all tied up...

I'm at work and Nick sends me this....ever wonder what your spouse does when you're not there? LOL

conversations with claire...

Things have certain titles in our house. For example, Claire has some hand me downs (that we are so grateful for, don't let the story detract from this. It's all about the funny factor). In one of the batches of hand me downs we received were some blue, Cinderella tennis shoes. They are absolutely plastic wrapped with gold sparkles and a prominent Cinderella displayed on each side. I think they are the most hideous things in the entire world. Hence: Claire LOVES them. I started calling them her 'ugly shoes' and it stuck. She asks me where her 'ugly shoes' are, or if she can wear them to church or whatever...(and now I have to explain that I teach Claire that Mom doesn't like pink...blech...but Claire can like pink. that's fine. But we don't have to always like the same things...it's all about independent thinking...I digress...ahem....)

So this is the preface to this story:

Claire is clacking away in these awful fake high heeled, princess, pink, plastic shoes. Nick and I hate these things. If she's not stepping on our toes in them, she's trying to tap dance, which literally shakes the house. I'm in the shower, oblivious. Nick is trying to put Matthew down.

I get out of the shower.

Claire barges in.

Claire: Mom, Daddy told me to take off my 'stupid shoes'. (In our house we try not to say stupid. Honestly, that was harder than I ever thought it would be.)

Mom: Claire! We don't say 'stupid'!

Claire: But Daddy calls them 'stupid shoes'.

So, we have named these too.

this was going to be several conversations recorded...but that'll have to wait. I took to long telling the first story!

mallory...

So, Nick works with this girl, lady, person named Mallory. I didn't meet her for a while, but her wedding announcement to Wes was on my fridge for...months. She is gorgeous. The typical blond haired, blue eyed beauty. Little bit intimidating.

Then I see her for the first time. She lived up to her picture. But, Nick had to leave in a hurry and never introduced us! So, then I felt completely awkward and left before I could really talk to her. I decided that was a bad choice and told Nick to tell her that I wouldn't wait for an intro. I'd just start talking to her next time like we were already introduced.

So we did. And we're friends. And she remembers my kids' birthdays and Christmas better than 1/2 my relations!

Anyway, she took Claire to a Princess Festival this last month for Claire's 3rd birthday. It was super cool. Here are some pics.

Her prince charming. She always wants to be kissed. Watch it, boys. I have a feeling she'll kiss before most kids ;)

Princess and the Pea---or Winifred's jousting equipment ;)

One of my students from MVHS---Kristen as Rapunzel and Claire

Her name sake...I love her growl face! Claire BEAR!

I'm a pretty princess riding in my carriage!

Birthday Bear! 3 years old today

It's my dear girl's birthday today!

Happy Birthday, Claire Bear!

You light up my days and nights. I still have to go in to see you before I go to bed because I can't help it. I kiss your soft cheek and you turn over in your sleep, usually away because you don't like to cuddle, which makes me laugh.

You're so opinionated! You want to be the boss of everyone. I love it when you sit and laugh with Matthew. You call him "My son" as if that were his name. You splash in the tub with him. You try and carry him (ahh!), you take things from him if you think he'll choke on it. You yell at him if he's playing with electric cords like Mom does.


You hate time outs, potty training, broccoli, and potatoes

You love your Daddy, Dora, Aurora (eek!), purple, you give your dad anything that's blue because "it's your favorite color, Daddy!", reading, apples, hot dogs
You would drink every meal if you could.
You ARE SO SMART! And maybe that is a very biased mother, but I still cannot believe that you ride your bike so well and how fast you learned to do it. You speak so well. A full year ago you were speaking how most of the 3 year olds I know speak and now that you ARE 3, you speak like a 5 years old.

I love you SO MUCH, little girl who wants to be big.

"I went on a bike ride last years!"

"I am a big girl so I can ride in the street!"

"Mom, can we go to the librahry to play on computers?"

adventures...part 1

Greg (Nick's brother) was married on June 18th in the San Diego Temple in San Diego. For that temperature I would move there in a second. The beauty is also extremely appealing. I wanna, I wanna, I wanna...

Expense---wow. Okay, probably not.

We went to all three (3)---yes I had to make sure that was clear. THREE) receptions. One in Oregon (in conjunction with Daniel and Sarah), one in San Diego and then one in Provo. It wasn't the amount of receptions. It was the fact that we went to all three. I have a 2 year old and a 11 month old. WHAT WERE WE THINKING!?! They were both so overly tired that we just about died. I remember specific times when Claire (who does not sleep in the car...at all) would finally fall asleep and wake up no less then 20 minutes later screaming no matter what we did. AH!

We also tried to be super cheap, so we drove to Oregon. A typical 12 hour trip was about an 18 hour one. We were crazy and flew to Vegas (normally an 8 hour car ride, with kids, prolly close to 10), then stayed with my sister a night and then drove to San Diego (normally a 6 hour drive, with kids 7...not too bad!). We then drove to Las Angeles and flew to SLC. It really was insane. Things took a lot longer than we hoped, but we saved over $200 bucks doing it that way. Phew!

So, the whiny part is over...

The trips were really very neat. We saw a lot of family, met some new friends, and figured we could and will do anything! The wedding was beautiful. Ashley and Greg were married by her grandfather. Neat! The reception was amazing. I loved her color choice (aqua, white, and silver). It was very posh.

more to come. I have to interact with children now.

Some adorable pics: