10 on 10: January 2020

1. Hazel found the dishwasher! Here we go.

2. One of my favorite parts of the morning is when the kids are all ready for school, and we pause by the door to say a prayer before walking out to the bus.

3. Another snippet of life currently I want to remember: backpacks in order of who gets on the bus first, kids running around playing tag.

4. I’ve seen a possum roaming the neighborhood a few times recently. Kind of creepy because I’m pretty sure they’re supposed to be nocturnal? And they’re just nasty creatures.

5. Working on learning letters with this boy. 

6. Pausing during lunch - “Oh hang on, I gotta kiss Hazel!”

7. Heart melting cuteness!

8. A movie night, complete with a popcorn picnic.

9. Dad stole Hazel for some play time when she was between her outfit from the day and her pajamas. I don’t blame him one bit.

10. Still very into chess over here - even with a movie going Max still wanted to finish the game.

Millie is 8!

It’s great to be 8! I can’t believe it was 8 years ago that our Millie was born. Her birthday fell on the first day back at school after Christmas break, so we celebrated beforehand too. Gigi and Poppy took the kids to Bounce Bounce and they had so much fun! I took zero pictures of them actually bouncing, but they sure loved it. Slurpees at the end cooled them off nicely.

We went to Willie’s for lunch and came back to Gigi and Poppy’s for cupcakes and playing. It was a beautiful day.

And then Monday was the actual day! She had been grumbling a little bit in the days beforehand about having to go to school on her birthday, but when it came down to it she was excited. It was a foggy morning and one of my gifts to her was not forcing a hairdo on her! Love this birthday girl. Gigi dropped off donuts for breakfast too, which was so sweet!

The little kids and I took lunch to Millie. She invited her friend Rachel to join us and it was fun to hear them talk. Sweet friends.

Millie wore her “Eight is great” shirt (which she has worn so much over the last year that it is now missing the E so it says “ight is great”) and Hazel loved the sparkles.

Millie was thrilled with her cake, which was so sweet. Making it was a little like the good fairies making Aurora’s cake on Sleeping Beauty. 

Monka and Umpa came over for dinner and cake, and Millie opened presents. 

The most exciting part of turning 8 is that Millie is now able to be baptized! That will happen at the end of the month. We are all very much looking forward to it. Gigi and Poppy gave her a beautiful book to record her baptism memories and Monka and Umpa gave her a dress for the big day. A few days later we went over to the temple and took some pictures of her in her dress. She looks so grown up and beautiful! I’ll break these up with some facts about Millie at 8 years old.

- Millie is such a helpful big sister, especially with Hazel lately. She has helped change diapers and outfits a couple of times and loves to hold her and carry her around. Since Hazel sleeps in a pack ‘n’ play Millie can even get her out of bed! 

- Millie has gotten very into cheerleading lately. She has some friends who do it on teams and they all cheer together at recess, and Millie has come home with some fun little cheers.

- She often lives life at a frantic pace. She runs so fast everywhere she goes, reads quickly, eats quickly, etc. 

(Plus a little behind-the-scenes of taking pictures with the other kids in tow. They were all really SO good, but occasionally we had a hard time keeping Harvey out of the shot haha)

- Millie loves to read and write and create, but has decided recently that her favorite subject in school is science. 

- She has a very unique sense of style. I try to pretty much keep my mouth shut and let her wear what she wants, and I love seeing what she comes up with!

- She wants so much to be good and do what is right. She loves reading scriptures with her dad at night and is developing her own testimony.

We love Millie Mae! Happy 8th birthday!

Welcome 2020!

We got to hang out with Gigi, Poppy, and the Morris crew on New Year’s Eve. We went to the boardwalk to see the pretty Christmas tree before they took it down, which turned into an ice cream outing and then some park hopping! The kids loved watching their ice cream be made with liquid nitrogen.

We played at Gigi and Poppy’s and had dinner. Wes introduced our kids to The Lion Guard so they had fun watching that too. They love to pretend they are the lion guard, lots of roaring involved there! It’s pretty cute.

