bean's blog

We're combining!

2008-09-30T21:23:00.002-06:00

After much thought and debate (over the girliness of my blog) we have decided to combine and become one. Josh and I are now at joshandlisamoore.blogspot.com. Sorry for the inconvenience! Oh, and when you visit, feel free to become a follower of our blog because we like to know how popular we are. And Josh would like to call you his "minion." Thanks everyone!

Love notes

2008-09-24T19:42:00.003-06:00

Sydney is really into making love notes for people these days. At church on Sunday she made a love note for everyone in the family sitting behind us. She's always asking what comes after the I and the L in I Love You. She can get two letters in before she needs help with the spelling. Most of the notes turn out like this one: I Lovey Ou. I haven't taught her how to separate the words yet. This love note is extra special though because she said it's a picture of her and Jesus holding hands. She sat down and said "I'm going to draw a picture of Jesus....Oh! And I have to draw a picture of me holding his hand....How do I spell 'I love you?'" I thought it was sweet.

Dress-up

2008-09-18T14:18:00.003-06:00

This week I decided to add to the collection of princess dresses. A friend of mine sells them for much better prices than you'll find at Toys R Us or Target. So I got two, one in a smaller size so that Natalie almost fits in it. It's still about a foot too long for her but I think she was pretty happy about getting to play dress-up like her big sister.

The fair

2008-09-09T20:59:00.006-06:00

Today Sydney, Tanner, Natalie, and I went to the state fair. We chose to go today because my youngest brother, Adam, was performing with his jazz band. They sounded fabulous and Natalie was really getting into it with all her little dance moves. She's a big fan of music. We met up with my mom and dad which was great because 3 adults with 3 kids makes a smooth outing.

Here's Adam. I guess he had better things to do with the rest of the afternoon than visit the sheep, pigs, goats, and cows with us. Aaww, you missed out Adam!

Tanner's favorite animal was, by far, the goats. And they loved him too. He would toddle up to their pens and they'd all stick their heads out and he'd just giggle. I assumed these animals were nice enough not to bite.

These two were butting heads. Hhhmmm...that reminds me of a couple of my kids. Maybe they're twins too. Well we do call Natalie "Nanny" most of the time, which is a goat term.

Speaking of which, here's the the little angel. She was so content to sit in the stroller for almost the whole time.

My dad was kind enough to push these two rugrats around the whole time.

At one point during the animal tour Sydney saw the pony ride. And we all got to hear the words "I want to ride a horse" about a hundred times while we finished looking at the animals. When she wants something she does not forget about it.
The day hit a highlight for Sydney when we met up with my friend Shayla and her kids. Sydney is friends with Elise as you can see.

I rode with them on the ferris wheel.
My new favorite part of the fair is the Little Hands farm where kids do farm jobs and at the end they earn a farm "dollar" with which they can purchase a snack at the market. One of the best parts is it's free. Woohoo!

Tanner looked so adorable in his little farm apron I was tempted to smuggle it home.

Sydney is picking apples in the orchard.

Natalie is supposed to be planting a seed but her apple is too interesting.

What diaper?

2008-09-05T16:33:00.003-06:00

This afternoon I could hear that the twins had woken up from their naps and were in their room chatting. I went in to get them and could see them looking at each other through the bars of their cribs. I thought that was unusual because they normally ignore each other as much as possible. They seemed pretty happy about something too. I went to get Tanner out of his crib and stepped on something a little wet. Hhhmmm...I get the joke - open diaper on the floor. Tanner didn't have his pants on during his nap because they were dirty from earlier in the day and I guess he decided he didn't need that diaper on anymore either. There wasn't much mess and it was well worth the laugh.

4-year-old preschool

2008-09-05T13:53:00.002-06:00

I think one reason why fall is my favorite season is because of back to school. It was always so fun getting new clothes, backpacks, school supplies and getting ready to see all your friends again. Of course after the first week it's not so fun because you have start making your brain work. But Sydney doesn't have that problem yet because she's been so excited for pre-school to start again all summer that she's been regularly practicing ABC's, numbers, and starting to sound out some words. I clearly remember sounding out my first word in kindergarten so I think kids are smarter these days. Sydney was so anxious to go to school I think she asked half a dozen times if she could go the night before and I've never seen her get ready so fast on her first day. I ended up taking her picture a half hour before we had to leave just so we had something to do.

Aahh, the summer goodness

2008-08-27T15:48:00.002-06:00

Fruit shakes are one of my favorite things in the summer. Not to say that I don't also have them the rest of the year. But they are especially refreshing during the summer so we make them a lot. Today was a picture-worthy day because Tanner and Natalie had their very first fruit shake. And they made a pretty good attempt at the hard-top sippy cups which they have never used before. Natalie must have been a bigger fan because she drank her whole cup. Tanner wasn't sure if the treat was really worth all the effort of trying to figure out how to use his cup.

For those of you who are dying to experience this summer goodness for yourselves, simply blend a bunch of frozen strawberries with some strawberry yogurt and orange juice. Easy peasy! I've been splurging lately and using Simply Orange orange juice which really makes a big difference compared to the concentrate.

Befores and Afters

2008-08-25T12:43:00.005-06:00

I've been so excited to post the before and after pictures of our kitchen because it is finally done! I just finished the backsplash a few days ago. I'm realizing now that I gave the old "before" pictures of the kitchen way too many benefits (clealiness, good lighting, ect.) and I probably should have had totally trashed it in order to show a really dramatic improvement. So despite how the pictures look, just know that the old kitchen had warped cabinets, warped and spliting countertops, and cracked tile. And now it's pretty.
Before kitchen:

After Kitchen:

I was also pleased with all the things I learned during this kitchen remodel. I learned how to install a pergo laminate wood flooring, tile a backsplash, and stain and finish a banister.
Before banister:

After banister:

The old banister was a serious safety hazard. We were just waiting for the day someone leaned against it and fell to their death down the stairs. And I mostly have it to thank for the whole kitchen remodel. We had to replace the banisters, which would mean replacing the floor, and hey might as well put in new cabinets while we're at it, and of course a countertop. Thank you banister!
I painted a couple bathroom vanities this last year too, after being totally inspired by a vanity my mom painted black. I forgot to take a before picture before the countertop was resurfaced. It was pink and so would have added greatly to the before picture. Anyways, I was especially happy with this little project because it was such an inexpensive improvement. The painting and resurfacing probably cost less than $125.
Before vanity:

After vanity:

Last but not least--our little backyard. I found this picture of the old backyard on zillow.com. I can't believe I didn't take before pictures of the whole thing because it's really been a big project. But this is the garden corner which has been especially exciting to me because it's the first time I've actually grown anything that I could eat! And I know I'm a tree killer but this apple tree was enormous and making such a huge mess. I don't think anyone had ever pruned it. And look, we added a peach tree which is the superior fruit in my opinion.
Before backyard:

After backyard:

Girls will be girls

2008-08-18T21:35:00.004-06:00

Well I think I brought it on myself. I decided yesterday I was way overdue for a haircut. I just haven't gotten around to making an appointment. I have given myself haircuts many a time. So, I figured I'd just do a little trim because it was driving me crazy. Sydney saw me doing this and of course wanted a haircut too. We didn't have time to do one before getting ready for church though so I promised I would do it later. And I clearly stated "only grown-ups cut hair." I guess she considered herself a grown-up this morning and decided to cut her own hair because and she said, "it was bugging her." So I've done the best I could with it but I'm still debating on whether to take her to a professional or just wait it out and trim it again. There's still a pretty good chunk missing on her left side. I nearly cried when I had to cut 4 1/2 inches off. But I suppose I should be grateful because kids have been known to do much worse!

Natalie became my little sickling this afternoon. We were so looking forward to a family night playing tennis with the Weavers. But we had to cancel. I was also glad she let me know about her ailments when she did because I was gearing up to head to the grocery store with all the kids. That could have been awful. It's so hard watching such a small person be sick. These bibs are great though. The help keep the mess to a minimum.

The great outdoors

2008-08-10T09:59:00.007-06:00

Every year for as long as I can remember my family has gone camping up in the Uintah's. Here is the beautiful Trial Lake where we have most often camped. It's not the warmest place to be in the middle of August so my little family has not slept over much in these last few years. Sydney headed up on Thursday afternoon with Kim and Nick and Josh, Tanner, Natalie and I went up just for the day on Friday. I just love the smell of it up there, the fresh air and campfires. We were not up there for the whole time so if you want to see more pictures from the trip click here and here. We weren't there for Sydney's exciting fishing excursion so that's where you can find those pictures.
Natalie was obviously very excited to see Grandma. Sydney said her favorite part of the trip was roasting marshmallows which she did a lot.

While the twins were taking a very short nap I took part in a little sudoku challenge that my parent's always like doing. I was the big loser of the game I'm afraid. I think it is because I play on the computer and it tells you when you've made a mistake. The old fashioned pencil and paper way just doesn't work like that.

During our sudoku match Josh did a little photo shoot with Sydney and got some great pictures. Our camp site was right next to a field of wildflowers and made for some beautiful shots. Cute stuff huh?

