Sisters

Every girl needs a sister. It is a right that no female should be denied. Taycee is one of the best big sisters around. She loves to nurture and mother both of the babies. She is one of my biggest helpers around the house and is always quick to pick up a fussy baby or grab a binki. One day I was doing a few household chores. I had heard Brie fussing in her room a bit but it stopped and I thought she must have fallen asleep. I went in to peek on her and this is what I found. Taycee had put her in the bumbo, dressed up, turned on the swing so the music was playing and was dancing around to make Brielle happy. The best part was that Brielle was grinning ear to ear watching her big sister spin and dance around. I stuck my phone in and snapped a few pictures before they noticed me. 

Later I came back and snapped a pic of he beautiful entertainer.

Booster and Brie and pretty lucky to have such an awesome big sister.

Plan to fail

I had a goal, it didn't seem like an unattainable goal, I had a plan in place for everything to work out just so. But there is a Murphy's law somewhere that says this "If you plan and prepare for pictures, somehow something will go terribly wrong." And plan and prepare I did, and terribly wrong it went. All I wanted was to get a good Christmas shot of the family. I had plans to make Christmas cards (okay, maybe more of a Christmas email) all the kids had new church outfits and the house was decked out in Christmas decor.  Saturday night I said to Chris before we went to bed. "I want to take pictures tomorrow before church. We all need to be ready by 12:00." It was such a do-able request that he didn't even bat an eye at the word "pictures" I stayed up an extra hour fashioning the perfect hair pieces for each girl. I laid out clothing and everything was as ready as it could be.

The next day came, baths and showers were had all around, out came the gel, curling irons and hairspray bows were in place and shoes were tied. WE WERE READY!! With time to spare! Chris made the kids a little snack (that wouldn't ruin the pretty clothing) I sat down to feed the baby, things were going so well. Which really should have been my first indicator that things were about to go terribly wrong. About 5 minutes later Chris came upstairs and said "we have a problem, Addison just threw up." I asked if it was a choked on a bite of food throw up (our kids have killer gag reflexs) or a stomach bug throw up. He said he wasn't sure but he had wiped her down and sprayed her dress with Febreze. Pictures were still on.

I finished feeding Brielle and corralled all the children onto the piano bench in front of the tree. In a stroke of luck I snapped a picture right away that appeased my smile requirements and had minimum blur.

I set the kids free and started to shoot a few singles.

When did this girl grow long luscious locks?

When I got to Addison I noticed she was looking a little green around the gills. When I started shooting I noticed she seemed to be swallowing slightly. I decided maybe having her on the carpet wasn't the best of ideas so I would be happy with the pictures I got and move on to Brielle. Chris took Addi gave her a cup of apricot juice and sat with her in the kitchen.

After Brielle I set up the tripod to snap a few family shots. I was almost done when I heard that horrible sound that every parent dreads. The sound of the clenching of stomach and the projecting of liquid. My earlier question was answered, it wasn't a gag reflex problem. The Boost had a bug. But I had a plan, and I had prepared and I had spent an hour on hair pieces. So I did what every good loving mother would do, I stepped over puddle got a rag wiped off her dress and called the family for one last picture. Chris requested one more spray of Febreze so we could all sit by her and still smile. She got spritzed and I was kind enough to stand her in front so A- the smell didn't waft to anyone's noses too quickly and B- if she threw up again it wouldn't be on anyone. Now the real miracle of this whole story is that Chris didn't axe the whole thing. He isn't a picture taking lover, and this was a less than ideal situation. He must have been feeling extra charitable or maybe he saw the slightly crazed look in my eye as I was stepping over apricot spray on my carpet and grabbing febreze bottles and knew just to go along. He gave me 4 self timed clicks of the camera before putting an end to the slightly ridiculous situation. And our own little Christmas miracle occurred, we actually got a picture with all eyes up front.

Alas, even with all that effort there was no Christmas card, or email or shout out of any kind because for the next week we all took turns being sick and I just barely got around to taking these pictures off the camera. Looking at that little smiling girl you wouldn't guess she was 2 minutes post puke and about 2 minutes away from the next bout. But just looking at this picture brings back a slight pungent smell and a small roll of the stomach. 

Dear Addi Boo,

Please don't read this in 20 years and think I was a terrible mother. I promise I snuggled you and tickled your back for hours after this picture was taken. After I scrubbed the carpet that is.

xoxo- mom

First

Tasty Sweet finally got to have her long awaited first day of preschool away from home. She has been wanting to go to preschool since... well since Kaden went 3 years ago. Remember this picture?

 She grabbed her sippie cup and binoculars and charged to the door telling me she was ready to "doe to sool!"

