Merry Christmas

Tagged and Turning Five

Jonathan turned five last week, and was tagged by Krystal, so I'm going to bend the tag rules a little and tell five things about Jonathan's life to celebrate his birthday.

1. Jonathan was born a week late and was 10 pounds even. He had a hard time breathing in the hospital, and I had epidural complications, so our first few days were a little rough. We were thrilled to get to come home from the hospital by Christmas, though. My mom snapped this picture right after we walked in the door, so he's only three days old, but he looks huge already! He was huge already!!

2. Jonathan turned 1 year old just before we moved out of our first home. He was such an easy going baby, and took GREAT naps! He's always been my best sleeper-he's still the only kid who doesn't come out of his room several times every night to tell me he can't sleep. Even at a year old, he always had us laughing. He's still a funny kid, and he loves that about himself. Jonathan loves to make up jokes, laugh and be silly. Can we say class-clown in the making?

3. When Jonathan was 2, he really didn't like other women. Whenever I had a friend come over, he would scream and cry, and he would avoid them the entire visit. He only liked to be around men, and it was cute to see him always tagging along after his dad, uncles and grandpas. Once, when we were at a preschool screening for Suzanna, he was playing with an older "grandpa" age man, and when the man left, Jonathan started trotting out the door after him. Guess he wasn't done playing!

4. When Jonathan turned three, he was so sick with a bad cold. I see it in his poor little eyes every time I look at that year's birthday pictures, but this one isn't so bad. Jonathan is a sweet kid, even when he's sick, and it seemed like he was always sick that winter. He started preschool at 3 1/2, and loved his time playing there. He wasn't really interested in learning much at first, but he's more "studious" this year. He's a smart kid, but he'd rather be playing than learning letters.

5. As a four-year-old, Jonathan was all about friends. He spent the last year always asking who's house he could go to, or who we could have over. And with lost of play dates came lots of opportunities to share. Jonathan can be very good at that. Whenever he gets home from a birthday party with a treat bag or has any candy at all, he gladly shares with his siblings. Before they even ask, he's offering to share and passing out candy. He's really generous with his stuff, most of the time.

We can't wait to see what Five-year-old Jonathan is going to be like!

Jonathan Turns 5!

Last week for Jonathan's birthday party, we invited his preschool class over for a Scooby Doo Christmas Mystery. An "elf" stole all the presents, and the kids had to play some games to get clues to find them.

The last clue was hidden in my pinata masterpiece. In case you can't tell (and you really can't) it's supposed to look like a Christmas ornament, but this homemade pinata did not want to cooperate at any point in the process. By the time I was done making it, I was just glad it could hold candy. Luckily kids don't care, and they all had fun hitting the thing.


We had a Scooby Doo's paw print for a cake...


and the kids all got to make their own pizza.


Jonathan had a great time, got some great gifts, and is super excited to finally be five. All day on his birthday he kept coming up to me and saying "I can't believe I'm actually five!"

Freezing Cold Idaho

Last Thursday Phil's parents and Phil and I left for the freezing North. I didn't get my camera out for any pictures. I kept leaving the camera in the car, and there was no way it was important enough to face the snow and wind to go back for it. So all of my pictures are from Cheryl (thank you!). And no, I'm not bitter about the cold =)

We drove up to Provo on Thursday, stayed the night an then drove the rest of the way up to Rexburg to attend Phil's sisters' graduation from BYU Idaho. At first, the weather was deceivingly mild, but by that night the snow started....

The graduation was great (President Uchtdorf spoke), and we were excited to see the girls graduate! It wasn't as fun to walk around the campus admist the cold, cold winds. I'm sure it's a beautiful campus, but I didn't see much as I tried to just survive from building to building. I'm such a wimp about the cold.

Here's Cheryl




And Wendy




And here's Cheryl's nice apartment complex covered in snow. Doesn't it look so pretty?!?



The snow is beautiful...until you have to go out in it. And the freezing wind. Well, let's just say that I'm not planning a return trip to Idaho in the winter. EVER.


We left Rexburg on Saturday during a nice snowstorm. Scary times. Luckily the weather for the rest of the drive to Salt Lake was clear. And Sunday morning we attended the Tabernacle Choir's "Music and the Spoken Word" that they do each Sunday, but this Sunday they also had a mini concert afterwards where they sang most of the songs they'd done at their Christmas concert from the previous week. It was amazing! We had to walk a few blocks from our parking spot to the Conference center in the light snow--but I didn't mind the cold at all. Maybe I was getting used to it, or maybe it was just that it was so much better than the freezing winds of Rexburg, but it was so peaceful and beautiful Sunday morning.