Sydney even picked a boquet of flowers for me. She seemed to really like the white ones. And she included the roots with them so I could have brought them home and replanted them!
The sun came out during the afternoon which we were all very happy about because it often rains all day up there. So we took off for a little hike up to Star Lake. The trail is very difficult to find so you just sort of go and hope you're heading in the right direction until you find some trail markers. Sydney got very good at pointing out every pile of rocks for us.

Sydney did a little "fishing" once we got there.

Natalie found a rock that she thought was pretty cool. Doesn't she look kind of like a little monk in her sweatshirt?

Tanner and Grandpa are just enjoying the scenery.

Now here's something you don't see every day at the lake. Adam and Eric did a few dives while up there. I don't imagine the marine life really compared to Cozumel but hey, they looked good!

Lake Powell

2008-08-03T13:45:00.004-06:00

Every year my mother's extended family has a family reunion in Lake Powell. We haven't always been able to go since we keep having kids just before the trips, so we were very excited to go this year. My cousin Jeremy and his wife Sharla hosted the gathering on their cruise ship, I mean houseboat. Seriously, this thing is almost twice the size of my house. We are incredibly grateful to them for giving up their master bedroom to our family so we could fit 2 portable cribs in the same room with us. They are so generous! Above is a lovely picture of Peps I when Jer's helicopter was about to land on the top. He was getting just too many of those pesky tickets for landing his helicopter on the shore so now he lands on top of his own property.

Here's a picture of Animal House, Jeremy and Sharla's second houseboat. I guess it was decided that Peps was getting a bit crowded with the 40 of us so this one arrived on the second day of our stay. It's very stylish and appropriately named. It has cheetah patterned carpet and all sorts of animal patterns on the curtains and decor.

Sydney loves hanging out with her 2nd cousins since there are several girls close to her age.

My mom took charge of doing their hair every morning with these cute little hair clips and scrunchies she got them. Here they are all done up before going out to swim.
Sydney spent almost every spare minute outside and went through a lot of sunscreen. She has some pretty good tan lines now!

Natalie loved swimming in the lake which is funny because, as I mentioned in the last post, she has been afraid of swimming.

Tanner was a little unsure about swimming in the lake at first. Usually, he is my brave one when it comes to swimming. After a little while they were both loving it though.

The twins especially like being put in their floaties and passed around a circle.

My aunt Linda bought all the young kids fishing poles to play with. They spent many hours pretending to fish with them. Don't worry, they didn't have real hooks, just little plastic pieces. Here is a picture of Sydney being the fish.

The party just kept getting better and better when Jeremy offered a friendly little game of black jack with and $100 bill sitting on the table for the winner. Gambling with somebody elses money does tend to make it more fun! I snapped a picture before taking the kids out to swim again.

I was really glad we brought these booster seats for the twins. Here's a picture of them eating bananas which they do every morning. It's pretty entertaining because they don't take them out of their mouths. They just push them farther and farther in while chewing and swallowing until they're gone.

Swimming and Hiking

2008-07-28T08:45:00.005-06:00

We seem to be doing a lot of these two activities lately. This last week we went swimming up at Josh's parent's condo pool on Monday which Tanner and Sydney both loved and Natalie was scared out of her diaper. She did eventually get a little bit wet while she clung to me for dear life. I didn't get any pictures of this event though.
We went swimming on Friday with Dan and Andrea Graham at their neighborhood pool. We are gonna miss these guys! They're moving to Arizona this week. :( Natalie was much more brave this time around. She got pretty attached to Dan though and just snuggled up with him the whole time. It was very cute.

We finally got another hiking backpack for the babies on ebay and we took it out for a test run on the 24th of July. It seemed to appropriate to celebrate our Pioneer day by doing some hiking. We went up to Donut Falls, my old stomping ground from the days of my youth. I spent many a summer evening playing up there. I hadn't been there in years though since they closed for a while due to reckless people. It's such a pretty hike and easy enough for Sydney to do.

This picture was funny because Sydney kept picking these little purple flowers whenever she saw them. Then we rounded a corner and there were bushes covered with tons of little purple flowers. It stopped her in her tracks.

On Saturday we decided we needed a little more of that fresh mountain air. We went to Lake Blanch this time with no intention of actually finishing it. We did about 1/10 of it and turned around. It is a much steeper and longer hike and unlikely that Sydney would be okay with it. Plus it starting raining just before we got back to the car.

Welcome to the world Noah!

2008-07-20T10:56:00.003-06:00

We are very excited to have a cousin on the Ruben side! Up until now my kids have been the only grandkids and now they will have to learn to share the attention with a new baby. Rich and Rachel decided kind of last minute a week or two ago that they were going to move from Orem back to Salt Lake and stay in Kim and Nick's basement apartment for a little while. So yesterday was the big moving day but they missed it because at 4 in the morning they were on their way to the hospital! It's so funny how things work out sometimes. Everyone moved their stuff for them though and hopefully they approve of where they put everything. Noah Brett Poulsen was born around 4:15 weighing 8 lbs. 10 oz. and 20" long. He is absolutely adorable! He's got a nice big head which must be a Ruben thing because 2 of my 3 kids have big heads too.

Here are the cute new parents. Rachel was looking pretty good for just going through a 12 hour labor.

Sydney is taking her photography very seriously these days. She got right in their with everyone else that was snapping pictures. She is thrilled to have a new baby cousin!

Idol Mania

2008-07-15T11:38:00.002-06:00

Monday night was the big American Idol concert at the E Center. It was awesome! I didn't get great pictures so it was obviously much cooler to be there than it actually looks. I went with my parents, Rich, Rachel, Adam, and his friend Ellen. Here's a picture of all of them singing at the end looking very tiny.

We had really great seats on the front row of the side. They would have been just slightly better if the lady next to me didn't keep moving right in front of me blocking my view. Ggrrr. So during the second half I moved back a row and could see just great.
It was interesting how much better the last singers were compared the the first ones who were cut from the show earlier on and didn't get as much stage practice. Here's my personal judging of how the concert went. I could totally be the next idol judge.
Chikezie and Ramiele were both sharp and I couldn't understand their words a lot.
Michael Johns was awesome and honestly I don't know why he was voted off the show so early.
Kristy Lee Cook was great on "God bless the USA" which gives me goosebumps no matter who's singing it.
Carly Smithson was at the top of her game. Incredibly strong voice. Here's a picture of her.

Brooke White was amazing and great with the crowd. She and Carly were the best amongst the girls in my opinion.
Jason Castro sounded great and looked goofy as usual.
Syesha was very strong. She sounded a bit like she was yelling at times though and she dressed a little slutty.
David Archuletta was phenomenal and brought more than a few people to tears I think with one of his songs. It was little difficult to hear him well though because people were screaming their heads off. Here's a pic of him.

David Cook was also incredible of course and had a great stage presence.
We were all literally deaf at the end of the concert. I don't think I've ever lost my hearing quite so much before. That can't be healthy. But it sure was fun!

Real Fun

2008-07-15T10:45:00.004-06:00

Last Saturday I got to go to my first Real soccer game. Josh has gone to quite a few. His friend Nick gets tickets pretty often and invites him to go. This time he had four tickets so Nick and his wife Heidi invited both of us to come along. This was also a momentous occasion because its the first time we dared leave our kids for several hours with a non-family babysitter since the twins have been born. Fortunately, our 12-year-old babysitter did just great with the whole feeding and going to bed routines. This is very exciting for me because I wouldn't mind going on a dates more often with my hubby!
We had a really great time. Our friends introduced us to a little family owned chinese restaurant called the New Dragon which was quite yummy. We got to the game a few minutes late which was a shame because our team scored in the first 3 minutes. Anyways, the game was great and it turns out I am a lucky charm because they won! They've never won at any of the games Josh has gone to so Nick said he must be a curse. Hee hee. The players were really awesome. It always amazes me how they can head the ball without getting a concusion.

Getting around

2008-07-08T08:49:00.004-06:00

Natalie is a non-conformist who refuses to crawl the "normal" way. She's going to be a trend-setter when she grows up. You'd think she and Tanner would copy each other a little more but they seem to want to do things their own way. Tummy time is now impossible for Natalie because she can sit herself back up and this is how she gets around. Instead of callused knees she has callused ankles. It's going to be a little tricky teaching her how to go downstairs though I think.

Friday at the Farm

2008-06-28T13:41:00.004-06:00

Last Friday we thought it would be fun to go to the zoo after Josh was done working for the day. Then my mom called with a better offer -- barbeque at the farm! My old home ward was having an activity at Wheeler Farm where we are frequent visitors. Our kids love it there and Mom and Dad love showing off the grandkids. My uncle Calvin has these cool paper rockets shooters which gave the kids plenty of exercise. After we ate Sydney begged me to make a paper rocket with hers.

It turned out pretty good and would go really far. She would shoot it and run way across the field to get it and run all the way back and immediately shoot it again. And she did this non-stop for about 40 minutes. She slept very well that night.

Tanner provided great entertainment for us with four ducks that were wandering around. We brought some old hamburger buns and fed them. He was so excited and had such a huge smile on his face the whole time. And he kept saying "Duck, duck, duck!" So I guess he knows that word now. He was also not scared at all to get right in there with them and chase them around. I was a little surprised by his bravery but I guess they're not much different than our cats to him. It was very cute.

And here's a cute picture of Natalie and I.

