Butterfly

Sunday we were out watering the flowers when Dustin spotted a butterfly.  He had accidently got it's wings wet so it was stuck.  We had a great time looking at it and watching it climb on a twig.  Sadly the next day the girls found it frozen in the same spot.  So poor butterfly became part of our new bug collection. 

Heavenly Father truly has beautiful creations.

Itchy Itchy Itchabod

Alissa has a serious issue with itchy things on her skin.  She hates tags, won't wear certain fleece or other fabrics and can't even stand the feel of the church bench on her legs.  Sometimes it makes me crazy because she acts crazy when this certain itchy material touches her.

Then it dawned on me... I was the same way.  I hated and still hate feeling lacey material against my skin.  I don't like sweaters very much because they itch me.  I think my garments probably help ease a lot of the itching these days, but I still have a small issue. :)

I guess when I look at it that way - I'll cut all the tags out and send the itchy material to Molly's room.  She doesn't seem to mind.

Fathers Day 2012

For Father's Day we headed to Pocatello to Dustin's neice Julie's baby blessing.  It was emotional for me.  Her husband passed away in December so her brother in law blessed the baby.  I'm so happy she has such good in laws who take such good care of her.  Her baby Kailey is beautiful!

We had lunch at her mother and father in laws house and with Dustin's family then headed to my grandmas for round 2 with my family.  

Here is the cute daddy that lives in my house with our 3 beautiful baby girls.  I feel so blessed to have him beside me raising these girls because they are a ton of work!  I know the girls love their daddy to pieces.  Molly is the biggest daddy's girl.  She gets excited when he comes home from work and loves to snuggle him while he watches TV in our bed.  I think one of the things the girls love most about their daddy is dancing with him or laughing at him while he dances in the kitchen.   He plays hide and go seek and with a little nudging will sit and read to them on the couch.  I know Ella thinks he is SUPER dad.  She once said, "Dad, can you really jump all the way to the sky?"  She would believe anything he would tell her.  We were on a little bike ride a few weeks ago and Ella had a friend along with us and Dustin was chasing them on the bikes.  The neighbor overheard Ella say to her friend, "See, I told you my dad is tricky."  They just think he is so great.. and he is!

This is my dad and I think he is Super!  As I sat and listened to the talks given in church today I pondered some of my fondest memories with my dad.

I love how when we came home from church each week he would pull out either chips & salsa, crackers & cheese or make a crazy concoction of mac n cheese with clams, tuna, tomato sauce or some other random ingredient.

I love the memory of all the "shortcuts" dad would take us on.  Every time we would go on a road trip somewhere we would end up taking an extra hour or more in the car because dad had to see where this road went.  When we asked where we were he would say, "We took a shortcut."  I HATED IT, but it's funny now.

I love that my dad encouraged me to be brave and try new things.  Dad is brave.. mom is not so brave and trying to figure out what was safe and what was not was/is sometimes challenging.  One of my favorite memories was when dad was trying to help me gain courage to jump off this big rock cliff into the lake.  He told me he would tell all his scouts how brave I was if I would do it.  That's all it took - off I went.  It made me feel so good to do something that scared me.

I love how every time we would go out to eat he threatened he would never take us anywhere again because without fail somebody would spill their drink all over the table. But he never left us behind.

I love that on cold mornings he would go out and start my car for me so it would be warm when I got in it to leave.

I love that my dad loves my mom. 

I have the best dad!  I am so grateful that he showed me what I needed to look for in a husband and accepted and loves Dustin.  It means a lot to me!

This is my father in law.  I think he is pretty super too and so does Dustin.  You know that song called I've been Watching You by Brad Paisley?  It fits Dustin to a T!  He admires his dad so much and his dad can give him advice and it is solid in Dusitn's mind.  I do really love the admiration he has for his dad.

David has taught me a lot of valuable lessons in the 10 years he has been my father in law.

I love that he loves everybody.  He accepts them and loves them no matter what!

I love that he is humble.  He doesn't feel like because he is 75 that he is any better or wiser than anybody else.  Even though he is much wiser than most of us.

I love that he is a wonderful pianist.  He has amazing talent to hear music and plays such beautiful music on the piano.  I love that he now listens to Ella try to plunk away at the piano and encourages her.

I love that he is frugal and has taught Dustin how to be frugal and manage money well.

