Dinners with Friends

Me, Amy J., Amy B. and Shelly
Amy, Me and Holli


Oh, Holli and Amy!! I miss you guys so much. I don't often have many positive things to say about our stay in England but I did make some great friends! Actually several great friends. Amy and Holli were both back for home leave and for the holidays and they were kind enough to make time for me. CAT wives are all kind of thrown together when they move to England-kind of like a sorority. You kind of have to figure out who you hit it off with and who you don't. There are only around 30 or so women. I was lucky enough to make several friendships. The beautiful thing is that 99% of us will move back to the same area. Amy and Tina are actually moving back within the next couple of months and I look forward to us getting together. Holli says she LOVES England and is in no hurry to get back-but WHATEVER!!!! Okay, I am happy she is happy. I hadn't seen Amy and Holli in 7 months but I felt as if no time had passed-fun times. Kyle and I also went out to eat with Kent and Becki on Fri. night and had a great time-we met them in England too. I also ate out with some friends from high school within the last week-Amy, Shelly and Amy B. Amy B. lives a ways away and I hadn't seen her in three years or so and it was fun to catch up. Oh, yeah-I also ate out with Kristen and Jenny this week-I see and talk to them lots but it is always fun to get together. Yeah, after all this eating out I guess my diet should start.

Christmas 2008

This holiday season has gone by incredibly quickly! I even already took our tree and decorations down. After Christmas I just like to get everything put away, the house cleaned and new toys in place. We always look so forward to Christmas time because Kyle always has 2 weeks off work. We love this!!! His hours are so long throughout the year that having him home consistently for 2 weeks is a huge treat. The kids had a great Christmas. They were very happy with their gifts and are happy to be off school for awhile and I am thrilled to have them home. Faith's favorite Christmas gift was her cell phone, Sawyer's was his fish tank and Eden's was her Nintendo DS. Kyle's parents got us Rock Band 2 and we are having a ton of fun with it. The kids all love playing the drums and Faith and Sawyer like to sing. They love "Eye of the Tiger". We had both sets of parents over on Christmas Day. The grandmas do most of the food preparation and we always fondue. I am guessing Beckett's is his push/ride-on toy-he loves pushing it around. Beckett is also taking 3 or so steps at a time and saying "uh-oh" and is trying to say "kitty" and "stinky"-it is so cute.

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Some Random Thoughts and Photos

I have a busy week this week. In fact, I am skipping the gym this whole week so I can get some things accomplished like cleaning the house, wrapping gifts, etc.. On Friday night I am having some friends over for a little gift exchange (this spurred my cleaning frenzy). Faith and Sawyer both have class parties tomorrow and I need to get teacher gifts ready plus bus driver gifts, primary (church) teacher gifts. I also want to get a few of our neighbors a little something since they were so helpful to us when we moved in. Kyle will have almost 2 weeks of work off which we look forward to every year. He works such long hours the rest of the year that we get so excited to have him home with us!!! My parents came over Monday and added a tile back splash in my kitchen. I LOVE IT!! It looks great. My dad worked so hard on cutting all the tile and putting it up. My mom and Kyle did most of the grouting. What did I do??? Not much-not my thing-I wiped it down some the next day. THANKS DAD!! Mom also watched the kids while I had my hair done (my roots were looking pretty bad). My mom also helped with picking out the tile and strongly encouraging me to add the trim piece in the middle-THANKS MOM! So I have posted some before and after pics. of the kitchen-the "afters" come before the "befores"-sorry. I also have some of Eden from her pre-school Christmas program. She is attending a Methodist pre-school this year so they did actually sing about Jesus. Also, in case you wonder how I get anything done during the day with a now 11 month old-it is because I put him in this backpack-which he LOVES. I think he would sit in there all day! I vacuum, make dinner, wrap gifts-you name it-with him in there. I thought I better blog about the backpack because I will forget someday. I also added some of Bex-he turned 11 mo. on Monday. I will be crying when he turns "one". Within the next couple of weeks I will be seeing some of my friends who are back visiting from England as well as some old high school friends-can't wait!!

Am I Crazy!

Well, this is what my life has come to...waiting in line for 2 HOURS for an autograph for my girls. Dylan and Cole Sprouse (aka Zack and Cody from Suite Life) made an appearance at an ice hockey game here in town so we bought tickets to enjoy the game but mostly to get these guys autographs. You would think it was Brad Pitt signing autographs. We let Faith and Sawyer each bring a friend but only the girls were interested in the autograph. The thing is after waiting in line about 1/2 hour they were tired so Kyle came out and got them and took them into watch the game and I stood in line holding 23 lb Beckett for the next hour and a half. Beckett did not want to sit with Kyle and was crying. I did make friends with the people in front and behind me so that made time go more quickly. I was also starving and was wanting some greasy game food. I talked "their people" into letting me snap a photo but my camera takes too long (it is a piece of crap) and they were shoving me along and I didn't get one. Another of Faith's friends from school was there and her mom managed to get one so she is supposed to email it to me. After they were done signing autographs, they watched the game from a box seat behind us so we were able to gawk at them from there-once again we tried to get a picture but my camera stinks. Here are some photos of us in line and a poor attempt of pictures of them. All of my kids love their program so it was fun to see them in person and it was worth waiting in line. The local ice hockey team won as well. In the 3rd picture down-they are the 3rd and 5th persons from the left.

