Birthday Boy!

This sweet boy is one—and I don’t know how it happened so quickly! As I prepared for Thanksgiving this year, I couldn’t help but reflect on what I was doing “last year” at this time. The memories are so vivid, that it is hard to believe it was already a year ago. I spent Thanksgiving last year in a hospital with a warm newborn cuddled on me, and a plate of leftovers from the meal my mom prepared for my family. This year, that little baby sat on my lap munching on his own roll while we ate.

We celebrated Nate’s birthday by going swimming together at Scott’s work. He had pumpkin pie for his first birthday cake. Don’t worry—he can have any kind of dessert he wants on his birthday as soon as he has an opinion. For some babies, their first cake or other sweet is given to them on their first birthday. Not so for Nathan. He’s already sampled his fair share of cookies and cake! He loved the pie!


 

  

Some notables on Nate:

• Nathan LOVES to play ball! When he was only seven months old he was watching Scott throw the football to Jared and started bouncing up and down while making baby noises. I told Scott that Nathan wanted a turn, and sure enough when Scott threw the ball to him he grinned from ear to ear. And then he picked it up and threw that ball right back to Scott! He throws and chases footballs and basketballs all over the house.

 • Nathan also loves cars—or anything with wheels. It is so cute to watch him push cars all over the tile floors. I often find him clutching wheels he’s rummaged from Jared’s stash of Legos.

• Nate has never really “crawled.” He gets around with a funny gorilla-type scoot. It’s hard to explain, but we have some good video footage for memory sake.

• Nathan has been taking several steps at a time for the last couple of weeks. He is so proud when he does it and looks around with a huge grin on his face making sure we see how big he is.

• Nate is attached to his blue silky blanket that Grandma Asay made. Every time he sees it he giggles like he hasn’t had it for years.

• He loves to turn off the TV while the kids are watching it. It drives them all crazy, but it’s hard not to laugh at the same time. He pushes the button off, looks around at everyone and starts laughing like he is the funniest thing!

• Nathan has never slept through the night.

• Nate brings such joy to our family. I love how everyone rallies around everything he does. They love every new accomplishment and I often hear one of the other kids exclaim, “Mom, guess what Nate just did!” He loves to play with the big kids, and lately he has taken quite a liking to Kaitlyn. He loves when she takes him outside or lets him play the piano. We love this boy!

Words of Affirmation

I'm a "Words of Affirmation" kind of a person (from The Five Love Languages) so imagine my delight when after telling the girls how Scott and I met, Brynn responded, "Oh yeah, I can totally see why Dad thought Mom was catchy!"  That comment is still keeping me going.  Thanks Brynn!

I Can't Decide!

Scott is mad at me for the family picture I posted on my heading--he is accusing me of choosing it because it is one of the better pictures of me.  Can you believe it--would I do something like that?  I think all the family looks good.  But, I will post some of the other favorite family pictures.  I really wanted family pictures with our New Mexico scenery.  It's hard to get seven people to look good all at once.  I wish I had the awesome talent of my sis-in-law who can photoshop pics to really make them stand out.  Which one do you like?

HALLOWEEEEEN!

 Posted by Kaitlyn and Brynn

Halloween was on Sunday so we handed out candy and did not go Trick- or- Treating.  But we still went to the carnival at our church that is held every year.

Kaitlyn was an angel. She’s so cute with her angel costume that mom got at a garage sale.  She really didn't need to dress up in the costume, because she is an angel everyday.

Brynn was a black cat. Look at the awesome makeup! Our dad did it.  Mom made the tail and the sequins ears.  And since we're talking about it, Brynn made the rest of the costume from things in her drawers.

Jared was a Lego. He won a prize for the best “building block” at the carnival.  Mom made his costume. She used glue gun to write Lego on all the popping out circles.



Look at the AWESOME family!



Ellie was a clown. Unfortunately we didn’t get a good picture of her makeup, because she kept rubbing it off.

Nathan was a pumpkin. Unfortunately his costume got wet and he became a frog. Have you ever seen someone as cute as that?!

Mom was a witch. She had an awesome costume, and some pretty awesome hair, but you can't really tell from the picture.

Dad was just dad. I think?

We also carved pumpkins.  We had four, but for some reason we only have pictures of these two.  Go Cougars!

A Wise Boy

 The kids each have a night they are assigned to help me clean the kitchen after dinner.  Tonight Jared asked whose turn it was.  I told him I didn't have a helper tonight so I'd do it myself.  He sweetly replied that he would help me tonight.  As we did dishes together he asked me if he could get money for helping me.  Before I could respond he quickly said, "Actually, some people only care about money.  I don't want to be one of those people so I don't need any money mom."  He is a very wise, very tender-hearted five year old.

From Jared's journal entry on Sunday:  My friend's wanted to spy on their neighbors.  I wasn't sure it was ok so I told them I wouldn't.  They said I wouldn't be in the club if I didn't.  I said that was alright I just wanted to do what was right.

I am proud of Jared for his strong desire to choose the right.  I'm pretty sure his friends were not doing anything wrong, but I'm glad he had the courage to stand up to his friends anyway.

After a couple hard months, this little boy has conquered his Kindergarten fears.  He is thriving at school and now says his worst thing of the day is leaving school.  He likes to come home from school and write words and sentences for me.  His major accomplishment has been that he's let Scott drop him off at the drop-off in the morning and walk into the Kindergarten area himself.  He told me he'd do that more often, but that sometimes Dad would walk him to his classroom just for fun.  "Maybe we'll do a pattern mom.  Like, drop-off, drop-off, drop-off, Dad, drop-off, drop-off, drop-off, Dad."  I smiled at my cute little boy and all that he is learning.

Jared loves to be read to.  His attention span is amazing as he sits mesmerized listening to stories without pictures.  Recently Scott read "Where the Red Fern Grows" to the kids.  Jared loved listening about Old Dan and Little Ann.  His imagination painted a vivid picture of each scene, and he often related to us the details of how he pictured the boy and his dogs.  He also listened to "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and loved it too. 

Jared is always up for snuggles and loves...if only we could figure out how to keep him in his own bed at night!  He invariably ends up in bed with us or we find ourselves in bed with him (usually Scott takes Jared duty, since I am still up with Nathan at night) every night.  Jared told me one night after I challenged him to stay in his own bed, "I just can't help it mom.  You guys are just so snuggly and warm!"

Then and Now

 OCTOBER 8, 1999

Bountiful, Utah

  

 Exactly 11 Years later

OCTOBER 8, 2010

Albuquerque, New Mexico

T-shirt Designer

Brynn's teacher named their class the "Owls."  They wanted to have a shirt to wear on their fieldtrips, so each student got to draw a design.  The class then voted for their favorite one to be printed on the t-shirt.  Brynn's cute design won! 
 

Isn't it cute?  Way to go Brynn!