I love that he and Carol are excellent gardeners.  His garden is beautiful and he (and she) are always willing to let you just walk through and eat dinner in their garden and fill a doggie bag to take home.   They don't criticize or even give advice without us asking on our sad garden.  I guess they believe that trial and error is the best way to learn.

He calls Carol his angel.  He love, loves his wife and I love that!

I am so blessed to have a husband, dad and dad in law in my life.  They are all excellent men who hold and honor the priesthood.  So grateful!!

Funeral and Birthday

Last Monday evening Great Grandma Bateman passed away from aspiration pneumonia.  Mom and I were able to go see her a couple hours before her passing to say goodbye and feel peace with her passing.  I love this picture I had taken with her at her 89th birthday party in April.  She looked so lovely in her new pink sweater and her pretty lip stick. 

Grandma has been living at Parkwood Meadows Assisted Living for the past couple of years and every time I talked to her she said how much she loved it there.  She had a board up on her wall where we would bring her pictures of our kids.  She was blind from macular degeneration so I would try to describe to her what the kids were wearing so she would know somewhat what the picture looked like.  She was so proud of all of her family.

One of the most amazing things about my grandma is that she could remember EVERYBODY'S birthdays!  It was fun for me to take the kids up and visit her when we could and get to know her better.  I'm glad the kids got a chance to know her and I'm sure Ella will remember her and all the candies she would sit and eat as we visited her.

I had the opportunity to say the prayer at her funeral and my girls along with my brothers girls got to sing, "I'm trying to be like Jesus." 

The pictures were taken at her burial.

 

We had lunch at Chuck A Rama and I convinced mom and her cousins to pose for a picture.  They were missing 2 who left prior to the picture.  I will be back later to put names in when I find them out from my mom.

Uncle Gary, Grandpa (Dennis), Sandy, Pam and Bonnie.

Grandpa and his siblings.

After the funeral and a nap we got together at my moms house for a little birthday party.  Mom's birthday is Fathers Day this year so we had a special early celebration for her since Fathers Day can be a bit crazy for all of us trying to visit in-laws, etc.  We let the kids play outside, gave her our gifts and then acted STARVING to get her out of the house so we could help my dad surprise her with his gift.

Which she was very surprised!  He got her a 2013 red Mustang!  It was so fun to surprise her because she is usually in on the surprising.  Then we went to Leo's Place for a 9pm dinner. :)

Anybody that has seen my mom knows she doesn't look like she could be turning 50.  She looks amazing.  I love my mom, she is one of my very best friends!!  HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!

Oh what do you do in the summertime...

To say I am happy about summer is an understatement!  I LOVE HAVING ELLA HOME!  She is my mini mom and takes such good care of her sisters and does an excellent job at entertaining them.  All my kids have been sleeping in until 9 every morning and doing much better sleeping through the night.  I don't think I have felt so caught up on rest since Alissa was born.  It has been so great!  It's amazing how much more organized your brain can think when you are not sleep deprived. :)

I love leaving the door open all day (when it's not crazy hot) and letting the kids go in and out and turning the sprinklers on so they can run through.  I stocked up and have like 20 boxes of popcicles all ready to be gobbled up by all the kids.  I used every breath in me today to blow up the little swimming pool so the kids could play in the water.  SO FUN!

Anyway, Ella and I have been making our big Summer Bucket List again and so here is our list so far.  We will cross them off as we do them.

Visit the Zoo
Go Bowling
Worm the lawn
Go fishing
Finger painting
Make Popsicles
Swimming
Treasure Hunt
Feed the ducks
Go to the pet store
Blast Off
Drive in Movie - home made or actual
Splash Park
BBQ with friends
A hike with dad
Temple Visitors Center
Play Tball or softball
Service Project
Make Snow cones
Swimming Lessons
Dollar Movie
Ride Fourwheelers
Make homemade pizza
Fly Kites
Go Camping
Bug Collection
Paper Airplanes
Play Dough
Bike Rides
Origami
King Tut Museum
Make a craft
Science Project
Fruit Loop necklace
play with friends all day
slip n' slide
Mesa Falls
Pajama and unlimited TV day  (Ella's request of course)

We headed to the Public Library today to check out a few books and sign the girls up for the Summer Reading Program.  I was grateful they explained it to Ella because it got her fired up!  Each week we will be making a trip to the library to review our weekly reading goals and get prizes.  We have spent a lot of time at the Library this past year.  I am thankful to live so close to a library with such a huge selection of book and fun things for the kids to see.  They love the fish pond in the front. 