Beckett's First Haircut

Yeah, I know I said I was NEVER going to cut his hair-well, I changed my mind. Actually, Eden decided to cut her own hair on Sunday-a nice big chin-length chunk off the front. She is the FIRST of my children to do this and I figured since she is now five that the scissors were safe. So, I took her in to get it all evened out. They had an opening so I decided that Bex was looking pretty shaggy and to get him done too. He was such a good boy. I took them to this place called "Cookie Cutters." It is for kids and they have these cute little chairs for them to sit in and they get to pick out a DVD to watch while they get their hair cut. It turned out cute. Eden's hair actually looks really cute too but I haven't gotten a photo yet. They cut at least 5 inches off so it is just barely below her shoulders and added some layers to make it go with the chunk she cut off. She thinks she is pretty hot with her new "do". She is growing up way to fast for me.

SNOW!!

On Sat. night as we were driving home from my parents house Kyle casually mentioned that we were supposed to get a "dusting" of snow overnight. Well, it was more like 5 or 6 inches! Sawyer woke up early and was running from window to window making sure that there was indeed snow in the back of the house like there was in the front. Just as a reminder- we had been in England the last two winters where they barely get any, if any, snow at all. My kids were so excited! They got dressed pretty quickly and make their way outside to play in it-Kyle too. They made a fort (actually Kyle made it) and two snowmen. Sawyer spent 3 hours in it until he had to come in and get ready for church. We have a berm in our backyard that worked great for the sled.

Thanksgiving

I have a lot of photos I want to put on from the last week. I will start with Thanksgiving. I barely took any photos of Thanksgiving-WHAT WAS I THINKING!! Anyways, we hosted this year which was wonderful! The main reason we put in double ovens was for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Tyler and his family came up from Texas. Their girls are 9 and 6 so they love playing with Faith and Eden. They had a new baby, Teagan in Sept. so we were all so excited to meet her. My parents and mother-in-law were also here. My father-in-law went to Florida to spend time with his parents. I was only responsible for the turkey and the rolls. I bought the rolls at Wal-mart but I did bake the turkey - I even reached inside of it to get the giblets and neck out -YUCK! That is just not my thing. The highlight was the shopping on black Friday!! I have missed that for the last two years in England. My mom, sis-in-law and I were up at 4 am to go and get some great deals. I won't say what we bought because Faith and Kalista both read my blog. We had a wonderful time together and stayed out until 4 pm. We even took Teagan and Bex with us. LOVED IT!!!! Can't wait for next year!!! I did buy myself a purse that I LOVE that was regularly $108 and I got it for $25. The picture of Sawyer is of him during his Thanksgiving program at school. It was just his 2nd grade class and he did a great job. I can't end this post without saying how THANKFUL I am for ALL I have been blessed with. I have so much!!!

Family Picture Day

We haven't had a family photo in 2 years so we thought it was time. We usually try to do one every year but since I was at the end of my pregnancy last year it just didn't happen (nor did I want it to). Plus, photography places like Portrait Innovations and Sears are pretty much non-existent in England. It went pretty well. Sawyer is definitely going through an awkward stage with having his picture taken. He would do much better with a photographer in a non-structured type setting. I just have to realize that it is hard to get 4 kids all looking perfect in the same photo. We had some pics. done with the in-laws as well. It had been since Sawyer was a baby that we had photos done with them. Here are a few we did today. The one of Bex alone I cropped because he looks so cute in it and you can see his teeth. The one where he is crying was the last photo taken and he had had ENOUGH!! Pretty funny.

Faith and Sawyer earn straight A's!!!

Okay, I don't normally like to overly brag about my kids but I am so EXTREMELY proud of them that I had to share!! Faith earned straight A's on her first report card back in the U.S.A. She did get a B in P.E. but in all her subjects that count ALL A'S!! I have to note that her P.E. teacher only gives A's to kids who can do all the Presidential Physical Fitness testing (this includes pull-ups)!! Her teacher wrote that she loves having Faith in class and that she is always prepared and very helpful. I was worried about Sawyer since his first year in England was so rough but he got all "3's" which is the highest you can get in all his classroom subjects. His teacher wrote that he is a "mathematician" and that he is "sweet" and a "hard worker." I want to always remember this because who knows what is coming in the higher grades when hours and hours of homework kicks in. I am telling you all that 4th grade math is a lot harder than back in the old days. They have some money coming their way and they are very excited!! They have earned it!

Also, Faith and Sawyer had their music programs at school within the last couple of weeks so I put some pics. on of that. We could hardly see Sawyer in his so that is why there isn't any pics. of him performing. The one picture is of them holding their report cards. Next to Faith at her program are her friends Emma and Jaclyn.

Eden Gets Her Ears Pierced-Beckett is 10 mo.

