Post 3: The Cabin

We headed up to Yellowstone this trip and had a lot of fun checking out all the animals. Here are the girls trying to stay warm while we were looking at the Bison.

These three waited I think their whole LIVES for this. Or in other words it took FOREVER for Old Faithful to finally go off.

While this little one was pretty content just hanging out with her new best friend Uncle Spencer.

This would be the one who decided that going to to cabin without Jon and taking the two girls would be a fabulous idea. For the most part it was, but there were other times I was wondering what I was thinking.... for instance...

Take this sweet innocent little Claire... Almost 2 (and I am wondering what wonderful things I am going to learn in her terrible 2's stage that I am not learning right now.) She looks so sweet, but don't let that fool you. I had just spent the last 20 minutes trying to get her to keep her shoes on. After pure exhaustion on my part I gave up and ....

I gave her a stick and I ran for the marshmallows. I was in desperate need of a perfect s'more.... well you know what happens when you become a mother. The things you want are no longer first priority and when I looked over at this little one signing PLEASE like crazy I just gave in and gave it to her.

Yummy--that was good. Just as I finished roasting one for myself, I looked over and I saw this...

How could you not give it to her. Look at those eyes. It is like she is saying, "Momma are you really going to eat that?" So on to number 2.

And Three....

Four..
Right after number five I noticed Claire was just chilling. She looked like if she had one more she would have popped! So instead I asked for a smile and got this...

and I got to finally eat my s'more. YUMMY!!

Here is Claire in her Marshmallow coma. (Side note - this cabin trip was pretty cold. It ended up being pretty raining and it even snowed on us. Mom had to do some finishing work on the windows of the room we were staying in so we kept the heater blowing on the windows almost the whole time to help them dry out. boy did it make our little room nice and toasty warm. it was great!)

Thanks so much to everyone who helped me out on this trip. you guys are the best! I am going to be really sad that we won't be able to take trips up here as often as we would like.

Post 2: A little more

Marcella had her Sweet Pea (that's the name of her class) graduation for preschool. They sang some cute songs. She has had a blast this year and LOVES learning and going to school.

She was super suprised to see Grandma, Grandpa and Nathan there. Thanks for coming, guys.

We now have another nephew to add to the clan. David and Rosalee had a little boy and named him Henry. He is so sweet and tiny. We sure love him.


We did it. The first of many pictures of Claire smiling that are actually in focus. Love it!


Now for a little teaser. What do you think we did for Memorial Weekend.... Let's just say there were a lot of little cow girls running around.

What have we been up to lately (Post 1)

Well I sure haven't posted in a while. So here is the first of hopefully many updates in the next couple of days. The end of April we moved down the street to basically house sit for some friends. After we got that all settled and most of our stuff in storage we started doing some fun things.


I ran in the Race for the Cure with my friend from high school Sandy Jo! It was so good to see her even though I wouldn't say it was a "race" I am still loving the fact that I like to run now. Hopefully this will last long enough that I might even get better at it.

Then this little one....


and all her cross-eyed cuteness went in for surgery on May 12. After being told by one eye doctor that "we should only do surgery to fix her strabismus around 1st grade or so...we should really wait to see if she is even 'high-functioning' before we do surgery," I decided that I needed another opinion. After talking with the second doctorwe decided that it would be better to fix her eyes now. He reasoned that good vision would give her a chance to develop to the best of her ability. We heartily agree.

This is the only picture I got right after the surgery, and I am a little sad I didn't get a better one. The poor girl had a huge black eye and looked completely miserable. The worst part about her recovery was when I found out I have the Dougal fainting genes. I could barely even hold her because I felt so sick seeing her like that. It was awful. By the next day though she was up and running around.

By Sunday (May 15)....

She decided it would be fun to take a walk by herself. We were all in Caroline's backyard just playing and I looked around and looked at Jon and said, "Where's Claire?" We went into panic mode, running around to the front of the house hoping that she wasn't in the road. Jon looked around and saw her six houses down, holding Jeff's neighbor's hand, walking back towards us. Relieved that she wasn't hurt or playing in the road, it was pretty funny she was 6 houses away just cruisin' on the sidewalk.
What a little stinker!


Even though she still looks a little miserable in this picture, she was having the time of her life. She would be happy if we just let her go wherever she desires. Take sacrament meeting, for example. She's miserable on the bench, but completely happy just running around the gym. She doesn't have to have toys, books, or food - she just wants to walk and run and be free.



