Little Man

Wow! I am pretty sure I have never been so bad at blogging in my 4 year blogging history! I have totally fallen off the wagon! To be honest, there have been a lot of things lately that I have had to put on hold for awhile. I have some good excuses. Well, I think they are good excuses! The month of September, we spent a week in Disneyland and had the BEST vacation ever, but getting ready for it and then catching up when we got home put me behind on a lot of things. (Also, I took over 2000 pictures, so that will take awhile to edit and blog....)
Besides coming home from vacation, Darren had his knee surgery a few days after we got home and was pretty much stuck on the couch for a few weeks. Also during this time, I was REALLY sick. I haven't really shared our big news on the blog or Facebook, but we are expecting baby #4! We are really excited and will be finding out the sex of the baby in just about a week. The suspense is killing me! But, having Darren down and out from surgery and having me being exhausted and sick from my pregnancy left our house in a bit of a crisis mode for a little bit and only things that HAD to be done got done. We are still recovering from that! I am now feeling much better, but I have spent much of the last few weeks working on a fundraiser for a dear friend who recently had a baby with a very rare disorder. The fundraiser turned out to be much more work than I expected. I really enjoyed doing it - I worked with some of the best ladies and we were able to pull off something amazing and raised over $10,000! However, my house and family were severely neglected for awhile. And my blog. So, there is my LONG list of excuses! I am attempting to catch up, but I know it is going to be tough!

Anyway - On to the subject of my post... Our little man! Since I posted pictures of the girls, I figured I better include some of our Logan. He is growing up much too quickly and I can't believe that he is just about SIX and a HALF! Time flies! If you don't know Logan, you should! Everyone should know someone like Logan. He LOVES life and is so passionate about everything and the funniest things come out of his mouth. If I didn't know better, I would think sometimes that he is SIXTY, not six! He just has this way of saying things and thinking about things that are well beyond his years.

He had his 1st grade pics taken in September. When he brought home the pictures, I knew we would be participating in retake day...Not his best look!

Fortunately, it did get better!
Isn't he handsome????

And when I had my photographer do some family pictures for us, she took a couple of Logan that I love. He even smiled even though he hates having his picture taken!

I just love this boy! He is finally really starting to love first grade and school all day. It was a bit of an adjustment for him, but he is finally doing great and he loves having so many friends in his class. His teacher was making him redo a lot of work because he is not always very neat, but he is getting better and better at his handwriting and is loving all the books he gets to bring home. He only hates first grade when he finds out about fun things we do during the day while he is at school and he can't come along, but I think school lunch makes up for most of that! He LOVES that!

Logan says some of the funniest things. About a month ago, Darren took his for his Flu mist. He was very hesitant to get out of the car because he was worried that it was a trick and it was going to be a shot. (He has my fear of needles...) Darren finally got him in and the nurses told him to sniff the shot as they were administering it. He sniffed and then said, "Hmmm... smells like the Nile River!" The nurses didn't know what to do and they were all laughing and one asked, "How do you know? Have you been to the Nile?" Logan said, "No. That is just what I imagine it would smell like."

He FINALLY has a loose tooth! He has been stressing over this for a LONG time and is always complaining that he was going to be the last one in his class to lose a tooth. He actually has 2 loose ones and he loves to wiggle them. They could be the result of him punching himself in the face for the last few months trying to get a loose tooth like everyone else, but either way, they are finally really loose. However, he now is pretty nervous about them falling out.

Despite how big Logan has gotten, he still sucks his thumb and rubs your finger. I sometimes hate it, but secretly, there is a part of me that is happy about it because it makes him seem more like my little boy and not like the big 1st grader who all of a sudden has a bit of an attitude.

Logan has recently discovered Netflix and LOVES the old school cartoons we have introduced him to. Transformers, HeMan, Inspector Gadget - He LOVES them all and Darren and I like that he watches them, too. He also got really into Cars 2 lately and loves to talk about all the different cars and how fast they can go and how much they cost. He has started calling Darren's Accord a "family sedan" because that is what Darren told him it is called.