We left for home after the Choir concert and stopped at a gas station in Nephi where we ran into....Elder Packer!! He and his wife and security people (that's what they looked like anyway) were there for a restroom break. We didn't bug them by saying hi or anything, but it was pretty fun to run into them. Only in Utah =)


The drive home was painfully long. And when we were only twenty miles away from Thatcher (at 1:30 in the morning), I saw some nice flashing lights behind me. I hadn't slowed down enough in Fort Thomas. Bother! Luckily the nice policeman just gave me a written warning, and we FINALLY made it to Phil's parents' house.


We were excited to get the kids from my parents the next morning. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for taking care of them Mom and Dad!
We visited for a while, visited with my Grandma and Grandpa Flake (who gave the kids cute crocheted butterflies that made them happy--so cute to hear Ty say butterfly), and then make our last drive home. It seemed like a piece of cake to drive three hours home after all the driving we'd done. We feel blessed to have made it home safely before the roads got bad in Northern Arizona--it was scary to read of several accidents on roads that we had traveled that night.


So glad to be home in Arizona! I'll take the last few rainy days over the freezing snow up in Idaho ANY DAY. I think I'll have to reread this post several times this summer, to help me remember how thankful I am to live here =)

On Santa's Lap...

Every blog has to have a Santa Sighting, right? Well, I wasn't there for my kids' visit with Santa, but I wanted to share anyway, so my entry is pretty much plagiarized from our Allred family blog (thank you Lisa!).

While we were out of town, we left our kids with my mom and dad. The kids were extremely excited about spending a few days with Grandma and Grandpa, but still a little sad that we would be missing our ward Christmas party back in Phoenix. But never fear, Aunt Lisa was there to save the day! Phil's sister Lisa and her husband Phil brought our kids to their ward Christmas party. So they got their Santa time after all.

Tyler was (so I'm told) a little nervous about Santa. But no screaming this year!


Jonathan wanted to tell him his life story, especially about why he had a band aid on his head. Apparently Santa was nice and chatty.



Brendon had a little explaining to do about his shirt: "Santa doesn't need to know about this." But Santa doesn't need to worry...Brendon's been good this year!



Suzanna was a little disappointed that Santa didn't ask her what she wanted for Christmas. All the parents think Santa was wise =)

Extended Family Fun

Saturday night we "traveled" to Mesa for a family gathering at the Martindales to see my cousin Sarah and her husband Tamir who were visiting from Chicago and to welcome home Grandpa and MarJean from their mission to Salt Lake. The Martindales have the absolutely perfect house and backyard, and my kids were in heaven. Which meant I had a great time, too!

Jonathan is drawn to any and every ball, so I wasn't surprised to find him playing tether ball. Notice the scooter lying at his feet--that's his other love and he's anxiously waiting for Santa to bring him one of his own.

Tyler loved everything--especially the drinking fountain outside. We have to visit the drinking fountains at EVERY store we visit, so having one in a backyard was a fun find. In this picture he's admiring their pond.

Brendon had a routine. First warm up by the fire...

...then go jump off the jungle gym onto the trampoline. And repeat. And repeat.

He was also pretty excited to play the Wii with Cole. Cause Cole somehow has become the "expert" when it comes to Wii at our house. Don't really know why/how that came about, but it's pretty funny when my kids don't know how to do something on our Wii and they say, "can we call Cole?"

Suzanna talked about playing with the dress-ups downstairs all the way to Mesa, and that's where she spent all of her time. But no pictures of that fun....

We all had a great time visiting and my kids were glad to have their favorite wrestling partner, Grandpa Lunt, back.

How many kids can say that they wrestle with their great-grandpa?

Band Blowout

Last night was Brendon's "big" holiday band and choir concert. And yes, the italics are used for sarcasm.



It was a crazy afternoon/night at our house, so things had already been hectic by the time we arrived. Then, when Brendon got up to play his first solo, the trumpet he was using (his trumpet wasn't working earlier that day, so his teacher had him use hers) wouldn't work. The teacher stops the concert and comes over to help, tries to oil the valves, and she still can't get it to work. I was dying in my seat (and praying too!) that something would work out, cause I could tell Brendon was distraught--though he was doing his best to cover it up and act tough. He is ten, you know. Finally the teacher just grabs Brendon's friend's trumpet and switches out the mouthpieces so Brendon could play his solos. And then he did GREAT! I was so proud of him for being able to hold it together through all of this. Because if you know his music teacher, it was not pleasant. She's a stressful woman.