Cookie Time

2008-06-28T13:13:00.003-06:00

A few days ago I needed to make cookies for a neighborhood party. McCoy was over that day since Sydney and McCoy play together almost every day. They had a lot of fun helping me bake. They took turns dumping the ingredients in the bowl after I measured them. They kept very good track of whose turn it was. And Sydney is wearing her cute new apron that Grandma Moore made for her.

Storytime with Sydney

2008-06-25T11:21:00.003-06:00

Sydney's not really much of a talker around lots of people. So many of you probably don't know that she is actually quite a good story teller. She's always making up stories about every bug she finds and making up her own variations of the fairy tales she knows. One afternoon I got several clips of her telling me stories.

The Birthday Princess

2008-06-22T08:22:00.005-06:00

She's officially 4 now! When Sydney woke up on her birthday yesterday we asked her how old she was. She insisted she was still 3 and not 4 yet. My theory is she expected she would feel different and be all grown up if she were 4. Since she felt exactly the same as yesterday she must still be 3. But by the time we had her party and she blew out candles and stuff she resigned to the fact that she really was 4 years old. Guess she just didn't have that magical transformation she was hoping for.

The highlight of her gifts that day was definitely her new bike. She had very much outgrown her tricycle.

At noon we had all her princess friends over for a party. This is the first friends birthday party that we have done for her. She was very insistent that this was a princess-only-no-boys-allowed party. Which made it somewhat awkward for the little boy next door who she plays with almost every day. We are going to have a special McDonald's mini-party for the two of them soon. Anyways, the party turned out really fun. We let them color princess pictures.

For lunch we had PB&J sandwiches cut into heart shapes, grapes, chips, and strawberry lemonade in these cute little pink goblets.

Then we did a craft where we beaded bracelets for the girls. This craft turned out to be a little tricky because I cut the strings a little too short and they were hard to tie and they'd come untied and beads would go everywhere!

Then we played "Pin the Heart on the Princess Tiara" which half of them cheated at. Sydney was like 2 feet off and then she tilted her head back and all a sudden she gets her heart right on target.

Next, we opened presents which I think was the favorite part for all of them. It was so cute to see all these girly princesses all gathered around.

Then we sang "Happy Birthday" and had the cake and ice cream. I don't know why my kids get so somber when they have birthday cake. If you look back to Tanner and Natalie birthday post you'll see this same stone-faced looked. Maybe she's just focusing really hard on her wish before she blows out the candles.

Later that evening we went to the parkway to practice riding the new bike. One of the pedals kept falling off so we need to think of something to do about that. But it was a fun evening.

Sydney was really excited when she saw this mile marker with a number 4 on it.

Party party

2008-06-16T21:15:00.009-06:00

Well I realize I have been a bad blogger lately. If you've noticed then thank you for reading my blog in the first place. Anywho, we've been having quite a lot of fun these days. It's just one party after another lately. First, my little brother Nate has finally reached the ripe old age of 19 and it's time to say "See ya in 2 years!" Nate will be heading off to Arcadia, California next month to teach those people a thing or two about why we are here, what we are doing, and where we are going. He's going to be a great missionary! Nate's taking his own little stash of Books of Mormon with him to Arcadia. These books have 531 pages of great content and include the little bonus of David Archuleta's testimony and autograph in each one. I thought that was a clever idea of his and nice of David to do for him. I also got my own autographed photo of David. Woohoo!

By the way, does anyone else find it hard to believe that Nate and I share the same genes?

Saturday, we had Rachel's baby shower. It was so fun and I don't know why I can't seem to remember to take my camera anywhere anymore. I think maybe I'm just trying not to forget the bottles, the binkies, the snackfoods, kids, ect. But for this party I only brought Sydney along. Thank you Kim for blogging so I could steal your pictures! Hee hee. The twins were missed but couldn't come because the minivan is out of commission due to a recent fender bender that I'd rather not talk about. The shower was quite fun and Rachel made out like a bandit. That little boy is going to sleep extra well due to the adorable baby bedding my mom and Rachel have been making for him.

And look at this adorable diaper cake Tracy made! Everyone agrees that she really should quit her day job and make diaper cakes for a living.

Sunday, was of course, Father's Day. We would have liked to let Josh sleep in that morning but had a sacrament meeting to attend in Bountiful at 9 am. My cousin Darren just got home from his mission in Chicago.

It's amazing to me out we can be on time to a church meeting at 9 am a half hour drive away, but scramble to make in on time to our own sacrament meeting, just around the block, at 1 pm almost every other Sunday. We had a really fun time hanging out at the new Muir house afterwards though. Their new house is incredible.

Sydney had a blast with all the girls there.

Tanner is looking so cute but just a little too grown up in this picture.

Well, you may think this is enough partying to last us the summer. But stay tuned because in a couple days we'll be rolling out the red carpet for Sydney's upcoming princess party.

The zoo

2008-06-01T20:50:00.003-06:00

We finally got out to the zoo and got our family zoo pass for the year. We did the zoo pass a couple years ago and went a lot so we thought we would do it again this year. We went on Saturday which I generally avoid like the plague because it was CROWDED. There were times I was reminded of the high school halls in between classes. But it was still extra fun because we went with the Brent and Jenn Carroll and their cute boys. They are some of our bestest friends from the land of Bountiful. They used to live above us in our apartment and we don't see them as often now that we have 30 miles between us instead of 15 stair steps.

They are very much like us. We got 2 cats, they got 2 cats. We had a kid, they had a kid. We had twins...hey, wait a minute. So they're one behind us on the kid thing. Better work on that guys.

Sydney always loves hanging out with Jace.

We got to see the new baby giraffe. I don't know his name and he's not very small anymore. I learned from one of Sydney's board books that giraffes grow an inch a day for the first few weeks of life.

Here are 5 wild and ferocious tigers.

Tanner and Natalie spent quite a bit of time in the stroller. They were pretty well behaved considering how tired they were. We kept the cherrios, goldfish, and juice coming and traded off holding them so they could see an occasional animal.

I think I should stick to the wii...

2008-05-27T09:52:00.004-06:00

Memorial was super fun for us because Josh took the day off work and we played. Sadly, it was rainy so the original plan to have a picnic at the park didn't work out. So my sis-in-law Jenny created plan B: bowling! I haven't been bowling in at least 6 years. I can't really remember when the last time was. However, I am a pro bowler on the wii with a sparkly ball and everything. Apparently all my hard work and practice has not paid off in the real thing though. I think the problem is that in real bowling the balls are heavy! Good grief! I mean I haul around two babies all the time with no problem but sheesh I can't throw a stinkin' bowling ball to save my life. I think I bowled a 72 on the first game and even Sydney pulled ahead with an 81 (in all fairness she did have the bumper pads). I thought for sure I would warm up and do better on the second game but it ended up somewhere in the 50's I believe. Josh tripled my score with a 149. He's amazing! Anyways, still a very fun afternoon. This was Sydney's first time bowling and she was so cute picking up her bowling ball and waddling up to the lane like an overdue pregnant lady. It was fun to see all the Moore family and Josh's parent's were so great and offered to watch the twins for us. Tanner would have been all over the place I'm sure. I stole a picture from Jenny's blog since I forgot my camera.

Double the party

2008-05-18T10:58:00.006-06:00

Tanner and Natalie have made it through their first year of life! We had quite the celebration for their birthday yesterday. We had all the family over for pizza party and cake and ice cream. The highlight was by far watching them eat their cake. Natalie was so dainty and careful with hers, pinching off small pieces one at a time and putting them in her mouth. She has always been this way with her food. Her daddy actually helped her get a little frosting on her face to start and she did end up a bit of a mess in the end. But it was nothing compared to Tanner who is all boy and tried to shove the whole cupcake in his mouth at once. It was hilarious. They were both very tired by the end of the party and we thought they might fall asleep while eating their cake. You can tell in these pictures that they are quite somber.

We decided to get a swing set for their birthday and a couple of small gifts because I couldn't handle the idea of getting them one thing that they can't unwrap or really even play with much yet. Sydney is pretty excited about having our own swing set. She and the cousins had a lot of fun playing on it.

Tanner and Natalie made out like bandits as far as presents went at their party. They seemed extra excited to get their name puzzles from Aunt Jenny which we were so glad she still does. They love playing with Sydney's name puzzle but Sydney rarely lets them.

They also really loved the little maracas Eric and Andrea brought back from mexico. As usually they can be completely surrounded by toys but decide they both want to play with the same one.

My mom got a really cute picture of Rachel and Tanner. I think he must be very excited for his cousin to get her because as soon as I handed him to her he molded himself right over her tummy and just snuggled. We are so looking forward to having a cousin on the Ruben side!

Happy birthday to me

2008-05-11T17:58:00.003-06:00

Well my birthday was actually a couple weeks ago but I've been reaping the benefits in just the past few days. Josh got me a gift certificate to Breathe Day Spa. I've never had a professional massage before or been to a spa so I can't really compare, but this place definitely had ambiance. You get the waffle knit robe, slippers, sitting in the tea room drinking herbal tea (yuck), and music with ocean waves. It was awesome. My sister, Kim, also had a gift certificate from Christmas so last Thursday we went together and got the bindhi herbal body treatment which left our skin feeling baby soft. We ended up getting Mom a gift certificate for mother's day and since she will likely want some company I just might have to go back again.