Logan is still obsessed with all things Star Wars, and particularly Star Wars Legos. He is an expert on all things relating to them. He can tell you what planet you can mine the crystals that go in each Jedi's lightsabers and many other trivia questions. He got a Star Wars Lego Advent Calendar and I can get him to do pretty much anything each day so that he can open the next box. It is awesome!

I am so proud of the little boy Logan is becoming. He is always so nice to other kids, even when they are not so nice to him. He is always telling me about some of his friends who aren't very nice to him when they are around other kids and won't always include him, but he never seems mad at them and always still wants to be their friend anyway.

Logan also recently saw his BIG Christmas gift in the trunk of Darren's car. Darren quickly made up a story that it was for someone in need and that I was taking it to my fundraiser. The day of the fundraiser I made a big deal about loading it up so that he would see it to make him think we were really getting rid of it. I asked him if he wanted to look at it real quick and he did. Then he said, "Mom, I know some little boy is going to love this. I'm really glad that we are giving it away!" He melted my heart! And yesterday we went to a live nativity and took food to donate and he just loved to shop in my cupboards for food for the needy. Today, he brought home a flyer from school for a fundraiser they are doing at his school. They are raising money to buy animals for people in need. $250 will buy a water buffalo and that is what Logan wants to do. He talked all day about what he could do to earn some money and how much he wanted to donate and how he really wanted at least $10 to get some chicks. He has also been talking a lot the last few days about how he would like to go to California and tell them to stop fishing for sharks in the ocean because he read a book about how so many are becoming extinct and he really likes sharks and is very worried about that.

I love how passionate he is and I love how giving and loving he is becoming. He is so sweet and has a big heart and I am so grateful that he is our little man!

Rylee

Rylee is now officially 4 AND a half. My kids always like to hit that point where they can add the half to their ages. These pictures prove it! She is growing up much too quickly!!! We love our little Princess!

She insisted on picking the BIGGEST bow the photographer had! So Rylee!Rylee is either my best helper or the BIGGEST stinker depending on her mood. She is very independent and very stubborn and has a strong opinion on pretty much everything, especially her clothes. She has started school and dance class and is loving both! She is our little artist and is constantly drawing. Lately, she has been into writing too and we spend all day spelling everything for her so she can write letters to people or "No boys allowed" signs for her room several times a day. Rylee has a big heart. She always wants people to be happy. She also has a bit of a temper! She loves her little sister... a little too much sometimes... and is constantly playing with her (and bossing her...) and is very motherly with her, which isn't always tolerated too well. She asks for a different bedtime song every night and her choices usually crack me up! They can range from I am a Child of God to Disney Princess songs to Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (that is a favorite of hers year round!) Some of her favorites right now are preschool, dance class, dressing up, coloring, writing letters, the movie Annie, Tangled, anything Princess, pink and purple, playdoh, Olivia, Strawberry Shortcake and playdates with her friends.

Avery

So, I haven't really gotten better at blogging.... But, I do have some VERY cute new pics to share! These are Avery's 2 year pictures. I am in LOVE! She was being a stinker when we got there and wanted nothing to do with photo taking, but between her little stuffed monkey and our fabulous photographer Katie working her magic, there are some great shots. I actually ended up going back and getting family ones done the very next week because I LOVED the place where we took them so much. I know that she is MY little girl, but seriously.... Isn't she the cutest???

I still can't believe this baby girl is TWO years old! She is my BABY! It doesn't seem possible. She is very much a do-it-yourself girl these days and wants to do everything the big kids do. She talks non-stop, although not all of it can be understood. She loves all things Disney since our trip and knows all the character names. She doesn't go anywhere without her stuffed monkey, Coconut, or To-co-nut, as she calls it. Some of her favorites right now are coloring, playing puppies, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Elmo, Barney, dancing, Woody, Buzz and Jessie, singing and baby dolls. She is always putting them to sleep and trying to change diapers. We love our sweet little girl!

