Big Decisions

Isn't he cute? We think so and he is growing up so fast I can't believe he is going to be done with kindergarten in one month. That went fast. This last week he started baseball and he LOVED it! We went to his first practice on Tuesday and he had a fantastic coach that really got on the kids' level and William just ate it up. At the end of practice they told us when the next practice would be and that they would let us know when the first game would be. Well  the next day they let us know that the first game would be on Sunday May 6 at 1:00. Needless to say Ben and I were not thrilled and so we finally got a them to email us a copy of the schedule hoping that this was like a 1 time thing and that most of the games would be on another day and we could just miss the ones on Sunday well no, more then 50% of his games were going to be on Sunday. So we had to talk to William about it and he made the big grown up (and right) choice to not play baseball on Sunday. What a great kid! He was pretty bummed but luckily he can do another year of Tee-ball so we will do that this summer. I wish we would have known that the games were on Sunday before we ever went to practice so that William wouldn't have to make that call but he did so I guess it is a good learning experience for him. Now we will have to make Sunday's extra special for the summer so he knows that it was worth it! We love you William!

Better Late than Never?

I am just not in the mood for blogging today (really I am not in the mood for anything today, I think I am a little tired) but nonetheless here is our week in a nutshell. The kids played a lot. Then on Friday Grandma and Grandpa Allen came to visit and the kids were surprised and they were SO excited! 

 Some classic Charley pics. (In the bottom one he was showing off his socks just in case you were wondering :).

 Some Grandma reading time and the kids are sporting their bolo ties that they got hand-me-down from their daddy. I think their outfits are well picked don't you?

I was cutting up strawberries and Charley saw this "HUMONGOUS one" so he needed a picture.

 Emmerlyn is trying to drink her "milk". Silly girl she has been super in to feeding her babies this week.

I Almost Forgot!

Both of the kids are napping and I was just thinking what should I be doing that is quiet? Hmmm make dinner nah not right now, go downstairs and clean up definitely not. Luckily I remembered. This week has just been low key and relaxed and it has been wonderful. Ben had Friday off and we just relaxed all weekend it was so nice to go to exercise class without the kids. On Saturday we drove over to Havre just to get Ben some fresh air and a little change in scenery. While we were there we went to the Big R store so the kids could look at the chicks. Emmerlyn was so excited she was laughing and saying hello to each chick as it would walk around in it's box. Then she was running back and forth between the boxes and laughing. Poor girl doesn't get very much exposure to animals. Ben and the Young Men had to do a musical number in Sacrament Meeting on Sunday and I had to play so he took Emmerlyn up with him and she sang the whole time. Not words that made sense but she was pretty into it. She was also singing while I was practicing the piano yesterday only this time I could understand what she was saying she was singing about flushing her potty and fast fast fast to the potty. I sure hope she had picked different words when she sang in Church! After church was potluck and we stayed and after the boys finished eating they were playing with the other kids in the primary room and when Ben went to gather everybody up the young men had Charley who was telling them that he was a chick and saying cheep cheep. Ben said the young men were pretty entertained with him. He had also taken off his shoes so they could be cheese for the "mouses". Silly sweet boy. I let him play on the computer the other day as a reward for being good at the store so now that is his favorite thing to earn.

William came home the other day like this. In that very large plastic bag was all of the clothing he had worn to school CAKED in mud. shirt, socks, pants, boots, coat, sweatshirt. Oh what a boy. This last week I was thankful for my washing machine. He is pretty excited because he gets to start baseball practice tonight.

 This PJ scene looks familiar to everyone in my family. Emmerlyn will not leave her zipper alone so we had to pin it. She was NOT happy but beyond being a little tired of her constantly getting out of her clothes I don't want her to zip up her pudgy belly in it cuz that would hurt!

 Don't report me but it doesn't get any cuter then this! We have been trying to potty train Emmerlyn this week so we have been seeing a lot of this view since this little girl is getting really hard to dress she fights it all the time. I don't know if she is quite ready for potty training, some days are better then others but if I put a diaper on her I am constantly having to take it off so she can go potty so I don't know what we are going to do as far as that goes because I want her to be trained and she wants to be trained but she doesn't have the hang of it yet. We will have to see what happens.

 We set up the boys in their bunk beds this week and so far they are loving them. I can't believe they are big enough for this!

 This dolly is Emmerlyn's current very favorite toy. She brought me her sweatshirt and wanted on the baby because "bebe's cood". Well we have let her take it to bed with her the last few nights and the other night Ben went to put her down but couldn't find her binky (Emmerlyn only really gets them at naptime or bedtime now). He asked me and it wasn't on her when I got her out so he looked EVERYWHERE. He asked Emmerlyn and he led him under the dresser but it wasn't there either. Finally he just got the other one out of the the cupboard. The next day before I put her down for nap-time the binky was missing again. After searching high and low and pulling everything out of the bed and again being led to look under the dresser. I finally asked did you check the doll?

 We felt all around the doll and discovered tucked down in the pant leg BOTH of the missing binkies! I guess she had a plan because she gets the doll out all the time but not the binkies she was going to let the binkies hitchhike so she could have access to them after nap-time I guess. Crazy girl!