On Friday, Josh's parents came out in the afternoon with lots of little birthday presents which we planted in the backyard. So assuming I am not cursed with whatever would be the opposite of a green thumb, we will be enjoying pumpkins, carrots, onions, lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, strawberries, raspberries, and potatoes. I think that's everything. We'll see if anything else pops up out there! This is my very first garden and I am definitely not good at growing things. Basically everything I try to grow dies except for my one indoor plant which apparently only needs watering once a month. So I'll do my best and your prayers would be appreciated. Sydney loved helping Grandpa plant things. And the beautiful chain link fence will be going away sometime in the near future.

Reasons to have a king size bed

2008-05-09T17:38:00.002-06:00

Sydney is a frequent visitor during the night. I never even realize when she gets there because she goes to Josh's side. So do the cats. They know if they try to sleep on my side of the bed I'll push them off. But I've never pushed Sydney off the bed! She is normally my little shadow all day long, and occasionally it makes Josh sad that she doesn't want as much to do with him. So you think he'd be happy that she wants to spend time with him at 3 am right? For some reason he doesn't love it. I woke up this morning because she weaseled her way in between us and then turned completely sideways across the bed and started kicking me in the back. She didn't have a pillow so she used daddy instead. Poor Josh is all the way on the edge of his side. So glad we have a king size bed!

Little chef

2008-05-07T08:33:00.002-06:00

This is yet another way that comcast on demand tv has changed our lives. Sydney knows kid shows are available to watch all day long so I decided to branch out a little bit one day. She was negotiating how long she could watch tv and said she just wanted to watch a "really short one." So I found an 8 minute kids cooking show on activity tv where she learned how to to make these adorable little brownie cups. Well she totally loved it and she's always enjoyed helping me in the kitchen anyways. So activity tv is a new favorite around our house now.

I love the fact that she wants to be just like me. She was trying to exercise with me the other day but my lightest free weights are 5 lbs which were to heavy and frustrating her to tears. So I got her a set of 2 lb weights along with a new pink gardening tool since. She loves helping me in the garden too. She will entertain herself with the potato bugs and worms for hours. I feel kind of sorry for those poor potato bugs who get picked up and then moved to another location in the yard. But she loves them and talks to them and gives them names so it's really cute. I want her to stay this age forever but she says she wants to get big and I suppose she'll win that one.

One mobile, one to go...

2008-04-30T22:15:00.003-06:00

Well Tanner has taken to crawling during the last month and recently discovered that he could pull himself up to things as well. He often stands at the stairs and tries to shake the bars like we've caged him in. He is so incredibly curious about everything. Sydney, I recall, left most potentially harmful or messy things alone like the outlets, cords, and my chest of piano music. Tanner has brought us to a whole new level of baby proofing and I think it's just the tip of the iceberg. The big upside to this is that he keeps himself entertained all on his own almost all day. And if he gets bored his just follows Sydney around because he adores her.

Natalie on the other hand, has zero interest in crawling or rolling. She doesn't care that Tanner crawls circles around her. Tanner will crawl up to her and steal her toy or binky and she screams at him or defends claim by swatting at him, but still has no motivation to chase after him. I haven't been terribly good about forcing her to lay on her tummy because she tends to scream at me. I know she is strong enough and I know she could figure it out, but she doesn't want to do it. Anyways, I know all kids figure things out at different times. And I should probably just enjoy the fact that I only have to worry about one child finding some stray outlet plug to suck on. I just think she would have a lot of fun going off exploring.

Tulip Festival

2008-04-23T17:12:00.004-06:00

The tulip festival was slightly disappointing this year. This is our third year in a row attending. We usually go on my birthday but I saw it was supposed to be cold that day so we decided to go on Tuesday, the day after. It turned out Monday was beautiful and Tuesday was quite cold. And it's been such a cold spring so far that the tulips are not blooming yet. Most of them were still green. So we couldn't stay too long because of the chilly wheather and the cute matching outfits I had on the kids aren't showing because of their jackets, but I did get exactly 200 pictures and lots of cute ones. A bridal photographer was kind enough to offer to take a family picture for us which turned out pretty good. I felt so sorry for all the brides getting their pictures done there that day. They had to pay quite a bit to get in there with a photographer just to find out that there aren't hardly any flowers. Anyways, I did get some decent shots of all three children, and I told Josh that if I at least got that then I would consider the trip a success.

Our Caribbean Getaway

2008-04-13T09:16:00.004-06:00

Well we are back from our cruise. We got back last night and are still feeling like we're rocking on the ship. We are also missing the mints on our pillows, towels folded up like animals, and menus with no prices on them. But we are SO happy to be back to our kids again! It was a great vacation. I'm posting lost of pictures so I'll try to type less so this isn't an enormous blog post.

We had four stops on this cruise: Grand Cayman, Roatan, Belize, and Cozumel. Grand Cayman was our first and decidedly favorite stop. We did an excursion through Moby Dick Tours (which I HIGHLY recommend). We went snorkeling for a bit by a beautiful reef where we saw some cool tropical fish and an eel. Then we went to Stingray City to play with the stingrays. They are as friendly as puppy dogs and get really excited to see a boat because they know we will be feeding them. I fed one of them but she kinda chomped down on my thumb so I didn't do that again. We learned how to "hug" them though and got some cool pictures. It was an awesome experience. I still can't believe how cool the water looks in Grand Cayman. It's like someone dumped a bunch of blue food coloring in the water. Beautiful! Josh thinks we should move there.

Our next day was in Roatan, Honduras. It's pretty new to the cruising schedules so they don't have a ton of excursions yet. But it also hasn't been affected by the touring industry too much yet either. It was really neat to see an island with many more homes than hotels. We went on a tour of Gumbalimba Park. It was incredibly hot that day and we were glad for the shade there. During the tour everyone got a few seconds with the macaw and a few seconds with a monkey for photos. After the tour of the park our guide said we could do whatever we wanted until we wanted to go back to the ship. Josh and I chose to go back to the monkeys. We're so glad we did because we got to spend about a half hour with them all to ourselves. It was so fun. They would just climb all over us like we were just another couple of trees. We even got 2 capuchin monkeys and a howler monkey at the same time so we took a picture and decided it could be our new family portrait.

Our next stop was Belize. We booked a cave tubing excursion with explorbelizecaves.com. We were very surprised to find Josh and I got a tour guide all to ourselves. At first I was a little worried because really he could have just drove us out to the middle of nowhere and robbed us. But he was a great guide and took our picture whenever we wanted. We passed a tour group of 38 people while in the caves so it was nice to be on our own to do whatever we wanted. The caves were awesome and Belize is very jungly and beautiful. After the caves our tour guide asked us where we'd like to go, so we chose the Belize zoo. This zoo is very different from most zoos. The animals were naturally living there so someone just enclosed their homes and made it a zoo. The monkeys can actually swing right out of there if they wanted to but they don't because it's their home. It's the first zoo I've been to where I did not feel sorry for the animals. We saw the Belize national animal which is a Tapir, or mountain cow. It is a cross between a hippo and a horse.

On Cozumel we weren't sure what we wanted to do. So we got off the ship and rented a Jeep for the day. Josh was so brave to drive in Mexico. We went to Playa Mia for a bit, which is basically a beach park with paddle boats, water trampoline, and a rock wall in the ocean. It was fun for a couple hours. Then we drove down to Punta Sur and saw the lighthouse. We went on a boat tour that was incredibly boring and our guide did not speak english. Not the highlight. Punta Sur was a beautiful beach but there was nothing to eat there and we were hungry so we didn't stay long. We went downtown and did some shopping. We were wishing later that we had gone snorkeling because everyone at our table said it was awesome. Someday we want to get scuba certified and go back.

Well it was a fabulous vacation and special thank goes to our parents, who took care of our kids while we were away, and to Dane Newland, our realtor who paid for the vacation!

Easter

2008-03-26T14:15:00.004-06:00

One of my favorite things about Easter is the outfits. It was so fun to get Sydney and Natalie matching dresses and Tanner was hansome as usual. Once again I did not get any great pictures of all three of them. Someday, someday. I attempted to get all three of them outside after church to take their picture. But Sydney threw a tantrum over something I don't recall. That girl can get the tears flowing over anything. And then Tanner tipped over while he was sitting on floor and smacked his face right into Natalie's which made both of them cry and gave Tanner a nose bleed. So anyways, one day I will get the perfect picture of all three children and I will put it in the frame in our living room that says "This is our Joy" across the bottom of it. Then people will stop asking "what is your joy?" when they see the empty frame. Well we did get several very cute pictures of them in their cute clothes to put in their scrapbooks.

We missed the Moore family egg hunt on Saturday which we were very sad about. We spent the whole day putting in our new kitchen flooring. My parents offered to help us take care of it that day and it is SO nice to have a floor again. On Sunday, we went to my parent's home and had an egg hunt which mostly consisted of adults watching Sydney walk around a pick up eggs. We need a few more kids on that side to make it a little more interesting I think.

Tanner and Natalie thought the baskets were lots of fun to play with though. They were entertained with those for quite a while.

The Easter bunny is not a really big part of our Easter. In fact, Sydney totally forgot about putting her easter basket out the night before but I did it and the bunny filled it. My mom asked her that day who we celebrate on Easter and she said Jesus. It's nice to know she understands that.