So, we (myself, Bex and Eden)were at the mall today and Eden says "I want to get my ears pierced." I say "Are you sure?" She convinces me that she is sure. We went into a few more stores and wasted some time just to be positive and she never wavered. We head into Claire's and fortunately they had two people so they could do two ears at once. She is giddy with excitement during the whole preparation until each lady had a gun in each hand and was ready to go. She then covered her ears and started crying. We get her calmed down and she decides she wants to sit on my lap. She starts freaking out again so I told them to go for it. I had one arm wrapped around her holding her arms down and the other holding her forehead back against me. Are you getting the visual?? After it was over her crying went to euphoria and she was laughing and giggling and very happy. Whew!!!

Beckett turned 10 mo. on the 15th. He is all over the place. When he hears the basement, bathroom, dishwasher or dryer door open he crawls as fast as he can to investigate. I just started putting the gate on the steps last week. Although capable he just wasn't interested until last week. If he gets a chance to climb the steps with help he goes really fast and breaths heavy. He has four teeth. I just started him on Gerber 3 foods and am giving him a few pieces of what we are eating. He is so happy with baby food I hate to get him used to food with flavor. It is so easy to pack a couple of jars of baby food when we go places. He loves to stand by himself (note the photo) but no independent steps yet. He is still a "mamas boy" and still cries at the gym daycare (yes, I am still going to the gym). He loves to open and close the cabinet doors and pull everything out. He is still adored by his siblings and they still fight over him. He is a very happy boy.

GAS!!

No, I'm not talking about THAT kind of gas-people need to get their minds out of the gutter. I am talking about gasoline. It is $1.79!!! Yes, you read correctly. In my part of the U.S. this is the current price. This summer it was around $4.15. I thought this was blog worthy information. I thought my friends in the UK might be interested in this info. as well since they are paying roughly $8 a gallon. It was costing me close to $70 this summer to fill up my minivan and now it is around $30.

Hockey Game

On Saturday after Eden's b-day party I took the girls shopping. Faith had a gift card to use and Eden needed a new winter coat. I don't dare buy her anything now without her approval. Fortunately, she and I were on the same page with the winter coat. Anyways, after that we decided to take in an ice hockey game at the coliseum here in town. Kyle LOVES hockey and we thought the kids would really enjoy it. Plus, Debby Ryan was there signing autographs. Are you asking "Who the heck is Debby Ryan?" Well, Debby Ryan is on the Disney show "Zack and Cody-The Suite Life on Deck." This is a spin-off show from "The Suite Life of Zack and Cody." Debby Ryan (can't think of her name on the show) has pretty much replaced the part of Ashley Tisdale (Maddie on the original show and "Sharpay" on HSM). So, being that we have a 9 1/2 year old daughter who is very into this show we thought we better get her there for an autograph. I have put a picture on. She was very sweet and VERY cute and petite. Faith, the shy child she can be didn't utter a word. We got an autographed picture. So, the hockey game was very fun. Beckett cried some in the beginning due to all the noise but got used to it. Our local team won by one goal, which was exciting. Faith and Eden really enjoyed the whole thing-Sawyer mostly enjoyed the food and was then ready to go home.

Eden turns "5" and Halloween

Make a Smilebox photobook

We have had a very busy week celebrating Eden's birthday and Halloween. Eden celebrated her b-day at pre-school on Mon. Thurs. the 30th was her official b-day and we went out to eat (her choice) and then opened gifts (from us). Fri. was Halloween class parties, another b-day celebration with the grandparents and trick-or-treating. Saturday was Eden's b-day party at a place called "Make a Mess". We had 14 or so kids and it was a great celebration. We love Eden so much. She was born at lunch time on Oct. 30th 2003. Kyle and I had decided to not to find out during my pregnancy whether the baby was a boy or girl and I was SOOOO happy to have another girl. Let me tell you-she is ALL girl. She is boy crazy, a diva, drama queen, opinionated and wonderful!! She is the family comedian and loves to play. She has been my best "self-entertainer." I will be sad when she goes to kindergarten next year. She is my lunch companion and shopping partner.

Trick or treating was great this year too. We live in a large subdivision so we did lots of walking and also got lots of trick or treaters. The weather was amazing-no coats!

Beckett 9 mo. and Eden is 5 on Oct. 30th

I took Beckett and Eden into Portrait Innovations on Tues. to get their pics. taken. They did really well. Beckett was pretty serious but didn't cry. He is a huge mamas boy and starts to cry if he sees me walking away from him. He now has three teeth (two on top and one on the bottom), he is crawling and pulling himself up all over the place and is even letting go when standing. I fear him being an early walker. He is eating some Cheerios (1/2 of one) now and the Gerber Puffs. I take him in Monday for a well visit so I will know what he weighs then. He is so stinkin' cute I can hardly stand it! He gets more and more enjoyable everyday. Eden is doing great. She is a diva and has gone from only wearing dresses to now only wanting to wear jeans-UGH!! She has gone from loving and wanting to be Sharpay (from H.S. Musical) to now wanting to be Gabriella. She is boy crazy and loves Nick from The Jonas Brothers. She is VERY funny and VERY lovey. I will write more about her when I post pics. from her b-day party.