This was our entertainment that night. It was fantastic. They sang us a couple of songs as we roasted marshmallows on Caroline's fire pit. It was amazing.

I love that these two love playing together. It is so fun to hear there conversations and watch them play. They are so cute.



Jon and I took a little trip to Indiana to find a place to live this fall when Jon starts at Purdue (Nauvoo Temple above). We had so much fun. Thank you so much to the Grandmothers who took the girls for us. You are the best.

We had some awesome luck looking for houses and we were able to close on this one just last week.



Jon and I both agree that, while it's not our dream house (I want an old small brick house that has lots of character and he wants to be surrounded by land and a forest), it will be more than fabulous for us now. Going from a 725 sq. foot apartment to something with a garage and more than one tiny bathroom will be amazing. We can't wait to come and move in!! To BE Continued....

I'm Dreaming...

Yes, I know I shouldn't be saying this, but I really am dreaming of "a white Christmas". I was looking through some pictures and I stumbled upon this one. I would love to snuggle up in a blanket right now with that delicious looking cup of hot chocolate and watch the snow come down. (I know I will be regretting this post the middle of this week when it is really snowing...) Happy Dreaming!

one down...

I must admit I have been pleasantly surprised at how much I have enjoyed Anne of Green Gables. I love the whole series, but for some reason the first one has always been my least favorite. I have never been able to get past the first 30 pages and so I listened to it once and moved on to my favorites.

While reading, I kept going back to many forgotten day dreams. I used to think about how nice it would be to live in the 1900's. To live in a simpler time. Granted I would miss being able to flip a switch and have light, flushing a toilet, or flying in an airplane, but when I think about that time period I can't help but imagine it was more unique and magnificent in so many ways.

I love that Anne is so descriptive. For the few days of reading I have been transported and "lived" the life I would have loved to. I love that Anne has red hair. It makes my connection with her feel that much stronger.

I love that you can read a book and gain insight into what you can do to make your life better. When I came across this passage, for example, it just hit me.

"It's really wonderful, Marilla, what you can do when you're truly anxious to please a certain person."

What a simple thought that has power in it's meaning. Hopefully you along with me can take this small morsel and change the way we think or feel about someone in our life. How great the world would be if we put all efforts in trying to please one person we know.

I urge all to read or reread this book. It is delightful. If you are anything like me and would love to live back when, you will see yourself in Avonlea walking right alongside Anne. Enjoy.

"UP"

"UP" is what you will hear Claire say after you get her off Marcella's table. She has started to climb and thinks it's sooooo funny. I will usually hear a conversation that goes something like this:

"Claire.. oh, no. Claire! Mom! Mom! it's a emergency, emergency. Claire, that's so dangerous. You need to be safe Claire."

I will go into their room and find something similar to this. Except yesterday she thought it would be funny to stand up on the table. What a silly goose! Hope you all have a fabulous day!

Books

The other day I heard myself telling someone how I feel as though I need to step it up, in giving my kids the opportunity to gain a LOVE for reading, not just because I love to read but because I am married to an English Professor. I have been pondering a lot about how I can set a better example for my kids. I have decided to set a goal that I have been wanting to set for a while. So here goes nothing...

(Sidenote: I love having pictures to go along with my posts and to tell you the truth the picture that would go perfect with this post is going to have to be left to your imagination. My camera battery needs to be charged, with a lost charger, hoping to find soon. I have seemed to misplace my little camera, so I am left to shooting slide film... yes I know the last person you knew that shot slide film was your Dad and it was all on his mission, but that is a post for another time...)