This was the first year Sydney painted eggs too. I have bought egg dying kits every year and we just never get around to using them so this year I made sure she got to do that while the babies took naps one afternoon. She really enjoyed that and we only had a couple of egg casualties.

One man band

2008-03-21T09:27:00.003-06:00

I'm so glad I had Sydney before having twins. There are times when she totally keeps them entertained. We had quite a party the other day! Complete with live music (Sydney) and dancing (Tanner and Natalie).

Princess Sydney

2008-03-16T22:00:00.002-06:00

Sydney is so into princesses lately so I took her to the Disney on Ice Princess Wishes show that was in town last week. It was so fun to spend some one-on-one time with her. Unfortunately, I couldn't find my little camera to take to the show and most likely they wouldn't have allowed my SLR in so the only pictures I got were on my phone. They didn't turn out great. One of my favorite parts of the evening was actually the drive there and back. We took the corolla with no dvd player so Sydney actually talked to me instead of zoning out with a movie. Our conversation went something like this:

Me: Are you excited to see the princesses?

Sydney: Yeah. Baby dragon and baby piggy are coming too. (She has imaginary friends.)

Me: They are? That's great.

Sydney: Yeah, but baby monkey is not coming. He's sick. He's been sick for three days.

Me: Oh that's so sad.

Sydney: He's staying home with his daddy and he's been throwing up in a bowl.

She's got quite an imagination. The show was a lot of fun too and we ate way too much kettle corn. Next time we go though I'll be sure to order tickets earlier. Our seats we way up there.

Hometown celebrity

2008-03-11T11:06:00.003-06:00

I must admit I've never really gotten into a season of any tv show until they come out on dvd and I can watch all episodes one right after another. I find that I can't really organize my life around tv. But this year I'm definitely watching American Idol because I sort of know one of them. David Archuleta is friends with my two youngest brothers, Nate and Adam. If you were to ask David if he knows me he probably wouldn't, but if you asked him if he knew Adam's older sister who plays the piano he might remember me. I used to teach piano at my parents' home and there was a time or two I think I went downstairs to ask if he could keep his singing down. I should have just sent the piano student downstairs to learn about music from him instead. Oh and one time he told me I was his hero for being able to play Clair de Lune. Anyways, he is one of the nicest kids I've ever met. So if you think there's no way he's actually as humble and sweet in real life as he appears on tv then I'm here to say that yes, he really is. He so deserves to be the next American Idol. He performed all through my sister Rachel's wedding reception a year and a half ago. Apparently, someone recorded him there and posted it on youtube. 15 seconds is all I could get to download for some reason. That little cutie in the background working with the sound equipement is Adam. If anyone needs a good D.J. he's your guy!

My sweet hubby

2008-02-21T23:06:00.004-07:00

Okay I'm finally blogging again. Thanks for the tag Roseann!

1. What's his name: Joshua

2. How long have you been married: 5 years

3. How long did you date: About 6 weeks if you count the "unofficial" dates.

4. How old is he: 27

5. Who eats more: It depends on what and when we're eating. Usually, he eats more at meal time and I do a lot of snacking throughout the day.

6. Who said "I love you" first: It was me but Josh can't seem to remember that. He thinks it must have been him because he's a little more romantic than I am.

7. Who is taller: Him. And he seems to think I'm short because of it. I'm a good average 5'5".

8. Who sings better: Eeehh...probably me just a little bit.

9. Who is smarter: I would say Josh. He speaks this whole language with lots of acronyms that I don't understand at all.

10. Whose temper is worse: I don't really think I have much of a temper, but Josh definitely has more patience than I do.

11. Who does the laundry: Mostly me, but Josh helps with it quite a bit. Especially when he can see its about to take over the house.

12. Who does the dishes: We share this one pretty well too. Josh is always willing to do them after dinner if he has time, but sometimes I prefer to do the dishes and let him spend some time with the kids. I can be a little picky about the cleanliness of my kitchen. Josh helps unload the dishwasher a lot which is one of my least favorite chores. And he can reach the dish cupboard with the dishwasher open and I can't. I guess his tallness has its benefits.

13. Who sleeps on the right side of the bed: Facing the bed, he would be on the right side. I have a weird thing about needing to face out from the bed and also be facing the door.

14. Who pays the bills: Josh makes the money and I manage it. Most of our bills are on auto pay so there's really not too much to do there.

15. Who mows the lawn: Josh takes care of that one.

16. Who cooks dinner: I do. I seem to remember a nearly empty refrigerator in his apartment back when he were dating.

17. Who drives when you are together: Usually him.

18. Who is more stubborn: Probably me. But once again it really depends on how important something is to each of us.

19. Who is the first to admit when they are wrong: Josh is much better about this one. I really don't like being wrong. Josh seems to like it quite a lot. Just kidding!

20. Whose parents do you visit the most: We live closer to my parents and so we see them more. It's a little more even now that Josh's parents are back in the country again!

21. Who proposed: Josh did. We'd already talked about getting married and shopped for the ring though. So he didn't have to wonder if I was going to say yes!

22. Who has more friends: We've never counted. Josh makes friends faster I think but I would say most of our friends now our friends to both of us.

23. Who has more siblings: He does. He has 6 siblings and I have 5.

24. Who wears the pants in the family: We don't make any big decisions without consulting each other so we really share that one. Josh wears pants most though because some days I wear skirts.

Our future missionary

2008-02-20T17:53:00.002-07:00

There is nothing cuter than a baby dressed like a miniature adult with a gigantic binkie stuck in his mouth. I find I don't need to buy a lot of clothes for Tanner these days because we get so many cute hand-me-downs from his cousins. But, I just couldn't resist when I ran across this little number the other day. I would save it for Easter but I want to get the most out of it. I didn't find out until after I got it home that it is dry-clean only. Isn't that silly? Who makes dry-clean only baby clothes? And Tanner is kind of a spitty little guy. He made sure to break it in with a little spit up right before we left for church. Oh well, I buy almost all our clothes on sale so this is my splurge.

Natalie was also looking exceptionally cute on Sunday. We cracked open the next box of Sydney's old baby clothes for her. Lots of cute dresses for the upcoming season. She's very excited about it.

Sydney wanted to be included in the photo shoot but she was not dressed for church yet. She did her own hair though so she could match Natalie. Natalie is giving us the evil eye in this picture.

Getting Out

2008-02-15T11:44:00.002-07:00

Last week we were able to get out quite a bit more than usual. The weather got a little warmer there for a bit which was so nice. I like our house very much but the kids and I are all getting a little stir crazy what with this incredibly snowy winter this year. On Monday, my mom helped me take them to the Discovery children's museum at the gateway mall. Tanner and Natalie are free for 3 more months until they turn one so I thought we should take advantage of that. It's a little pricey to get in but Sydney had a ton of fun. Her very favorite thing is the helicopter. We found a little station where you can talk into a microphone and pretend to be a DJ on the radio with background music and stuff. I told Sydney to sing into it and in her loudest singing voice she starts, "Listen to the still small voice! Listen, listen! When you have to make a choice he will guide you! Always!" It's her favorite primary song.

On Tuesday, we had unusually nice weather and the snow was almost all melted. (Just in time for another nice big snow storm on Wednesday.) So I bundled up the twins pretty good and took the kids to "Ducky Park." We named this park ourselves. We had the playground all to ourselves the whole time we were there. Tanner was just so excited to sit there in his stroller and watch Sydney play. He kept squealing. I got some cute pictures of Sydney and was having too much fun with my camera. It takes such great outdoor pictures and it's been so cold I haven't had a chance to use it outside too much. Sydney refused to even look at me after a few shots. After a hundred or so she was telling me to stop taking her picture.

My mom phrase

2008-02-09T10:29:00.000-07:00

"Sometimes we have to do things we don't want to do." I feel like I've been saying this a lot lately. It's becoming my "mom phrase." You know, the phrase you say all the time and then later on your kids will say it and go "aahh! I sound just like my mother!" I don't recall my mom ever saying this to me, so I must have come up with it all on my own. It might have something to do with a certain 3-year-old who's favorite phrase is "but I don't waaaaaaant to." I find myself sounding just like my mom from time to time, but I don't mind so much because if I ended up being just like my mom it would be a pretty good thing. And Sydney talks all the time about how she wants to be a mom when she grows up, so maybe when finds herself using my mom phrase she'll say, "yay! I sound just like my mother!"

Shopping

2008-01-24T21:34:00.000-07:00

One of the few places I will shop with all three kids is Sam's Club. This is because my list is usually pretty short so it's a quick trip. Occasionally, we can find the double seated shopping carts. Tanner is just getting to the point where he can sit up in those but we have to get one with a working seat belt or else he tips over. On his first ride in the cart seat he held onto the front bar the whole time like he was on a roller coaster. It was really cute. Since Natalie is by far the smallest she always gets to ride in the baby bjorn. If it weren't for the ache I get in my shoulders after a while of carrying her, I would forget she was there. She loves shopping and hardly makes a peep the whole time. Sydney loves shopping too but now its mostly because she wants me to buy her anything that has a princess, scooby doo, or dora on it. She was also very insistant today that she could fit into a pair of 9-month purple striped pajamas.

