Escape

Anyone that knows me, knows that I LOVE to travel. It doesn't really even matter where, just as long as it involves a nice hotel room and good food. None of that camping stuff for me. If there isn't a bed, bathroom and maid, it ain't for me. Kids tend to slow down the travel thing. Either you have to take them with you and it becomes a trip, not a vacation, or you have to find some poor soul willing to take over the tough job of mothering while you're gone. My mom became that poor (or brave) soul this week. She came and stayed with the kids while I ran away with Dave. He had a conference in Midway and it seemed like a great opportunity to escape. We had never been to Zermatt before, so didn't quite know what to expect. OH MY GOSH!! Had I known how nice it was, I would have suggested more than just one night. Midway is a beautiful place to begin with, but the resort is fabulous and we had a gorgeous one bedroom condo, too.

We enjoyed a nice dinner in Heber and then a relaxing night back in our room. Sometimes it's just so nice to escape the reality of life, even if it's only for a day. Having alone time with Dave is a huge booster shot for me and I love the times that we get alone together. Each time we do, it reminds me of all the good things that made me fall in love with him to begin with. He is my best friend and the one person in this world that I lean on when life gets hard. It's too bad that it takes a trial or vacation to make me realize how much I love him, need him, enjoy him and appreciate him, but sometimes it does. The last two weeks have been especially hard for me and have shaken me up quite a bit, so to have this escape was badly needed. I'm just glad that he stands by me through everything. He is my rock and my blankie. I can't imagine life without him by my side.

Today was back to reality and I wasn't ready. I love my kids, but nothing makes me love them more than being away from them for a little while. Now if I could just remember that when I come home...

All Dressed Up

With Halloween on a Sunday this year, we celebrated Halloween for days leading up to the real thing, which turned out to be just another day. Wednesday was McCall's party at school. She is loving preschool this year and is so excited to go each week. She came home with the first of several bags of cavity-causing candy that made their way into our home. She loves all the Disney princesses, but her latest fave is Ariel. She was very specific in how she wanted her costume to look, including the fin! She couldn't quite figure out how to get her legs to disappear and truly be a mermaid though.

The parade at the elementary school was on Friday with class parties following. I love watching the kids walk around in their costumes with their friends. They love the sugar cookies, root beer and candy they get in class. Tiara has afternoon kindergarten, so she was able to watch the parade in the morning and then go to her own parade in the afternoon. She managed to find several of her friends at the morning parade and invited them all to come sit with us. Being a cheerleader was perfect for her as she organized her own cheering section for her brothers!I got to go help with the parties in both Seth's and Tiara's classes. It's always hard to figure out how to help with parties, so I was glad that Tiara's was in the afternoon and I could squeeze in two classes. The down side was that I spent my entire day at the school. Oh well, one less day I have to feel guilty about not having a spotless house!

Saturday was a party at the TaeKwonDo school. All of the kids were able to go and they had fun playing games and showing off their costumes...AGAIN. Since we live in "Mormon Country" everyone went trick-or-treating on Saturday night. Spencer went with his best buddy, Porter. Between their neighborhood and ours, these boys came home with almost 7 pounds of candy each!The rest of the kids went out with Dave. It was a rainy night, so I was more than happy to stay home, watch the Utah game, and give out candy. McCall tired out before the others, so Dave came home for a shift change. (Really he just wanted to watch the game.) I went out with Seth, Davis and Tiara until the boys got tired and we headed home. About this time, Spencer & Porter showed up and I went with them and Tiara to hit a few more homes. Tiara is a die-hard! She could have gone another hour if everyone hadn't turned out their lights. I can't believe that girl! She did almost as well as Spencer bringing home a whopping 5 pounds of the sugary stuff.

I just can't wait until it's all out of the house. I'd love to have the kids eat it all so I can brush their little teeth and not have to worry about constant sugar in their mouths.