My Beautiful Girls

So, blogging hasn't really happened lately. Along with a lot of other things... Cooking, house cleaning, laundry, working for Darren.... really I am SO far behind on everything and I don't know where to start to catch up. I know the holidays will be crazy though so I really am trying to get back on top of things. I debated just stopping my blogging addiction so that I could focus on other things, but I just can't.... It is my one way to keep a family journal and I actually love doing it and love having so many things down about my cute kids that I can look back on and all our memories. So, I am back and hoping to do better!

While I am trying to decide where to begin on my months of being behind, here are a few pictures of my beautiful girls that were taken a couple weeks ago before all the leaves were gone and it was freezing cold outside. I love how cute they are together in the pictures. It doesn't always go that way when they are playing together at home, but they are the best of friends, even if they do fight most of the day. They love each other and are starting to play together more and more and I love watching it. Rylee is constantly helping Avery and mothering her, which is not always appreciated by Avery, but they do try to get along. Lately, there has been a lot of playing Annie, puppies and family. I will answer to Avery calling for "mom" only to find out she is really calling for Rylee because they are playing something. And for some reason, I have frequently become Grandma Ali. I have no idea where that came from, but that is my name in their world of make believe! These girls make me happy and since it is the month of gratitude, I just want to say how grateful I am for them and the joy (and sometimes stress!) they bring to our home!



Stay tuned.... I have more individual pics of the girls still to come!

TWO

This month has not been a great one for blogging! I have fallen even farther behind than I ever thought possible and sometimes I just want to give up and forget this blog exists.... but I love it too much! It has replaced my scrapbooking addiction (for now) and is the place that I do the best about recording family events and all those moments I want to never forget. So, I will return... eventually.

Things are a little crazy at the moment. We just returned from my FAVORITE vacation ever where we spent 4 magical days at the Happiest Place on Earth and loved every minute! I can't wait to blog all about it.... But I took over 2000 pictures.... so it may take awhile.

We returned and ONE day later, Darren had reconstructive surgery to replace his torn ACL. I didn't think it was such a big deal, but it has been! I guess I didn't realize how much it would take him out and how little he would be able to do. And in return, how MUCH I have had to do. I have a very helpful hubby, which I probably take for granted WAY too often, and I am really starting to realize how much I appreciate all that help because I don't have it. It has been hard for me to keep up. The day of his surgery, I tried to be brave and make it through everything at the hospital, which is very hard for me. Ever since I was a little kid, hospitals have done something to me physically which frequently result in me passing out, or nearly passing out. Well... it happened again! I was SO close to making it through the day and as the nurse was giving me all the discharge instructions, I started to have THAT feeling. Maybe most people wouldn't know the feeling, but having passed out more than my fair share of times (including in sacrament meeting), I immediately knew the feeling and asked the nurse for some juice and told her what was about to happen and tried to put my head between my knees as I have learned to do, but my head didn't make it that far. It instead fell onto Darren's bed... unconscious... At least I warned them and I was sitting down! I then spent the next half hour puking in the recovery room and we had to call my little brother to come and pick us BOTH up because I couldn't drive home. Awesomeness! I felt so weird for the rest of the day and couldn't really recover. Darren and I were both on the couch while total chaos was going on all around us and the next day I realized how much damage was done! It left me so much to catch up on, especially since I wasn't totally done unpacking and because I had a birthday party to get ready for and NO hubby to help. Luckily, some friends were amazing and did a lot to help me and somehow, the party happened. And we got through the week. And I survived.

Which brings me to the REAL reason I sat down at the computer to post.... TWO years ago yesterday, this happened. Our sweet Avery came into our family and forever changed our lives, like all babies do.
Sometimes it feels like this baby was SO long ago, and other days, it feels like just yesterday. It is hard to explain, unless you have your own babies that grow up much too quickly, and then you know just what I mean.