My girly girls

2008-01-07T14:17:00.000-07:00

Tanner was taking a nap this afternoon and Sydney, Natalie, and I were working on cleaning the bathrooms. Sydney was so excited when she found a bottle of pink nail polish in one of the bathroom cabinets. It's been so long since I've painted her nails and she loves that kind of thing. So we painted her toenails and her fingernails. Natalie just watched with envy in her bumbo, so I painted her toenails too. Not her fingernails since they spend a lot of time in her mouth. She didn't really like the process too much so I was very quick about it. But, there is something so super cute about those tiny little toes with pink nail polish on them. See?

Mornings

2008-01-02T22:06:00.000-07:00

I'm not much of a morning person. Getting myself showered and putting my make-up on in the morning makes me happy and I tend to be a little more productive during the day. It only takes me about 20 minutes most days if I hurry. But it can be tricky with 3 little kids to supervise so I have to improvise to keep them entertained. Sydney's not too hard and usually just takes a "swim" in the bathtub. Tanner and Natalie play with toys on the floor while I shower, but today they were tired of that early so I relocated them when I got out. I think they thought it was pretty fun. I was standing behind them the whole time and keeping a close watch on Natalie who showed no interest in the faucet handles. And she couldn't even reach the hot water handle so it was a pretty cozy arrangement for her. And it bought me a few extra minutes!

Sun in Night

2007-12-30T18:26:00.000-07:00

Sydney's life has become a musical lately. I'm suprised how many songs she's learned at pre-school and primary. She tries to sing like Ariel on The Little Mermaid and she makes up songs about whatever she is doing. Today she was singing "Silent Night" for me. She only knows the first line and sings it like this: "Su-un in Night, Su-un in Night." I can imagine these are kind of confusing lyrics to her, but I'm not fixing it because it's so cute. I'm sure she'll learn the right words next year.

Snow day in Oakley

2007-12-30T17:39:00.001-07:00

Yesterday we went up to Aunt Jenny's family cabin in Oakley for a day to play in the snow. It's a really fun tradition we do every year. I should have taken a picture of the cabin because it is the coolest cabin I've ever seen. Sydney has been really into playing in the snow this year. Her older cousins are so great to take her on their sleds with them.

Here's a picture of Sydney and her cousin James. James has gotta be the best big brother a kids could have. He even made a point of telling me how much fun he had sledding with her later that day.

Here's a picture of Sydney and her cousin Ally waking back up the hill. And a picture of just Ally because she's so darn photogenic and thought this picture was really cute.

I haven't written anything about my littlest children in quite some time. They did a bit of sleeping during this event. Tanner and Natalie have great party manners. They are always so quiet and well behaved when we go out in public. I suppose they must get pretty bored and tired of being at home so much. If they are not being quiet they are often singing. That's been their thing lately. Natalie's sometimes sounds like a high-pitched garbage disposal, but its still music to my ears. Tanner sings his dada song. It goes like this: "Dadadadadadadadada." We've been working on a mama song, but no luck yet.

Merry Christmas

2007-12-26T09:24:00.000-07:00

Well Christmas day was a lot of fun for our family. It started off a little rocky. Natalie got sick Christmas Eve and threw up a few times. She slept well at night with no problems but when I nursed her in the morning she threw up all over her and me. Tanner somehow managed to stay clean through that. So she had a bath, I had a shower, and by the time we were all ready Sydney was up and ready to see what Santa brought her.

Sydney finally understood the Santa thing this year and was very excited. We actually had to go see Santa at the mall twice this year because the first time she was so excited and nervous she forgot what she wanted to ask him for for Christmas. She's really been wanting a big ball with Dora on it. So the first time she saw Santa she only said she wanted "presents". That afternoon all she would talk about was how she forgot to tell Santa about the Dora ball. So the next week we were at the mall again and made another more successful stop to Santa. Anyways, Santa did get her the Dora ball. She was very excited about it.

Josh sent me on a video scavenger hunt that morning for my present. He has been so excited about my present this year and with good reason. He got me a Nikon D40 digital camera! So now I can take some AWESOME pictures! I spent most of Christmas day trying to figure out how to use it. It's going to take me some time to figure out all the features.

After the unveiling of all our gifts Grandma and Grandpa Moore came over to visit. It was so nice of them to drive all the way out to us and Sydney loved showing them all the things she got.

We went out to my parents' home that afternoon. My mom had a special surprise planned for all of us. She gave each family gift bags and made us all wait to open them at the same time. Inside them were marshmallow shooters for each family member and a bag of mini marshmallows. And the war began! It was hilarious. Josh wants to build a snow fort in the front yard and shoot the neighbors that go by.

Sydney also got a box of princess dress-up clothes for Christmas. I think I may have a hard time getting her to wear anything else for a while. Natalie will have a lot of hand-me-downs in practically new condition.

Happy Anniversary to us!

2007-12-17T14:36:00.000-07:00

Well we made it! The big number 5. I'm not sure why 5 years seems like such a big deal to me. Especially when you look at people married for 50 years. I guess I just thought this day was SO far away 5 years ago. When you get married and the longest you've dated anyone is about 5 months it's hard to imagine lasting years and years with the same person. But it's been a great half-decade! I'm the luckiest girl in the world to be married to the sweetest, funnest, smartest, most patient guy in the world!

We don't have huge plans for our anniversary. We're going to dinner and a movie. But really it doesn't matter what we do, a night out with just the two of us is fabulous no matter what. Thanks mom and dad for babysitting! Josh got me this beautiful watch and matching bracelet from Brighton Collectibles. I love their stuff! And he's so smart to get a bracelet with the watch so the babies can slobber all over that instead of ruining the watch. Very clever.

I was pretty proud of my gift idea for Josh this year. Since he's so into astronomy lately I found an online store that will print out what the night sky looked like on any given night at any given location. So I gave him a picture of the night sky over Salt Lake City on our wedding night. The sky that night was actually covered in clouds because it was snowing, but had there been no clouds this his what it would have looked like. We noticed this morning that the moon, saturn and jupiter were all lined up which looks pretty cool.

My little copycat

2007-12-11T13:48:00.000-07:00

Sydney is growing up a little faster than I like. Yesterday, she was being an especially big copycat of everything I do. After I walked on the treadmill in the morning she got on her "gym shoes" (a.k.a. slippers) and walked for a few minutes and then went to get us both some "gym water" (sippy cups with water). After I put on make-up she also put on make-up and looked like she had a black eye the rest of the day. I tried to wash it off and I wish I'd taken a picture. That girl is going to be a make-up artist for horror films some day.
Later that day I saw her dragging my enormous nursing pillow into the family room with her baby doll. My mom gave her a baby doll a couple years ago for Christmas I think and it's become part of the family. Sydney announces to me, "I'm the best mommy!" A few minutes later she says "All done!" I look over at her and she's got the nursing pillow around her with her baby and her shirt all unbuttoned. She really is the best mommy!
I took all the kids to Sam's Club that afternoon to pick up Christmas cards and groceries. They were all being so good. The twins especially love to go shopping because there is so much to look at. I was taking my time and enjoying the absence of crying. Sydney likes to talk about everything she sees at the store. Then she says, "Okay mommy, you pick ONE more thing and then it's time to go home." Well I was actually all done but the whole way up to the checkout she's reminding me, "ONE more thing mommy, just ONE more and then we're all done." She gave me quite a few good laughs for one day!

First Snow

2007-12-03T16:29:00.000-07:00

Well we got our first big snow of the year last weekend! I'm so glad we did not need to leave the house that day. It was an all day thing. Sydney played outside with her friend McCoy while Josh shoveled the driveway in the morning. I painted the bathroom while the babies slept and in the afternoon I went out to play in the snow with Sydney. We started what could have been a very cool snow fort. But Sydney started to get really cold so we had to come in. I guess the boots I bought her are not waterproof. Neither are her gloves. It was fun to get outside and play like a kid again. The best part is coming inside and taking a warm shower and having hot chocolate.

Starry Nights

2007-11-18T19:55:00.000-07:00

For Josh's last birthday he got a telescope. He quickly outgrew this telescope and upgraded to what Sydney calls "daddy's HUGE telescope." We had no idea Sydney would be so taken with astronomy. She'll likely be one of the voyagers on the star ship Enterprise someday. She goes out with Josh every night the sky is clear to look for constellations. She tells me about galaxies, nebullas, and star clusters. She has a star chart Josh printed out for her which she has colored and is working on learning a few of the galaxies on it. Most nights they just lay on the lawn and look at their charts. Sometimes they get out the HUGE telescope and look for things. (One of these days I'll snap a picture. The flash will probably blind them.) Sydney is really patient for a 3-year-old. She'll just sit out there in the coldand watch her daddy get everything put together and aligned so she can look through it for a few seconds. The other night she came running in the house from the cold all excited and said, "Mommy, I saw the moon THREE times!!"

I've been TAGGED!

2007-11-14T08:51:00.000-07:00

I've been tagged by my dear Aunt Barbs. Here are the rules to the game of tag.

Rules:
A. The rules of the game are posted at the beginning.
B. Each player lists 6 facts/habits about themselves.
C. At the end of the post, the player then tags other people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

1. My fingers are "double jointed." Apparently, double jointed is not a real thing. It's just extreme flexibility. I can bend the pinky finger on my left hand backwards so far that the tip of it will touch the back of my hand. This is not as easy to do as it was when I was younger. I remember attracting a lot of attention from it in elementary school.