Turning Over a New Leaf

I have been so terrible at blogging for the past year. Most of the reason I started blogging was so that my mom could see what we were doing while she was on a mission in Chile. But once she came home, I didn't have quite the same motivation. After all, I could just call her or go visit and stay in touch. On top of that, I worried about who was reading what. The idea of all of our family's activities being out there bothered me (it still does). And I didn't want something I wrote to be taken the wrong way by someone. I felt like I was having to censor what I wrote and that defeated the purpose of having a blog that doubles as my journal. Well, I'm starting fresh. With the exception of my inner most thoughts, I'm back in business. I'm done censoring (for the most part) and I'm just writing what I think or feel. If I write something that offends someone, it's their choice to be offended because it isn't intended. I'm just thinking out loud and journaling our family life. Most of what I have to talk about is my kids and their stuff. There isn't much more to my life than being a wife and mom. But don't think I'm complaining. There isn't anything else in this world that means more to me than Dave and the kids, and there isn't any other title that I'd rather have. If I go through this earthly life and do nothing more than be a good wife and mother, I'll feel entirely successful. So here we go with the story of our lives...

Still Here

I'm still here!!! Life has been so incredibly busy... BIG surprise! When is it not? I've been wanting to get caught up on everything from Christmas on, but I'm now relinquishing and I'll just have to start fresh. Christmas was good, New Year's was fun, January was...well, January. Does anything good ever happen in January? It's cold, the inversions keep me from seeing the sun and keep all of us indoors, it's cold, we're out of money since Christmas hit, and it's cold. This month brought baseball, baseball and a little more baseball. Valentine's was spent with Dave in one part of the state and me in another. Not exactly ideal:( But we're headed into spring, off track time and hopefully some warmer weather.

Play Day

Last Monday I took the kids for a total play day downtown. We went to Discovery Gateway, had lunch in the food court, then went to see Santa vs. the Snowman at the planetarium. The kids have so much fun at the children's museum and could play there for hours. We haven't been there for a while because I let our membership expire last summer. I'd love to always have one, but it just doesn't work very well when we have preschool and kindergarten schedules to juggle. Bummer for everyone.


Anyway, they spent hours playing. McCall is finally old enough to play on her own, too. I found her playing in the house with whatever kids were around several times. One of the times, she had dressed herself in a chef's hat and apron and was cooking meals and serving them to the kids at the table. It was so fun to watch her pretending and playing on her own. I could have watched for hours.

Spencer was a huge help (as always) keeping track of the littler kids and playing with them.
And then there's Seth. *sigh* If I survive this kid it will be a miracle. He managed to get himself lost twice in the first 20 minutes. How hard can it be to stay in the same room as your family? Uggh! As I was gathering everyone to go to lunch, he managed to lose himself for the third time. He was right with us and then he was gone. I looked everywhere for 15 minutes! The place isn't that big. I had no idea where he could have gone. Knowing the way he thinks, I didn't know if he had just gone to the food court on his own or wandered off somewhere or been taken by someone. As I'm getting ready to have the whole place searched and call security, I have the thought to check upstairs. I didn't know why he would be up there, because we hadn't gone up there to play yet, but I thought I'd better check anyway. There he was, playing with some blocks, oblivious to the fact that he had been lost from us for going on 20 minutes. Off in his own little world...again! I was so happy/relieved to find him and so angry at him at the same time. He said he wanted to play upstairs and later gave the story that he followed Spencer up there. Good try, but not true. So Seth spent the rest of the day having to stay less than an arms length away from me. I wanted him to be punished without punishing the other kids, and I wanted it to be relevant to what he did. So he stayed right next to me the rest of the day to make sure that he wouldn't get lost or taken. After lunch it was off to the movie at the planetarium. Santa vs. the Snowman is one of the cutest 3D movies I have ever seen. I've taken the kids to see it before and I love watching them react to the movie. Trying to avoid being hit by a falling ladder, catch the snowflakes and dodge snowballs. Seriously SOOO cute!

The kids love seeing all of the exhibits there and getting to walk on the moon with the astronauts or play on Mars.





Then it was back to the children's museum for more play time. I told them they could play as long as they wanted, but had to peel them away to go home a little after 4:00. They really could have stayed until they closed. Maybe next summer would be a good time to renew that membership?!