*I forgot to mention that Brendon's vice principal, Mr. Blake called later that night to tell him what a good job he did performing in that stressful situation. That helped him feel better. I had told him the same thing several times already (he was feeling really embarrassed), but it always means more coming from someone who isn't your mom. I was really impressed that Mr. Blake would take the time to call ( he is a family friend/former ward member--so it really meant a lot to Brendon).

Here's Brendon after the concert with his friend (and trumpet lender) Tanner.






Tyler hardly moved through the band's performance. He would clap and cheer after each song--such a copycat!




He was also thoroughly entertained by the water fountain that he could just barely reach if he stood on his tippy-toes. Wow he's growing up!



Back to the concert...by the time it was over I was just sick of it all--the music teacher yelled at all the kids DURING the concert whenever they weren't in the right place or took to long saying their lines. They were doing a "radio show" from back in the day, and she told us to pretend we were the studio audience. I almost couldn't hold back my sarcastic remarks at one point when she said--to the audience, I think--that we "couldn't hear" her stage yelling to the kids because it was a radio show. No lady. We could hear you. But we sure wish we didn't have to.



I think I'm going to have to volunteer to help with the next concert and subject myself to her presence on a daily basis, because there is no way I want a repeat of last night's concert. The kids (and parents!) deserve better. I may not be able to change the teacher, but at least I could help her out with a few of the details so she maybe could relax a little, and I could definitely make it more of a production, right?

Thanksgiving

We went to Thatcher Thursday morning for Thanksgiving and had a great time visiting both of our families.

Tyler likes to ride in style--still in pj's, using way old headphones (he's ears are too little for the ear buds), and totally vegged out watching some movie. If only we could all have it so easy and look so cool in the process =)

I forgot to get my camera out for the rest Thanksgiving day to capture the delicious dinner and fun we had with the Allreds.

The dads, Rachel and kids went for their "traditional" shooting (clay pigeons) the next day without a camera (what were they thinking!), so we don't have any great pictures of that either. They even went again on Saturday and still no pictures...they need some training =) The kids all had a great time, and the women who stayed back at the house enjoyed a little peace and quiet.

And there was no way I would have even thought of taking my camera to our Black Friday shopping at Walmart (remember--I was in Thatcher so my options were limited), but it was CRAZY! I've never actually gotten out of bed early and gone shopping right when the stores open, so I could not believe it when we pulled up at five and the ENTIRE parking lot was full. And it's a huge parking lot. Especially huge for such a small town. After the full lot, I wasn't surprised by the madhouse inside. The entire back section of the store was jammed with people and carts--I felt pretty happy right then about my mom and I not having one of those, less happy later carrying all of my stuff. I met with some happy and helpful shoppers like the guy on the other side of the aisle who offered to help me find a couple of movies so I wouldn't have to go around, and some rude ones who jabbed me in the back with their cart--as if ramming into people is going to make the roadblock any better! We found almost everything I wanted thanks to my mom's persistence (no Wii games, of course, but I wasn't surprised by that), but now I kind of wish I'd just stayed in bed as my kids have changed their minds about what they want for Christmas. And that's why I usually avoid Black Friday and just shop the last week before Christmas. Cause my kids are finicky.

Friday afternoon we helped set up Grandma Allred's tree. Tyler thought that was the best thing in the world to actually get to touch all the breakable ornaments. Grandmas are way nicer than moms.

And finally some more pictures!

Friday night the kids split up with the Olivers for sleepovers (we were sad that the other Allreds couldn't join in because of sickness). Lisa got the boys and I got the girls, so I definitely got the better end of the deal. Anna and Lelia were perfect angels all night and the next morning while we set up and decorated Grandma Flake's tree.

By the time we pulled out of town on Saturday afternoon, our kids were exhausted! That made for a pretty nice drive home as they slept!!

Guess what my kids want for Christmas?

That's right---a kitty of their own. They've been campaigning for a long time, but it's especially bad after a trip to Grandma Allred's where they get used to having cute cats around. Grandma's cat Wicket especially loves her tree skirt. I think it was less than five minutes after putting the tree up that Wicket wandered out to the living room and then made a beeline to the tree skirt. I didn't see her move from that spot all day. Tyler loved that! No more asking "where's the kitty?" all day--he knew just where to find her.

Then today Anna came home pleading to adopt the cat that her teacher is fostering right now. Apparently she spent all day with the kitten, Orion, and it even kissed her nose! She's wants to write Santa right away to give him her wish list.

But my kids all know that Santa doesn't bring any gifts that mom and dad don't like. So they're laying it on thick right now. Telling me all the great things about cats. Telling me how easy it would be. How calm Orion is. And on. And on. And on.

Too bad I'm still not convinced!