River Time!

We finally made it to the river this summer. It's hard to do with so many little kids plus a little baby. Greg stayed with Maddie at my mom's so I could go have fun. Thanks baby! The kids really loved it. Ethan especially loved riding on "Papa's boat". Brayden and Tawny loved the tube. I just love everything about the river- the sand, the water, the pull of the current, hot wind on your face, tubing, everything.

The next morning Greg took the kids for a bike ride. Ethan even got to go in our bike trailer, which he thought was super awesome!

First Day of School

Tawny started kindergarten this part Wednesday. Where did the time go? She was excited about every little thing, and not the least bit nervous about anything. I think I had a harder time than she did. Don't mind her swollen right eye. She was bitten by something and her eye was almost swollen shut. What a great way to start kindergarten huh?

Grandma came with us too. She had to see her little princess off. Tawny's teacher is Mr Wise and so far Tawny seems to really like him. She says he is nice and never yells. That's a good enough start for me. When she came home after the first day and I asked her how school went she said, "Awesome! Everything was awesome. my teacher is awesome, my friends are awesome, my lunch was awesome, recess was awesome, coloring was awesome. I love school!" I'm so glad she's loving it. Brayden is doing homeschool this year and he loves it too. But I think I'll save that for another post.

Maddie hit her 3 month old mark on the first day of school. She's getting so much bigger and happier. A month or so ago we figured out that she's sick when I eat dairy. As long as I don't eat any dairy we have a pretty happy little girl. She doesn't eat at night anymore, but still wakes up on occasion. But all she needs is her pacifier and she goes right back to sleep. She's definitely filling out. Look at those rolls! I love that all my kids have been such chubby babies. She looks a lot like Tawny did at this age. But I think all my kids have looked pretty similar as babies.

Happy Birthday E-Rex

Ethan's birthday was three days after Tawny's. It was a busy week! We did a family party for Ethan. I let Brayden and Tawny frost and decorate Ethan's cake. They had tons of fun and Ethan liked it.

He liked opening presents once he realized there were new toys inside just for him.

This is his new camera cheesey smile. i kinda really love it.

 His favorite part of all was his "bir-bay cake". He loved blowing out the candles (which we did over and over) and loved eating it even more. It's been a few weeks and he is still talking about his "bir-bay cake".

 There's that cheesey smile again.

Things about Ethan:

• his new favorite phrase is "you're mean _____" (add whoever he's talking to). Make sure you read it with a super accusatory voice.
• He know nearly all his colors and a lot of his shapes
• He loves books and will sit down and "read" them by himself (he picks one word and says it over and over)
• He LOVES to sing. His favorite songs for the moment are, "popcorn popping", "ABC's", "Twinkle twinkle little star", and "Wheels on the Bus" complete with hand motions. (Twinkle is said "tween-do")
• He also loves his baby sister and always talks to her in this high pitched "baby"voice. Which is really weird because neither Greg or I do that voice. But he does and it's so cute. Sometimes he loves her a little too much
• He speaks really well. It's made life so much simpler because I know what he wants now. I can't always say yes, but at least I know what he is saying.
• He. is. loud. He's definitely all boy. The nickname E-Rex fits him so well because he is destructive and noisy. But he's our little dinosaur and we love him!
• He calls Maddie's pacifier a "maddie-fire"
• He loves the water and would spend the whole day in the pool if we let him
• He's started to correct himself when he catches himself saying a word wrong. recently it's been adding a "s" on the end, especially with "yes". Sometimes he'll say it a few times until he gets it right.

Happy Birthday Princess Tawny

Tawny turned 5 a few weeks ago and had an awesome birthday! She wanted to have a Pedis by Pool with everything pink. So that's exactly what we did. Pink banners, pink cake, pink favors, pink everything.

Her cake had pink fondant ruffles with zebra stripes in the inside. She really really loved her cake. She stood looking at it forever before her party started. It was well worth the time it took me to do it.

 The girls all got pedicures from Amber and my mom. There was definitely a lot of pink and sparkles over here too.

All of her friends know her so well. She loved every single thing she got.

For the party favors Tawny and I made little pink purses. Tawny picked out the fabric and helped me sew them. We filled them with tiaras, ring pops, and other candy jewelry. All the girls really seemed to like them.
Maddie got to swim for the first time after Tawny's party. She didn't cry, but didn't seem super impressed either.

 Even Brayden wanted to get in on the princess fun!

The next day was Tawny's actual birthday and we did all the family presents then. She mostly got things for school; clothes, shoes, backpack and lunchbox. Of course, most of those were pink, and all of them sparkled. She also got a princess necklace from Grandma Hebdon that she really loves.

 The kids finished out the night by giving Papa lots of love and attention. Doesn't it look like he's having fun?

I can't believe Tawny is already 5. She is such a responsible and caring little girl. She is able to find joy in everything and wants everyone else to be happy too. Some favorite memories:

• Brayden and her were playing the color game in the pool when Brayden exclaimed "Tawny, sparkle is NOT a color". Maybe not, but it is to her.
• She still says a few words wrong, like pacifier. She says "fa-ci-pier" instead
• She loves making lunch for her and Ethan.
• She paints her own fingernails and toenails. And yes, it looks about how you would expect. But she is so proud of herself that I don't have the heart to fix it.
• She loves church. every single thing about it.

Happy Birthday Princess. We love you!

Home Again

While we had so much fun with all our travelling, it was so good to be home. The day after we got home we went to Rosita's with my parents. Ethan was so excited to see his grandma.

We tried a few new things for lunch. This was probably the biggest success. We made octopus using hot dogs and spaghetti. The kids thought these were awesome and request them on a daily basis.

 Ethan has taken a liking to Maddie's rocker. Whenever he's disappeared this is where I find him.

We pretty much swim every single day and the kids love it. Ethan has even started cleaning the pool for me. He's so helpful!

Back to Flagstaff Again

The drive from New Mexico was way to far for me to do alone so we stopped in Flagstaff again for a few days. Tawny really enjoyed cleaning Grandma Wanda's house. She washed the table, the cupboards, the stove and finished up with helping Grandma do the dishes. It was so cute!

Since it was the kids favorite thing, we went back to the train station. It's amazing how much they loved watching the trains go by. I didn't even have to ask for these smiles. They were just so excited!

Maddie was very concerned with the noise the whole time, but didn't cry at all.

Thank you Grandma Wanda for letting us visit and spend so much time with you. They kids really loved it and are still talking about all the fun things we did. They ask every day or two when we are going back. I'm not sure I can handle the traveling alone again any time soon! They were mostly very good, but we had a few incidents. The worst was on the way home from Flagstaff. I stopped on an on ramp to feed Maddie between  Phoenix and Blythe. Well, it was hot and she was so tired of being in the car that she didn't really want to cooperate. While I was changing her diaper Tawny says she has to pee urgently. I couldn't leave Maddie so I told Tawny to just pee on the side of the road by herself (she usually needs help when there isn't a toilet, so I already know this is going to end badly). As she is getting out of the car Brayden decides to push her. He pushed her so hard that she flew a few feet from the car. The biggest problem is that there was a pretty steep incline by the side of this on ramp and Tawny tumbled all the way down it into the bushes at the bottom. She still has to pee so ends up needing a change of clothes. Maddie is screaming because I had to abandon her on the floorboard of the car (which wasn't clean at all) to go help Tawny up the embankment. As I get to the top I hear Ethan screaming because he had tore the bottom off his Styrofoam cup that still had a good amount of Icee in it.  Luckily we were already on our way home when this happened or I might have cut the trip short!