Christmas Round-Up

At this point, I'm not even sure where to start. December is always a busy month, but I thought I'd have time to better keep up with all of our activities than I ended up with. I usually have most of my Christmas shopping done by the first week of December when the kids go off track so that I can spend the month playing with the kids. This year was no different, but I guess we just spent so much time playing that I didn't do much else. I hate leaving the blogging part til the end, because this is the only journal I keep. Terrible, I know. But none the less, here's the summary of this month's craziness.

We went to see Santa at the mall. There is only one mall left in the valley that will still let you take your own pictures with Santa. I refuse to pay their outrageous prices for the dorky photos, so we ventured out on a snowy day to see Santa. I love being able to take the kids during the day when everyone else is at school. We can walk right up and see Santa and there's never anyone behind us pushing us to hurry. The kids whispered a few top choices in his ear and he promised to see what he could do.

We took Spencer and Seth to the John Schmidt concert. Both the boys are taking piano lessons now, and Spencer is getting quite good. I've recently found him laying upside-down on the piano bench playing "Jingle Bells" so taking him to see John Schmidt seemed to be he natural thing to do. For those of you that don't know who he is, he is a great composer/pianist that gets a kick out of playing the piano with various body parts, but more notably, upside-down. Spencer loved the concert and seeing how much fun someone could have with music. Seth liked it, but he's a little harder to read. I knew he enjoyed it when I heard him say, "Hey, that's John! I'm his biggest fan!" the next day when a commercial came on for the concert.

It was a fun night out with just the two of them. We took them to dinner and broke the news to Seth about Santa. He quickly exclaimed, "I knew it!" A thousand thanks to Dalin for babysitting the 3 little kids at the last minute. We couldn't have gone without your help.

Tiara's class had their monthly field trip to Gardner Village. We all went along to see all the elves. It was decorated so cute with elves everywhere. Tiara had lots of fun with her friends. Davis & McCall fit right in and added to the chaos. It was a cold, but fun day.

She also had her Christmas program at school. She was so excited to perform for all of us. She's been practicing her part and all of her songs for weeks. She is just the cutest little Santa girl!
We also made our traditional candy houses. First we made one at home. This is part of the off-track that I love. I assemble the house and the kids go crazy. They get to be totally in charge of how it looks and they love it. It may not end up as perfect as it could, but they LOVE plastering as much candy as they can where ever they can. It's so fun to watch them.

Every year we have a candy house party at Dave's parents' house. The kids build the biggest graham cracker house they can and then fill it with their favorite candy. They still decorate the outside, but the inside is the important part. Seth's house was a little different this year. He placed a candy on each outside wall and that was it. No candy inside and nothing around the house. Dave, of course, couldn't have a kid of his with an empty house, so he filled it with candy when Seth wasn't looking.

And, of course, no Christmas would be complete with out the family Christmas pageant. Tiara was so excited to play Mary this year. She has some older cousins that also love to be Mary, but they graciously gave up the part so she could have a turn. Thanks girls, she loved it! Spencer was her donkey, Davis & Jackson played shepherds and McCall was a cow. Seth was...downstairs playing the Wii...BIG surprise!

Little Flower

Tiara changed dance studios this year and it's been quite a change from last year. I'm very happy with the new studio and can see her dancing there for a very long time. For their Christmas recital, they always do a full length ballet. This year's ballet was Snow White. It is perfect timing, since the new DVD just came out recently. The kids have really liked watching the movie, which made it easier for them to come and enjoy the show. Tiara's class played the flowers at Snow White's funeral. She did an awesome job and loved dancing with the bigger girls. Dave got a little tricked into going to the ballet. I somehow forgot to tell him that it was a real ballet - it told a story, but had no words. He was a good sport and so were the kids. Spencer & Seth were quite attentive, Davis slept through the whole thing, and McCall was in awe of Snow White. She loves her and thought that it was the real Snow White on stage.

I loved the whole thing and was so impressed by not just the dancers, but the scenery, staging and choreography. But most of all, I loved watching my beautiful daughter love to dance and do it so well.