So on to your imagination:
Picture a nice 3' x 6' bookcase filled with one of the widest varieties of books you could think of. They range from Cookbooks to John D Fitzgerald to Cormac McCarthy mixed in the middle of our free church books from our Deseret Book days.
I have decided to pick one of the 6 shelves and read all the books on that shelf. (really let's be honest I have read maybe 1/3 of the books in the whole bookcase and I think that is a little pathetic!)
I have chosen the middle shelf on the left side. As I decided this was going to be the shelf that would soon take up a lot of my free time over the next year I was sitting on the couch. The closer I got to the shelf I had a few thoughts that went something like this:
The Silmarillion (seriously how many of the average person has ever even heard of this book?) well, Jon really liked it. I could give it a try, wait no I want to be able to say I have read ALL the books on that shelf. I am going to HAVE to read that book...
Sweet. I remember sitting on my floor leaning up against my bed laughing hysterically while reading Shel Silverstiens book A light in the Attic. Awesome, I can read that one in a day.
Bleakhouse.... That book sure looks like it has a ton of pages....
I would hate to bore you with all of my reactions to each book that I realized was on the shelf and I started wondering how I could fit SO many books on one shelf. After a few minutes I decided I would have to make this goal possible. After a few needed switcheroos I was ready to start and accept my goal. The end result: 31 books.
I will list the titles and their Authors. If their is anyone out there that would like to join me in my quest I would love to start a "Pick a book off Kanien's book shelf" book club. There is a pretty wide variety of books, except it just happened to be the shelf that has all my Jane Austin.... Here are the titles and you can choose if you are up to the let's read all the books I SHOULD have read in high school challenge.

A light in the Attic ~ Shel Silverstein
Anne of green Gables ~ L.M. Montgomery
Black Beauty~ Anna Sewell
Peter Pan ~ James M Barrie
Heidi ~ Jolianna Spyri
Little Women ~ Louisa May Alcott
A Child's book of Stories
A Room with a view ~ E.M. Forster
The Hobbit ~ J.R.R. Tolkien
Jane Austin:
Pride and Prejudice
Persuasion
Northanger Abbey
Emma
Mansfield Park
Sense and Sensibility
Middlemarch ~ George Elliot
Where the Heart Leads ~ Stansfield
When Hearts Meet ~ Stansfield
Letters ~ Sister Hinckley
The Great Brain ~ John D. Fitzgerald
Dreams of Trespass ~ Fatima Mernissi
A Heart Like His ~ Virginia Pearce
The Giver ~ Lois Lowery
Silas Marner ~ George Elliot
Howls Moving Castle ~ Diana Wynne Jones
Castle in the Air ~ Diana Wynne Jones
The Secret Garden ~ Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Jungle Books ~ Rudyard Kipling
Winnie the Pooh ~ A. A. Milne
Treasure Island ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
The Classic Fairy Tales

First Book: Anne of green Gables. (Side note: I have never finished this book. I don't even know if I have ever even gotten to the half way point. I LOVE all the other books in the series, I just have always skipped the first one to get on to the "better" ones. I hope I find I am completely wrong and I fall in love with this one as much as the rest.)
Wish me Luck!

Claire Walking

This post is mainly for grandparents. Claire has been taking steps for a couple of months, but she's just started to stand up on her own and continue walking after she falls.

Mom's at Young Women's tonight....

She said I had to give the girls a bath. She didn't say we couldn't watch a movie, though. He he he....Ponyo, here we come!

A few things I will miss

As you all know from Jon's Post (almost ready to post, I just couldn't wait) we are heading to...

As I was looking at some of our pictures today I started to think about ALL the things I am going to miss when we leave. Here are a few of the things I will miss most.

THE CABIN....

in the summer &

The Winter.

The mountains! We really live in an amazing place. I love all the beauty that surrounds us and I am really going to miss seeing the mountains everyday.

Utah Football Games. We will always bleed RED. The only saving grace is we have this to look forward to this fall...

Of course our families. I would have to say that Jon and I would do just about anything our families asked us to do. We sure do LOVE you guys and it is going to be so hard to be without you. Thank you for being our Best Friends and please come and see us whenever you want.

We have made so many wonderful friends and I hate to admit how bad I am going to miss them as well. I feel like a little girl who is going to cry because my parents are making me move away from my friends. It sure is going to be really hard. I want to thank all of you who have been so nice to our family. We sure love you guys!

Last but not least... since we have a couple months before we head out I am starting to make a list of "must sees" before we leave. For example call me crazy, but I have never been to Arches or Zions (I know a little pathetic) but I would love your input on fun places we need to go before we head out to the mid-west. So keep your suggestions coming and I will try to not think about how we will be leaving so soon. Love you all and have a fabulous afternoon!

2 Reasons why having kids is soo worth it

Reason 1.
When you are so sick you can't get out of bed, they tell your sweetheart that they have to go and get you these and make this:

Reason 2

How could that smile not make you happy?

At least it is Snowy

Today. That makes being sick a little better. Little Claire is one lucky duck.

She has a snuggle buddy, and someone who loves to read to her to make her feel better.

Feel better soon!