2. I used to collect alarm clocks. I had 5 or 6 in high school. It's because I would get so used to the alarm on each clock that I would learn to sleep through it. So I would rotate through them. I would sleep for an hour through an alarm going off right next to my head. It would wake up everyone in the house but me. My dad used to come in my room and dump water on my face to wake me up. So I learned to wake up to the sound of my door opening. The alarm would be going off right next to me and I'd be out, but as soon as I heard the slightest squeek from my door I was up!

3. When I was 8 years old I decided I wanted to be a piano teacher when I grew up. At 15 I started teaching and just recently stopped teaching so I could take care of my kids. I don't think a lot of people actually become what they wanted to be when they were 8 years old.

4. I love doing the budget for our family. I will spend hours organizing and tracking all our financial matters and making long and short term saving plans. It's almost an obsession. I think I get this one from my mom. It's not so much that I am obsessed with saving money. I really enjoy spending it, but I like to see where it's all going and where we'll be later.

5. I have a very hard time sleeping alone. Funny because when I first got married I had the hardest time sleeping with someone else in the same bed. Now I have the hardest time sleeping if Josh isn't there. It's a good thing he doesn't travel for work. When he is gone I don't fall asleep until really late and get very few hours.

6. I am very spoiled. I have a husband who treats me like a queen and does everything he possibly can to make me happy. He works hard and provides for our family so I can stay home with our kids. And he is the best dad a kid could want. He gets so excited to do the things Sydney loves to do and turns into a kid himself. It's so fun to watch. I have 3 kids who are just little miracles to me. They are always quick to smile and love any attention they can get from their mommy. I have great parents who taught me everything I know that is good. They are always willing to help with anything they can and are so fun to be around. And I married into a great family who I've had the pleasure of being a part of for almost 5 years now. I think my Heavenly Father forgot to include trials in my life. It doesn't seem quite fair, but I'm not complaining.

I tag Wende, Roseann, and Sara!

We won!

2007-11-05T15:53:00.000-07:00

Every year our realtor throws a client appreciation party by renting a movie theater and showing a new movie. He does a drawing and gives out some pretty cool prizes too. Almost everyone wins something. He also does a referral incentive program each year and presents the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners their prizes at the party. This year we won 1st prize -- a vacation! It's actually a travel voucher for a vacation for $2000. So I've been browsing my options and can't decide if we want a cruise or trip to the caribbean somewhere or a cruise to the caribbean or something else...Anyone have any suggestions? Also, any volunteers for babysitting? And if anyone needs a good realtor, use ours. We'd be happy to win again next year!

A witch, a devil, and an angel

2007-11-02T19:37:00.000-06:00

Aren't they cute? Everyone likes to ask if I favor Natalie when they see what costumes I picked for the twins. I think they really are appropriate though. Natalie is an angel 99% of the time and Tanner is a handsome little devil. Sydney is not really witch in real life, but she picked her costume this year. We took her to gardner village and got some great shots of her with the witches there. While we were there my mom found this fabulous hat and decided to be a witch this year too. I think she and Sydney were the best dressed witches ever!

Picture Day - Take 2!

2007-11-02T19:24:00.000-06:00

Sorry for those of you who are tired of looking at pictures of my kids! However, this is my blog and I can write what I want. I was somewhat irritated with my lack of pictures from kiddie kandids last week. 5 pictures just didn't cut it. I have more frames to fill than that! So I decided to try a few techniques I learned from watching Wende take pictures of our twin a few months ago. I snapped these with my little point and shoot camera in our living room a couple days ago. Yes, they are on a sheet from our bed. I think they turned out pretty good all things considered. I have yet to get a good one of all three of them, but I will not give up!

Picture day

2007-10-29T19:06:00.001-06:00

Well they turned out cute in the end but, wow, what an ordeal! I thought some indoor photo shots would be cute to do before they got too much older. I should have learned my lesson by now not to take such small children to a photo studio. It's funny how they'll be so smiley and giggling one second, but the second you put them in front of the photographer and the lights they turn stone-faced or suddenly their feet are incredibly interesting (that was Tanner.) I'm speaking mostly of Tanner and Natalie. Sydney is past that stage and absolutely delighted to pose for a camera. She was the same way as the twins when I took her to get pictures done at their age, though. Anyways, it took a long time, but we eventually got a cute one of each of them so all's well that ends well!

Our TV

2007-10-23T21:11:00.000-06:00

Saturday night Josh and I rented Transformers, which we had not seen yet. We were right in the intense fighting seen at the end when there was a huge crash outside, the lights flickered, and our tv went blank. We assume it was lightning but it sounded like a bomb. I think for a tenth of a second I thought maybe the movie had caused it. It really was amazing timing. We still haven't found out what it was exactly. But whatever happened it fried our tv, literally. We had it checked out today and it's a complete loss. The good news is it will be partially covered by our insurance. So, new tv for us!

Scarecrow Festival

2007-10-23T20:51:00.000-06:00

October is a month of traditions for us. We always get go to the pumpkin patch to pick out our pumpkins and check out the witches at Gardner Village. We've added a new tradition this year - the Scarecrow Festival at Thanksgiving Point. We heard this was a lot of fun from my cousin Shannon. It was a blast! Sydney got a pony ride, a train ride, and all the jumping she could handle. They had over a dozen of those huge blow-up bouncy pads and slides all lined up on one end of the festival. And I must say, she is quite the dare-devil. I know I would have been scared to go down some of those slides but she had no fear. I think kids must be made of rubber. Some of them were bouncing all over the place on the way down. I'm just grateful Sydney slid down gracefully. Tanner and Natalie also had a good time. They love to get out and see new people and places. It was well worth the few bucks to get in!

Double the Cuteness

2007-10-08T22:51:00.000-06:00

Well there are many things about having twins that are hard. But there is something extra cute about having two babies together and how they interact with eachother. Feeding times are especially cute. We try to have them always eat at the same time, whether it's nursing or baby food. I nurse them at the same time. I often feel like one of those mama pigs that just lays there (I sit though) and the little piglets gather around and find their spot. Maybe this is because my babies snort when they get worked up. Anyways, lately they hold hands while they're nursing. It's so sweet! I'd take a picture but, you know, not really appropriate. They are also very cute when we feed them baby food. For some reason I have no problem letting them share binkies and bottles, but when I feed them solids they have to have separate spoons. They look so cute sitting in their bumbos next to each other. As I've mentioned before, Tanner seems to be willing to eat at all times. So if he's laying next to Natalie and her hand or head gets near his mouth, he will try his hardest to eat her. She never seems to mind. One of these pictures looks like he's giving her a kiss, but he's just trying to latch on.

Explaining Why

2007-10-02T14:35:00.001-06:00

We have been trying to teach our 3-year-old Sydney what the word "why" means. When we ask her "Why didn't you go potty in the potty seat?" or "Why did you fill up the toilet with baby wipes?" She just gives us this blank stare. Sometimes she answers the question like we're asking her where she did things. We've tried to get her to fill in the blank -- "I did this because..." I guess this is one of those things that they just have to catch on to naturally. Defining the word why just doesn't work too well. I don't even know how to do it without using bigger words that she also doesn't know. I'm sure once she figures it out she'll be asking me why all day long. I'd like to learn her reasoning on some of the random things she does though.

My Day Off

2007-09-29T20:52:00.001-06:00

I have such a super husband who insisted on giving me a whole Saturday off. It was fabulous! My mom and sister had been planning a craft day down in Orem for a while, and I got to join them completely kid-free. I love my kids with all my heart, but I think I really needed this day. And when I came home the house was even cleaner than I left it! We'll get him some tights and a cape and call him Super Dad! I think we've discovered a good little trading system to give us each a little more free time. He got a day earlier in the week and I got mine a few days later. We obviously can't do this every week, but every once in a while it's a good idea.

Baby smiles

2007-09-25T14:35:00.000-06:00

Natalie and Tanner have the cutest smiles. They are both such happy babies and it's very easy to get them to smile. It's easy to get Sydney to smile now, but not so much when she was 4 months old. Daddy can get these two to laugh like no one else can. He says they have a ticklish spot, but I guess I can't find it.

Sydney's computer games

2007-09-25T14:24:00.000-06:00

While I was recovering from my surgery I decided to teach Sydney how to use a mouse so she could entertain herself on the computer for a little while. She caught on pretty fast! You can see she concentrates very hard on her games. We are big fans of pbskids.org. She also likes to use Paint and makes me some very abstract artwork. I love the mess-free part of that kind of painting. The only downside to this new source of entertainment is that now I have to share my computer and take turns. But I'm a grown-up and I suppose I can handle a little sharing.

Tanner's bananas

2007-09-20T17:55:00.000-06:00

My Tanner boy is not a fat baby, though he does look huge compared to his twin sister. But he has quite an appetite! I guess that's the way it is with boys. It's hard enough providing enough milk for two babies, especially when one is a little pig! I've been having a hard time keeping up with his demands lately so we gave in the other night and offered him some smashed up bananas. We were only 2 days before the 4-month mark so I figured it was alright. I didn't expect him to eat much his first time but he LOVED them! He would try to lunge at the spoon every time it got close and he'd scream if we were too slow getting his next bite. He ate almost a half a banana. Very impressive.