 She was trying on William's jacket that she loved because of the snaps. She kept coming to us to snap it so she could just unsnap it.

From the Mouth of Goobs

Charley saw a picture of a lady soaking her feet and said "whoa mom, that girl's feet are 'maked'." Wow this is serious :)

We Made It!

Yep the craziness ended yesterday night. We made it through out second tax season. This one actually went way better then last year I think that I was a little more organized/sane/coping mechanisms etc. The kids were also sleeping at night/naps better this year and so was I so I think that helped. a lot. Ben only joined us for about 1 meal a day for the last week (on the good days) so we kept things low key.

 We made whole wheat fruit pizza for lunch and the kidlets loved it. (Yep a wet rag on your head and eating with your knife instead of a fork is totally cool at lunch time when dad's not home.)

I'm not sure why they need the bowls on their heads but when I saw Emmerlyn running down the hall with one I discovered that she was not the only one with it.

 William came out the other morning like this. When I first saw him I wondered how he had gotten that much chocolate in the middle of the night. But no it was just a little bloody nose. Silly boy.

 The boys got cute new church clothes (Charley is not pictured because he refused to get dressed until literally right before we walked out the door and he was concerned that he was going to freeze to death.) I thought they would be nice and lite for the warm spring and summer weather. I still think that but it was snowing like crazy on Sunday so they did not get to enjoy that benefit. 

 This cute little girl had her first official day of Nursery on Sunday. She did great. She took off and followed Charley to the classroom and stayed in there the whole time and didn't cry at all. What a big girl. All the ladies asked in RS where she had gone and I was so excited to say nursery. I am sad she is getting so grown up but I was very ready for her to be in nursery. It makes Sundays a little easier.

I had a great weekend. Ben worked extra hard all week and I was able to go with some of my good friends in our ward to billings for some food, shopping, and a trip to the Temple. It was WONDERFUL! It was so nice to have good friends at to get out of house without kids! I did miss their little faces and was happy to see them when they woke up on Sunday morning.

Last Week of Tax Season!

Just because we love him, starting with the jerky and peanuts we brought Ben a treat or snack for everyday! What a great guy he is.

 

  On the last day we brought enough for his whole office because we knew they were all stressed.

(I just had to document it on here because I will probably never do something like this again so we needed to see it to remember that I was once thoughtful :).

The Last 7 Days of Tax Season

Just because we love him we dropped Ben off a little snack at work at 10 this morning since he had been there since 6 and wasn't getting to come home for lunch today. 

We sure love and miss you Ben.

Conference Weekend

Who doesn't love this seen? Luckily it was fixable and I am so thankful for my awesome husband who worked 60 hrs during the week and then spent his Friday night replacing a power steering hose on our van. It is a good think he is handy because when he called around there was no one in town who would work on our foreign car. He just needed to borrow a couple wrenches and get a little creative and he was able to fix it. He is awesome.

 While he was doing that the weather was LOVELY just warm enough to play outside so the kids were kicking the ball around and exploring a little. William and Charley came running to me to  have me come look at "a whole bunch of ovals" they turned out to be deer poop for those who are wondering :). In the picture above it was the first one I took when I came out with the camera and as I was walking out the door I heard Ben telling William to "hurry and go put that back before Mom sees it and freaks out". It was a deer jar bone with the teeth still in it. Gross. We washed our hands, really well.

 Emmerlyn showing me her stick. 

 Watching Conference. Before you think I am an awesome mom for giving my kids ice cream cones while they watched conference that is not the case. Emmerlyn went in the kitchen and provided everyone with empty ice cream cones (i think they are her favorite snack she tries to get them all the time.) the boys took them without hesitation.

 It was great to watch conference as always and it was nice to not have to leave the house on Sunday and have Ben time ALL day. We miss having him around but we are in the winning stretch. I hope everyone had a good week and here's to hoping for better weather in the future, the kids were a little dismayed that it was way to cold to play outside for the rest of the weekend.

Family Picture at Thanksgiving

Just so it is in the book!

Happy Easter!

Unfortunately for me I was sick all weekend and Ben didn't feel that great either but, luckily the kids were all feeling pretty good. William had Friday and Monday off from school for Easter break so it was nice to have him home for a few extra days. The Weather was super nice on Friday so we played outside for awhile (don't mind the snow :) It was of course nasty on Saturday for the Easter Egg hunt.

The boys built a fort to watch a movie in on Friday night. They looked pretty cozy I wished there was room in there for me! 

 On Saturday we went to the town Easter Egg hunt and Charley did awesome he took off and grabbed tons of eggs so many that they were falling out of his bucket and Emmerlyn was picking them up and putting them in hers. William only got 3 eggs because he was just chasing kids that he knew from school. Emmerlyn was pretty content just picking up the ones that Charley dropped because she was cold.

Then we dyed Easter Eggs

 Emmerlyn splashed hers in the dye so I just gave her water after 1 dunk and she was happy with that.  

 Then after they dried they decorated them with stickers. 

They put on LOTS!

 Emmerlyn had cracked hers all up after the dying process so we had to give her a different one to use for stickers and she promptly cracked that one all up too much to the dismay of her brothers.

We are really missing Ben these days but we are so grateful that he has a good job so we will go with it. Only 2 more weeks!