New Year’s Day (my birthday!) we met up with Monka, Umpa, Sarah, Tim and Lauren at the bowling alley. Growing up we kind of had a tradition of going sledding on my birthday when we were in snow, but now that we’re pretty consistently not in snow it has morphed into bowling! It’s fun, and a little depressing how bad I am at it now. I guess my once or twice a year bowling is not enough practice?? Shocking.

And then lunch at Freebirds. Yum.

Then we said goodbye to Sarah and Umpa, as they were leaving to get Sarah back to school. We went over to Gigi and Poppy’s to hang out for the rest of the day, and Millie played pool for the first time! And she beat me. Not even joking. Thankfully my self-esteem does not hang on my bowling or pool abilities, or else it would have been a sad day for me.

Tyler took me out for a birthday date a couple days later - tennis and dinner at Chuy’s. We had fun, even though Tyler beat me. I’m realizing as I write this that an unintended theme of my turning 31 was losing at everything I played! Hopefully not a bad omen for the whole year. 

Looking forward

Something I’d like to do this year is write a little more on this blog. For the last several years it has turned into a place to dump all my photos and write whatever I happen to remember when I post them, usually way after the fact. Recently Tyler got me an iPad with a keyboard and it is suddenly so much easier to want to blog! 

We’re in that weird, post-holiday but pre-regular routine time. It’s especially weird because poor Max caught the sickness I had last week and it was very gloomy and rainy weather today. So we had a very blah day with a lot more TV than maybe ever. BUT it gave me a lot of time to think about and come up with my 20 for 2020! I’ve had fun with this kind of framework for goal-setting before and am excited about it this year too. Some small things, some larger endeavors. I’m leaving one space open, in part because I want to leave room for whatever life throws at me this year, and in part because I am indecisive and tired from coming up with 19 things already.

It’s going to be a great year!

2019 in review

January: I turned 30, the boys started sharing a room and bunk beds, Millie turned 7, busy season began for Tyler, and I started some baby and home projects.

February: We went with family to watch Tyler’s old HS bball team play, enjoyed lots of fun parks, Millie sprained her elbow, and the kids and I pulled 12 bags worth of weeds from the backyard!

March: We got to go to the rodeo 3 times, my mom and I painted Millie’s room gray, had a fun visit from cousins Wes and Morgan (and their parents haha) and the Webbs, went to NASA, and Max turned 5!

April: General Conference, Arts Festival with Grammy, I finished some baby projects, we went to the beach, Easter, had a cheeseburger blind taste test and our first swim of the year.

May: Millie had her gymnastics show, Tyler turned 32, Max finished preschool, Hazel was born!! And Millie finished school too.

June: Newborn fog + slow summer days, family reunion at the dude ranch, Hazel’s blessing on Father’s Day, and time with family in town.

July: Lots of summery fun! We visited the Battleship Texas, 4th of July with the Juergens crew, Grammy’s 80th birthday, saw The Lion King twice, and a triple date with Heidi, James, Andrew, and Brittany.

August: Had to buy a new A/C unit, 10th anniversary!, take your kids to work day, Typhoon Texas with the Andersen crew, end of summer and back to school fun, and then school started for Millie and Max!

September: Tyler and I started teaching Primary together at church, we spent lots of time outside, the kids started piano lessons more consistently, Tyler traveled for work and helped the Westons clean out their house after it got flooded (again!).

October: Fun run at school for the kids, General Conference, Hazel and I went to New York City for  the Andersen girls trip, took family pictures, Halloween.

November: Veteran’s Day program at school, Harvey turned 3!, Tyler did a sprint triathlon, Santa visit, fun Thanksgiving week with all the Juergens crew in town.

December: Fun with Andersen cousins, Max was the star student at school, Hazel started crawling, Tyler went golfing a few times, we celebrated Christmas with family.

It has been a wonderful year! Can’t wait to see what 2020 brings.