurt. It was so much fun!

 Brooklyn took a dance class at the rec center. This is her last day of class.

 The girls with their teacher.

Before the dress rehearsal, I told her to strike a pose and I'm dying of cuteness at the result! 

 She did a great job!

 2nd tooth out for the books!

 Caroline, Brooklyn, and Haley at a play date.

 Sadie's 'gingerbread' house she decorated at school. (The base is actually an empty milk carton with frosting on it. )

 Ryan and I helped out at Sadie's class party. Making pancakes..

 Brooklyn tagged along

 The kids each got a gift from the teacher, Mrs. Rubi.

 Boston's class exchanged stocking stuffers.

 My girls helping me make eggnogg pies!

 The boys built a temporary table for us to do Christmas puzzles on.

 Brooklyn told Aunt Ashley that she had to look like Mary while they played a game.

Christmas is up next and it gets its own post!