Well now she's got a backpack, a headband and sparkly gloves and she really is ready to go to school.

Which means that I pack 2 lunches each morning

And send these 2 cute bodies off for fun filled days of learning.

After Taycee's first day her teaches said "She fit in like she has been her all year long". She loves it, and asks every day if she can go to school. Life goes by so quickly, it seems like a few days ago she was the chubby pigtailed toddler in the first picture and now she is this beautiful girl with big ideas and even bigger drive. 

Love you my Tasty Sweet, don't grow up too fast.

xoxo-mom

Ice Storm

We experienced our first Virginia Ice Storm last week, everything was frozen and we didn't stand a chance on the roads so Church was canceled. Instead we spent the day in pajamas and made a batch of Christmas sugar cookies. 

Last Sunday Kaden asked if it could be another cookie day. I think they enjoyed themselves.

Puttin on the Ritz

Chris has his first work party. He got the invite while I was still in Utah and called to ask me if I wanted to go. It was a "coat and tie" party and the kids were definitely not invited. We debated weather we would be able to find a baby sitter so soon after moving to an area we didn't know. I was banking on meeting some awesome young women in the ward and told him to RVSP yes. 

Finding a baby sitter was a little harder than I had planned. It turned out that our ward Christmas party was the same night and we couldn't ask anyone in the ward to miss it to watch the kids. Luckily I was told that the Stake Presidents daughters were great baby sitters and they were available for that night. So for the first time ever we left all 4 kids with a cute 15 year old girl and went on a date all by ourselves.

The party was at the country club of Virginia. It was a huge beautiful building. Every room inside had a buffet table with different types of food. Every room also had an open bar, we thoroughly enjoyed the free ginger ale. :) I got to meet a few of the people Chris works with and lots and lots of people he doesn't know. :) I think in all there were about 600 people there. He knew about 10. I think next year he might be a little better acquainted with people. They did have a dance floor with a really fun band playing and we danced for awhile. Towards the end of the night the open bar was starting to show on the dance floor and we decided to call it a night. 

All in all it was a fun time and I enjoyed the chance to get dressed up and do something different. I made Chris take "dance" pictures with me so that in 10 years I have proof that among the days of ponytails sweats and baby spit up there were still times I didn't look like bleary eyed sleep deprived mom.

And then we may have discovered this cool auto shoot setting on my phone where  I call out the word "shoot" and it takes a picture. And this series of pictures came about.

O Christmas Tree

Thanksgiving was over and Christmas was fast approaching. I have to be honest and say that this year I felt a little scroogy (I think I just made that word up) I had just spent weeks decorating, organizing and putting away and digging out Christmas boxes to do it all again wasn't on the top of my list of things I wanted to do. But the little people in my life were insistent and I couldn't let our first Christmas away from home be dampened by my lack of energy. So one day after cleaning up all the Thanksgiving festivities we pulled out Christmas festivities.  The kids were happy as clams (whatever that means) and had a jolly time decorating the tree.

I bit my tongue as their tiny eager hands hung 6 ornaments on the same branch and reminded myself that it didn't really matter where the ornaments were hung because they would be rearranged by the Boost about 400 times before Christmas actually came. They were oh so proud of their finished product.

And although I already have plans in the works to have a tree that look like this next year...

This year I will be content with my little tree in the corner that was decorated by my very own little elfs.

Thanksgiving

I thought before Christmas comes and I am buried under even more pictures and unwritten posts I should catch up on Thanksgiving!

This years Thanksgiving was our first one on our own. We were super lucky to have my cousin and her little family come down and join us. She lives about two hours north of us in Virginia and it was nice not to still have some family to celebrate the Holiday with. Thanksgiving came only 2 weeks after we arrived in Virginia and I spent almost every hour of the day (and night) trying to get our home presentable enough to host such a fun occasion. All the work and late (late, late, late) nights made Thanksgiving day seem extra relaxing. 

We cooked up a turkey and many other delicious side dishes and feasted.

The kids loved having Bridger to play and run around with. They were sure sad when he had to go home.

Brielle was an excellent supervisor as we cooked up the food.

Mckell whipped up some cream and we ended the night with a selection of yummy pies. We had banana cream, pumpkin and apple.

Poor Boost didn't get a nap and eventually just crashed right in the middle of the living room floor.

Chris and Devan went out that night to try and catch some of the Black Friday deals and they were extremely successful. They both got exactly what they went out for. I have a very large TV on my wall as proof.

It was a great first Thanksgiving here out on our own. This year as always we felt like there was so much to be grateful for. We truly are blessed.