Is she not the sweetest thing ever???
And... 2 years go by and she is practically a little girl! I can't believe how grown up she seems all of a sudden. She is talking SO much and even making full sentences these days. She loves her friend "Hal" and asks to see her just about every day. She is SO independent and says, "No, Avery do it" about 100 times a day, especially when it involves buckles, which she is somewhat obsessed with. She has started to love to really play with Logan and Rylee and I love watching them interact. When they are not fighting, of course. She LOVES to tease and has the funniest sense of humor and she now scrunches her face up and closes her eyes in just about every picture I have. She asks to "nuggle" and it melts your heart. She asks for "God" every night when you tuck her in, which means "I am a Child of God" and it is so sweet! She is the funniest little story teller and uses her hands and her facial expressions so cute. It just cracks me up! I just don't know what we would do without her! I will hopefully catch up and get all her birthday stuff posted...someday.... But, I just wanted to say how much we love our baby girl! Happy #2 Avery!!! Please stop growing up so fast!

And one more quick thing. I went to the Relief Society broadcast on Saturday and it was Fabulous! I LOVED, LOVED, LOVED Elder Uchtdorf's talk and really want to read it again soon. If you missed it, READ it! It is amazing! I loved the part about being happy NOW and about making the RIGHT sacrifices and his amazing testimony of the Lord's love for us. Truly inspiring stuff!

Kicking off the Summer...

