Molly girl is getting big

This sweet girl is so motivated lately.  

She currently goes to gymnastics and started learning to play the piano about a month ago and recently asked to start going to a jump rope clinic too.  She is super uncoordinated with the jump rope but I was impressed at how hard she has been trying.  She will just be sweating and still trying to swing that jump rope so she can jump.   Every day she is the first one up and dressed and generally the first to get her chores done.  She has realized that when she does it she gets good consequences.  She is motivated by her chore chart and every Saturday reminds me she needs her money.  

We took her to open a savings account where she has me put the money she earns every single week after she takes out her tithing.  

What a good girl.  I am thankful for her streak of motivation and hope it continues.  It sure makes life easier on me and her too!

Gem State

Ella's ballroom group competed at the Gem State competition this weekend.  They did an awesome job as a team performing.  As much as she claims to not like to dance with her cousin, you can tell she loves it.  Big smiles!

They took 3rd place out of 5 or 6 teams and Ella and Ian got to represent their team.

Hooray!

The next day they competed as couples doing multiple dances.  It took about 4 hours and was pretty constant dancing.  The individuals weren't nearly as prepared as the group however a few people still did get an award from their team.  Overall it was an excellent experience!  Sure love my little Ella dancer.

Lincoln Turns 2!

This baby boy is 2?!  I swear the time is just flying by.   We fed him some rainbow pancakes to celebrate and made him feel extra special.

He got a blow up alligator which he thought was pretty cool.

And grandma and grandpa gave him a slide which he got to help his dad assemble.  The box was pretty fun as well.

This boy just loves everything about his dad and any chance he can to get outside.

He's helping him haul a log here in this picture.

He is pretty spoiled to have 3 big sisters who love and adore him.  He gets pampered NONSTOP.  He has learned to cry for Ella (which is what he calls all his sisters) when he gets put in his bed.

I will admit he has me pretty wrapped too.  He's my little buddy.  Since all the girls are in school we hang out all day long.  He still sleeps by me most nights and for some reason finds comfort in squeezing my neck.

He doesn't talk much.  Well he jabbers a lot and points and grunts a lot but we have all learned to speak his language and haven't made him speak English so he is barely saying 50 words now and that's stretching it a bit with animal sounds.  

Our favorites are: jooch (drink), coe (sucker), peese (please), his monkey sound is pretty cute too - oo oo ah ah which is different than the girls used to do.  

He loves being outside.  We put a fence in the week of his birthday so he could play outside and not run into the street which is what he wanted to do all the time.  He has loved it.  

After about 6 months of fighting him he finally decided he LOVES nursery.  They got a new nursery leader which I am positive helped him loads.  When we drop him off I see him run in and hug her leg.  Makes my heart so happy.

He is a climber and has learned to push the chairs or the stool to where he needs to reach and will climb all over the counter or table doing whatever suits his fancy.  It makes me a bit crazy sometimes.  He's not as bad as Alissa was, but with tile floors they can't do much climbing without making me a little nervous.

We call him Linc, Lincoln Logs, Lincs, Bubba

This boy has been a complete blessing to our family.  We love him more than words can express.  So thankful Heavenly Father blessed our family with him.  

Talent Show

Here is Ella's cute group the night of the talent show.  They were so nervous but they did great!  We had some issues with the light and them not knowing when to start but it's ok.  They performed again the next day for the school.    Kailee Egan, Dani McCling, Kailey Daniel and Ella.  

My cup is full.

My sister and I went for a walk with the kiddos the other day and had a picnic at the park near the temple and just walked and talked and played.  She is pregnant with twins and is chasing after a little one and boy I just remember how hard that is and I've only had single pregnancies.  I am thankful she is close by and we can hang out as much as we can.  

A few weekends ago we were able to attend a Time Out for Women put on by Deseret Book.  It was like 9 hours of spiritual feast which I was more desperate for than I realized.   As I prayed in my heart to know what I needed to do my answer was pretty clear - "Read your scriptures".  I am so thankful for that and so thankful to have easy access to reading my scriptures so I can come closer to Christ.    When I got home I was pretty tired from crying for a lot of hours at these inspirational women and men and feeling like my cup was full and that gave me so much energy I had a hard time sleeping that night.  I just am so thankful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the hope that it gives me in this life.  So thankful for these women that could go with me so we can learn and grow together.

Little Things from February

I have all these "little things" pictures on my phone from February and I always forget to include them but they are the little things that make life so great.

On my birthday my parents took my siblings and I to lunch along with Molly and Lincoln who were not in school and Lincoln's chocolate milk came with a mustache on the straw.  We all got a kick out of it.  Cody took the picture for me.

Ella and her life long friend McKenzie were bored one day so I encouraged them to follow the recipe themselves and make some cookies.  They made some yummy cookies and were proud of themselves. 

I looked over at my night stand the other night to see Alissa's name carved in it.  I thought that was odd so I called Alissa in and asked her about it.  It was obvious to me she was telling the truth that she hadn't done it so I called Molly in.  After some serious interrogation she confessed.  Apparently the two natural wood lines making a triangle shape were just encouraging her to dig her sisters name into it with a pencil.  Honestly, it makes me laugh now.   

Straight out of the car from school Molly took Lincoln outside to push him in the swing because she knows he loves it and she loves him.  My heart swells when I see them doing things like this for each other.

See the colors on the window behind Molly.  We were at the car wash.  I realize more and more every day that these kids are growing up and things like the colors of the foam at the car wash aren't as exciting.  I'm trying to embrace these moments more. 

Lincoln is obsessed with going outside and its making me realize we need to finish our fence.  He knows how to let himself out and will shut the door behind him so you don't even know until you can't find him.  He almost made it to the road the other day.  He loves his soccer ball his dad bought him and he took it out and was giving it a ride in the swing and on the teeter totter.  I guess this is what boys do when they don't have a baby doll to play with?

He fell asleep watching TV like this the other day.  Makes me laugh. 

We found this Christmas present one of the girls had got a few years back and they all thought it was pretty fantastic to play with until it popped a few hours later.  Look at that grin though! 

Lincoln has started to smile and laugh at movies.  His all time favorite is Curious George but he will watch just about any cartoon you turn on these days. 

I lost my hand weights and looked everywhere I could possibly think of in my house for about 2 months.  My sister reminded me I should pray about it and during a quiet moment the thought came to me where I should look: in the basket next to my night stand under all the clothes I need to mend.  Sure enough, there they were.  A great reminder to pray. :)

School Talent Show

Last week the girls had the opportunity to try out for the school talent show.  They decided to do it and signed up without any prompts from me.  They just came home and told me they'd signed up.  Alissa and her friend Marie did some gymnastics.  A routine they wrote all by themselves which was so great.  They had so much fun practicing and trying out in front of the judges.

Ella and 3 of her friends decided to do the "cup song" and sing along with do the rhythm of the cups.  To step it up they wore their white shirts and a one of the girls moms modge podged florescent sticky notes to the cups and turned on a black light.  It made it pretty impressive.   They had so much fun practicing and trying out too.

Ella's group made the talent show and Alissa's didn't.  Thankfully she was a little disappointed but not terribly sad.  Ella has done the school talent show before they had try outs and didn't win but had such a great time just practicing and trying and I'm glad she wasn't discouraged to try again.  So we will encourage Alissa to try out for 2nd grade talent show next year.  We are looking forward to March 17th to watch these cute girls perform.