When Ella was so little I always took her to the library every week and let her sit and watch a puppet show called "Quackers".  I would let her sit and use the computer and we would read books.  I don't have much patience for my kids on the computer anymore because I am chasing Molly and Alissa hasn't figured out how to use the mouse so she tries really hard and then yells because she has the ear phones on. :)    I need to be better about teaching her at home.  Anyway, we love the library.. here are the kids.

We will be signing up for Swimming Lessons the middle of June or first of July.  I always look forward to swimming lessons and especially excited this year to watch Alissa try it out.  I think she is going to do awesome!  She is a brave one.

And because I forgot about these pictures on my phone... here is evidence that we made it to the Dinosaur Museum.  Even if it was the last day, we made it! 

Doctors Visits

We had a pretty eventful weekend.  Here is a quick summary.. It started Thursday morning when I called to talk to my mom who left for Florida on Tuesday.  I thought I would see how Florida was treating she and my dad.  She quickly informed me that my sister had called her from Rexburg in the middle of the night and was unable to feel the right side of her body and had to go to the ER.  She was going in for an MRI that day at 2pm. 

After calling my siblings to let them know the situation my sister in law volunteered to watch my kids all day while I went to spend the day with my sister.  I headed to Rexburg and woke my sister up at 12:30 since she didn't get back from the hospital until 5:30am and was sent home pretty well medicated.

She was up the night before until 1:30am doing homework and felt her leg go numb and then noticed her handwriting getting sloppy as her hand felt numb.  She got worried and called my mom and while talking to her, half her face went numb and she had a hard time talking and eventually even her vision went blurry.  My mom instructed her to wake her roommate who thankfully is one of her best friends and have her take Heidi to the ER.  Heidi woke her up but was unable to talk to her so she tried to left handed write her a note to say, "I can't talk".  I saw the note she wrote and it is frightening!  I can't imagine the panic she felt.  They did a CT scan on her and took some blood tests, drugged her up and sent her home to sleep.  The next day when I got there we took her for an MRI and had to wait a whole day to get results.  My poor mom was in Florida doing her best to stay calm and avoid jumping on the next plane to come home and take care of her baby girl.

We took her in to the Family Doctor the next day and reviewed the MRI which came back completely normal (THANK HEAVENS!) and they suspect it was caused by a migraine or possibly anxiety or both.  It's really amazing what crazy side effects anxiety can cause your body to go through.  Anyway, she is good and we are grateful! 

I don't love scary situations like this, but I do love watching my family pull together and be so concerned for one another.  My brothers would have done anything for us to make sure my sister was taken care of - at the drop of a hat.  There is truly a bond with family members that cannot be replaced anywhere else.  They are some of the greatest people I know.

The story continues... Friday night my sister stayed at our house and she and I stayed up until 1am visiting.  Alissa woke up at 2am with a fever of 103.7 degrees!  She could not find comfort and said her legs, head, belly and throat hurt.  She cried and moaned and rolled all over the place until I finally decided at 5:30 to take her to Redi Care since I was up.  Once we got to Redi Care she threw up in the waiting room and THANKFULLY I had a gallon ziploc in my bag that I just quickly grabbed for her to throw up in.  I felt a little bad for the receptionist and guy in the waiting room who had to sit and listen to her, but I wasn't about to move in the middle of the ordeal.  For the first time in hours she found comfort and fell asleep on my lap.  They sort of checked her while she was sleeping.  Didn't even look in her throat, just saw her ear looked red so they treated her with antibiotic.  Whatever.. every time I got to the doc I miss our Pediatrician in Logan.  He was the best kid doctor ever.

Dustin's brother was baptizing his son and blessing his 2 sweet girls on Saturday morning at 10, but since I didn't get home until 7am and had a sick child I decided I had better steer clear.  I was so very sad to miss this special occasion though!  I sent my camera with Dustin to take some pictures.  Dustin came home after the baptism and took Molly and Ella to their BBQ and Alissa and I slept the day away.  It was wonderful!  Thankfully after a couple doses of antibiotic her fever is gone and she is back to her busy body self again.

As I went through this crazy weekend I reflected many times on the words of my patriarchal blessing.  "You will recieve happiness because of the physical aspects of your body..."  I am so thankful for health.  I really would be a lousy sick person.  It is hard work to spend so much time in a doctors office or hospital or waiting for results, etc.  I am so grateful for the body I was blessed with.