I was doing SO good on posting for awhile, but I am falling further behind again! Here is one last post for June, which was actually going to be my first post, but somehow it got forgotten... It was going to be a bit of a recap before I posted everything else, but now it is a little bit of a repeat of other posts....
Here is how we started off our summer! June 1 - School is out for the summer!!! Logan on his LAST day of Kindergarten! How did that happen? They had snow cones and cleaned their desks with shaving cream and got into a shaving cream fight! He had a great day!
All the kiddos sending Logan off for one more day of school. June 1 - Here is a new summer project - A garden! Darren built and painted these boxes all by himself! Such a handy hubby! I love how they look! And we did have a lot of plants in them.... but almost everything broke off or blew away in a windstorm. We transplanted most of this from our little greenhouse garden, and a lot of it just didn't make it! So sad! We replanted a few more things and ended up getting a little bit out of our garden, but I guess it is a learning process... June 3 - Uncle Jeff graduated from high school! Way to go!!! June 4 - Miss Avery got her first big girl hair cut and is looking much too grown up! June 4 - My sister, Heather, announced she was expecting! Yeah for a new cousin!!! I think I was one of the first people to know. The kids can't wait. She just found out it was a girl, too. So fun! Rylee and Ethan after the big announcement. Logan was camping with Dad, so he wasn't there and Avery was asleep in the car for all the fun! June 6 - 10 - Logan went to British Soccer Camp and had so much fun...even if his World Cup team didn't win any games. June 7 - 9 - Rylee went to a fun Princess day camp and loved every minute! She had a great time dressing up and making crafts and going with her friend, Madi. June 9 - Avery fell asleep on one of our runs to pick up the kids from their camps. I think it is so funny when she sleeps this way! June 9 - Avery thought she was so funny with this hat and Rylee's necklace. She loves to try on clothes - especially hats and shoes and accessories - All girl!!! June 9 - We survived salmonella! Logan started with diarrhea and had a fever off and on for a couple of days. I took him to the Dr on Tues (and he missed soccer camp) and they had me take a stool sample. The results didn't come in until Friday and we found out he had salmonella! Poor kid! And by then, Avery had started and then Rylee started on Saturday. Luckily, the girls were able to get antibiotics right away, so they didn't have it nearly as long as Logan. I had no idea it was contagious until I talked to the Dr on Friday, so then we were on quarantine for a few days. Not the most fun way to start out our summer... We watched LOTS of movies and had several PJ days. We found out later we contracted it from our pet frogs! June 10 - I think this was one of our movie days. She cracks me up when she sits like this!
June 13 - Miss Avery decided she wanted some more cereal.... and made a BIG mess on the table! Good thing she is so darn cute! June 14 - I caught the girls eating their apples together on the couch. They looked so sweet! Sometimes they can be so nice to each other. Some times.... Avery LOVES apples! I love to hear her say that word - It is so cute!
June 16 - We finally got rid of salmonella and got to have a couple friends over. The kids were so excited and were waiting on the lawn for about 15 minutes before they got here. They looked so cute sitting out there together and it just looked like summer to me. I tried to sneak in and get some good pictures without them knowing... but they spotted me! This baby LOVES to swing!!! She stands by the door and can't wait to go out all day. She is really starting to like the big girl swing now, too. I just love where we live.... the view from our playground. It makes me happy! Logan and his little buddy - They have so much fun together! They were in the same Kindergarten class and got together to play a few times over the summer. They are cute little friends! And - he has a sister just Rylee's age. The first time Logan went to play at their house, Rylee was in the car in her Pjs, and their mom invited her in anyway. I was a little embarrassed, but she really wanted to play, so I let her go. She had a great time, and these 2 are now cute friends, too. Silly girls!
Going down the slide - It is finally feeling like summer!!! June 17 - Rylee had a little party, so Logan and Avery spent the whole afternoon doing sidewalk chalk. This is pretty rare for Logan because he doesn't really like to draw. He has been watching Nemo a lot lately, so he decided to draw pictures to tell the whole story. He got really into it and had so much fun! I loved watching him! Hard at work! Here was his little helper...
Kind of hard to see because of the basketball hoop shadow, but this is the start of his story - The anenome. The pink is the anenome and if you look close, you can see the little orange fish. I wish I would have taken notes because now I don't remember what everything is, but he did such a great job and couldn't wait to tell Daddy and Ry his whole story. This one has the pink jellyfish and Crush, the sea turtle and towards the end the whale spouting...So proud of his masterpiece! June 17 - Rylee went to a fun pajama party at her friend's house down the street. They got to watch a movie and she got her face painted! She LOVED it and she was SO sad when it was gone the next day. I guess she thought it would stay on forever!
June 17 - We went to Summerfest downtown, which is an art festival close to our house. We go every year and love it, but this year wasn't my favorite. We went on a Friday night and it was SO crowded! I usually am so excited for the food, but the lines were so long, we ended up going to Savannah's BBQ instead. The kids had a good time though. They love getting out and doing things. I think Logan had an emergency potty stop while we were doing pictures... He was there though. June 18 - We babysat my nephew Ethan for a couple of days while my sister and her hubby were in Disneyworld. It was so fun watching our little "twins" for a few days. They were so funny - They fought a lot, but they were also cute little friends. June 19 - We celebrated our wonderful daddy on Father's Day and treated him to breakfast in bed! He is the BEST!!!
June 22 - Rylee went upstairs after swimming and got in the tub in her suit and used mom's shampoo all over her legs while she was still in her suit - Little Stinker!
June 23 - Rylee drew this picture of Mom. Can you guess what the round circles with dots are??? Yep... She told me they were boobs!
June 26 - We did lots of celebrating of our Logan's 6th birthday. First, with a family party and a pretty awesome lightsaber cake!
June 27 - Then on his actual birthday with lots of presents, dinner at Chuck-A-Rama and a trip to the movie Cars 2.
June 28 - And finally with his fun friends for a Jedi party! June 30 - We spent a good part of June at the pool for swimming lessons for Logan and Ry. It was the last 2 weeks Mon-Thur. We loved staying after and swimming with our friends!
June 30 - And Logan played his very first season of t-ball with mommy as his coach. It took up a lot of our summer nights as it was every Tues/Thurs night for the month of June. It was a lot of fun and I think we both learned a lot! June 30 - Avery cheering on Logan at his last game. She is such a big CHEESE!
June 30 - We lost something on the last day of swimming lessons and had to go to the office to check lost and found. The kids found this Kyle Beckerman and had to have a picture. We love Kyle and Real Salt Lake!!!
I was surprised but Rylee wanted a picture, too.