The Fly

2007-09-14T00:08:00.000-06:00

My daughter, Sydney, calls all flies "fruit flies" ever since I explained to her about why we should not leave watermelon sitting around in the kitchen. Last night I was resting on the couch with my leg wrapped, elevated, and icing when a fly landed on my foot. My natural reaction was to shake my leg to get it off. So I did and it nearly killed me! It's still in quite a bit of pain from the surgery and I've been moving it as little as possible the last few days. So my impulse to shake my leg (which barely even moved) not only resulted in a huge amount of pain, but failed to get the fly off my foot. So I was screaming because it hurt and yelling, "Get it off! Get if off!" My mom, Josh, and Sydney were all looking at me like I'd lost my mind. They didn't know how badly I'd hurt myself. So today, I did something - I think I may have tipped over my water bottle or something like that - and I gave a little yell. Sydney comes running over and asks, totally serious and concerned, "What's wrong mama? Did a fruit fly get you?"

Twilight

2007-09-11T10:46:00.000-06:00

Well I'm convinced that vampires are real now. Kinda like reading Harry Potter makes you think your a muggle and there are witches and wizards out there, you just don't know who they are. I'm only about 2/3 of the way through this book. It's been one of my sources of entertainment whilst I lay here on the couch all day, recovering. Now I highly recommend this book. It's been very fun to read. But every once in a while I roll my eyes at the mushy, sappy romance stuff. Do people really talk that way? I guess I'm not your typical emotional girl. Anyways, I find those parts slightly humorous at times. But it's been fascinating story and I think I'll just stay here in Utah where it's almost always sunny and I will never encounter a vampire.

ACL Reconstruction

2007-09-06T20:44:00.000-06:00

I'm just throwing this little piece of advice out to the world. When you go snow skiing be sure your skiis are properly binded. If you can kick your skiis against the wall and they do not pop off they most likely will not pop off if you fall while skiing. This was my experience 8 years ago. I had just bought a season pass and with one spectacular fall the second time down the slope I was in the first aid room with a torn ACL. So I had surgery a couple months later to repair it. A couple years after that I had another surgery to clean out scar tissue that was causing some pain. On the 4th of July this year I slipped on the steps going out to our garage. I tore it again! So I just had surgery again yesterday. Now when I was 17 recovering from surgery was difficult but I only had myself to take care of. It's been a bit more challenging with 3 kids. Apparently they do the operation differently now and my recovering should be a bit faster. I'll be on crutches for 1-2 weeks and the doctor says he hopes I'll be running again in 2 months. I feel very lucky to have a mom who's been waiting on me hand and foot and a husband who is so good with the kids. However, I'm very much hoping this is the last time I bust this knee.

First Day of School

2007-09-06T20:33:00.000-06:00

We quoted a lot of Finding Nemo on Tuesday -- "first day of school! First day of School!" Sydney was super excited about going to her first day of pre-school. It's hard believe I have a pre-schooler already. On her first day of school she learned about the color red, the number one, the letter A, and about alligators. She brought home an apple paper bag puppet. She was so proud of all her school work and practiced writing the number one for quite a while that afternoon. Her class is on Tuesdays and Thursdays. So the second day of school was supposed to be today. Unfortunately, Sydney woke up with pink eye this morning and had to miss school. She was so upset and cried on the way home from the instacare. We'll have to remember to tell her about that later on in life when she complains about having to go to school.

Kid update

2007-08-23T15:21:00.000-06:00

Well, obviously I've gotten a bit behind on the blogging. It seems I hardly ever have two hands free at a computer anymore. I've become very good at checking my email while I nurse the twins but terrible at responding. Typing out a whole email with my one available hand usually doesn't appeal to me. I have recently enjoyed a couple nights of extra sleep. Two nights in a row this week Tanner and Natalie slept until 5 am, so I only ended up getting up once a night to feed them. I decided to try swaddling them again and it seemed to help a lot. I thought swaddling was just for newborns. They are 3 months old now and it seems they still like it.
Lately I've really been looking forward to my little trips to the grocery store, the gym, or the DMV. Wherever I can get a little time to myself really. My oldest daughter, Sydney is in need of a little more social interaction I belive. I love her and the cute things she says but sometimes the non-stop chatter can wear on me a little. It's amazing how persistent kids are. She will repeat something a hundred times until I respond. She will be starting pre-school in 2 weeks which I think will be a nice break for both of us.

My Little Angels

2007-08-01T19:26:00.000-06:00

I'm finally blogging about Tanner and Natalie's blessing day that was last Sunday. It's nice to look at pictures of them being so peaceful and cute. At this moment they are both crying and won't be soothed. They have been fed and have clean diapers and I can really only hold one at a time. So, they are exercising their lungs and I've learned to be okay with that. They looked so adorable on Sunday and we took tons of pictures. It was a very nice day. Zachary's blessing was later that same day so we got to see a lot of our family. Sydney was in heaven because she got to see her cousins. She has 23 cousins on her daddy's side and none on my side. I have a few siblings who I hope will do something about that sometime soon. But for now our kids get spoiled extra by their grandparents.

Lots of reading

2007-07-24T22:52:00.000-06:00

Our Harry Potter book finally arrived last night. I'm afraid I've been a slightly neglectful mother today, although I did hold my twins a lot while I read. I held them a lot because they sleep very well while they are held which allowed for more quiet reading time. Tonight I might be paying for all the sleep they got during the day.
Sydney watched a lot of "My Little Pony" which we borrowed from the library. I used to love My Little Pony when I was little. In fact, I remember I learned how to tell when it would be on tv by watching for when the sun hit a certain spot on the kitchen floor. Well it's lost a bit of its appeal to me but Sydney really likes it now.
Well, as far as the late arrival of our Harry Potter book goes, it was apparently not guaranteed to arrive on the 21st. Only Amazon does that. Good to know.

Where's my Harry Potter??

2007-07-22T21:47:00.001-06:00

Well we've been looking forward to the guaranteed delivery of our Harry Potter book all week. What an extreme dissapointment by Barnes and Noble yesterday when it never came! Josh only checked the UPS tracking website about a hundred times that day to see that it was still in transit to the final destination. We neglected to change the delivery address to our new house so we let the new owners of our old house know it would be coming and we would come get it. I'm sure they were tired of us calling them by the end of the day. We watched the news last night and saw all the happy people who received their books. It was practically the only thing on the news along with all the wild fires in the state. While out at my parents home today I managed to steel my brothers book for a little while and got in the first couple chapters. And now today we are wondering what the guaranteed delivery was all about. Do we get the book free now? I'll report on that when we find out.

Chocolate or Ice Cream?

2007-07-18T22:34:00.000-06:00

Today I took Sydney to my hairdresser for her first "real" haircut. I've given her many trims before to keep her hair healthy and even but it kept getting in her eyes so I decided to let a professional take over. I really talked it up the day before so she wouldn't be worried about a stranger coming at her with scissors. It was a pretty fun experience. My daughter has quite a healthy ego. She can be pretty entertained just by admiring herself in the mirror. She absolutely loves shoe shopping and buying dresses. The idea that a haircut would make her prettier was all she needed to cooperate. She sat perfectly still the whole time staring into the mirror, totally all business. She only glanced at me a couple times just to flash me her beauty pageant smile.
Later in the day I decided she was overdue for a nap. I got her into her room and I was very excited that she might actually take a nap while the twins slept. I thought I might get a nap too! I always read her a story before she goes to bed. Her two favorite stories right now are "Curious George and the Chocolate Factory" and "Curious George and the Ice Cream Shop". As Sydney laid down in her bed I asked her "Do you want chocolate or ice cream?" She sat right up and said "I want ice cream!" I suppose I should have asked her "What book do you want me to read?" instead. She didn't talk me into giving her any ice cream and I didn't talk her into taking a nap after that.

The big step

2007-07-15T21:42:00.000-06:00

Well I am taking my big step into the world of the bloggers. I'm the world's worst journal writer and that's mostly because I don't like writing things out with a pen and paper. So I think typing in a blog will work out much better for me. I am about to celebrate surviving my first 2 months of being a mom of three. This is an extra big accomplishment since two of the three are newborn twins. As much as I was scared to death to have twins, I now can't imagine life without them. Things are pretty crazy around our house most of the time but I wouldn't trade it in for anything. Our 3-year-old daughter, Sydney, is the best thing that ever happened to us. She's such a good helper and always tries to make her parents happy. She has her occasional tantrum but she's dealt with a lot of changes in her life very smoothly. I'd love to think that her goodness is a result of our parenting because that would make it likely that our other children will turn out the same way. But, I think she's just a good-natured kid and we had very little to do with it. I have recently been reading a book called "It's Twins!" which has several articles from parents with their own stories and advice. The first sections was on newborns which was so sweet and talked a lot about breastfeeding and sleeping schedules. I felt so proud of myself for mastering breastfeeding two babies at once. The next section was on raising twin toddlers. Suddenly, this very sweet book turned into a very scary book. I'll try to stay optomistic that my twins will make it through those terrible twos without feeding off each other too much. In the meantime, I'll enjoy how sweet and cuddly they are now.