Birthday Interview with Leah

How old are you today? Seven

Do you feel seven? mmm......yeah!

How much do you weigh? 48 pounds

Who's your best friend? Gracie

What's your favorite movie? Barbie, Princess and the Popstar

What's your favorite TV show? Sabrina, The Teenage Witch

What's your favorite color? red and black

What's your favorite thing to do? Go to school

What's your favorite breakfast? Pancakes and bacon (lots of bacon)

What's your favorite restaurant? Papa John's Pizza

What's your favorite drink? Rootbeer

What's your favorite fast food? Subway

What's your favorite holiday? Christmas and Halloween and Valentines Day (couldn't decide)

Are you afraid of anything? Bad dreams

If I gave you $100 right now, what you do with it? Buy a phone

Do you like your teacher at school, why? Yes, because she never gets mad at me

What's your favorite thing to do with Ashlyn? Play American Girl Dolls

What's your favorite thing to do with Brandon? Build hide outs

What's your favorite thing to do with Carter? Play chase

What's your favorite thing to do with Daddy? Read books and wrestle

What's your favorite thing to do with Mommy? Bake cookies

Tell me three words that describe you- I'm crazy, I like make up, and I LOVE playing with my friends

If you could do ANYTHING you wanted to, what would it be? Be a teenager

Here's some other fun facts about our little Leah Peah!

-She is the first child up every morning and almost always the first to bed at night.
-She loves to dance and cart wheel all over the house.
-She is the first one to jump up and help me with Carter when I need it.
-She loves to put outfits together and always wants to be in style and trendy.
-She eats NO vegetables. Absolutely NONE. Won't try any and will throw a fit if I try to make her.
-On that same note, she is VERY picky and won't eat even her favorite foods if she senses anything "different" about them.
-She wears her emotions on her sleeve. You know when she's happy and you know when she's upset. There is absolutely NO guessing.
-She loves school and loves learning and hates when there are days off.
-She has wanted a real laptop of her own since she was four (she's not getting one anytime soon.)
-She will clobber you with love and hugs and snuggles.
-She drives me crazy at some point just about every day(but maybe I shouldn't admit that. LOL)!

 But we love her TONS and our family wouldn't be the same without her!

Here's to a great year being 7.

Family

We don't get to see Steve and Skyler too often unfortunately, but Paul's parents sent us this picture from when they visited them at Christmas time. I thought it deserved to make the blog. And here's hoping we get to see them sometime THIS year! 

(hint, hint if you're reading this Steve)

Presidents Day

We definitely packed in all the fun we could into one day. We spent the day with the Osmond's and went out to Ventura. First stop was a playground shaped like a pirate ship by the ocean. Very cool. The kids ran around and played. We had lunch and a fun little game of kickball. Next up was bike riding. We rented those big family sized bikes and took off for an hour. Rode along the beach some and through the neighborhoods. It was great, although a little more help from the kids would have been nice. It was mostly me and Paul peddling while the kids enjoyed the ride. Nothing like hauling four kids on a big ole bike. It was still lots of fun. At least I liked it anyway. Paul might not have so much! haha...

After our bike ride, we drove over to another park where there was a stone pirate ship literally ON the beach with another play ground right off of the beach. The kids had a blast running back and forth, going on the zipline and climbing on rocks at the shore. 

At the end of the day we finally came to the BEST part of the trip. CAFE RIO! It was divine and I'm counting the days until we can make a trip out to Ventura again. 

The drive home was a bit long. We hit a couple of wrecks, but the kids were troopers and had fun playing in the back. By the time we got home, it was bath time and bed time. We were exhausted, but in the best possible way!

This picture is hilarious to me. Hyrum really had no chance.

Carter wasn't too into playing kickball so I played a little baseball with him. He's not bad for a two year old. It was a windy day though and he kept having us move because he said the wind was messing him up. Too funny!

Getting ready to head out!

Carter liked to ring the bell. A LOT!

Ashlyn was the only one tall enough to help peddle. She didn't though. Or maybe she tried, but we couldn't tell. 

A rare photo of all eight kids. Aren't they adorable!

Randomly ran into Elmo and Donald Duck. Not sure what they were doing, but the kids thought it was fun to see them.

 

Yummy Yumminess! I want more.

Even Leah's caught the spirit of Cafe Rio. Look at her protecting her food. 

I was impressed with the kids at the restaurant. We either sufficiently wore them out, or they just decided to behave. It was actually a nice restaurant outing. It helped that Cafe Rio wasn't too crowded, so there was room to move around.

Carter didn't want any food, but kept himself occupied with Paul's phone.

We sure love days off with Daddy!

Another one bites the dust

Yup....Ashlyn is sick. Poor girl. She's the one that started this whole mess of sickness in our house. She got a cold almost two weeks ago. It turned into a nasty sore throat and then a cough. In the meantime, Leah got a cough and stomach bug and then a viral rash all over her face. That's the time Carter went down, so my life was consumed with taking care of the little one. Carter's finally feeling better and Ashlyn started saying her ears were hurting her. It was even keeping her up at night. So yesterday morning, while she was laying on my bed, I asked her if she wanted to go to the doctor. She said yes, so that was my answer. I hauled all four kids (not a fun thing) to the doctor to have her ears checked before going into the long weekend. Paid off (in a weird sort of way) because we found out she has a double ear infection. I guess her cold/cough/sore throat made it's way to her ears and settled there. After a grueling fight with the pharmacy (man I'm grateful for them, but they can be SO DANG SLOW), we got Ashlyn her antibiotics just in time to head out to go boothing for Girl Scout cookies. I must admit I'm pretty much hating Girl Scouts right now. Cookie season is too much work! 

I will say though, that it's way easier to have a sick 9 year old than it is to have a sick 2 year old.

And the irony in all of this mess of sickness is......that the ONE child that hasn't gotten sick (knock on wood) is the one who INSISTS on wearing swim shorts, t-shirts and flip flops year round. Go figure!

One REALLY sick boy

Seems like all I've done lately is post about my poor sick little Carter. Well, for good reason I guess because he has been REALLY sick. It started on Friday. Got worse on Saturday and by Sunday it was just down right miserable for him (and me). His fever kept spiking. He had no appetite. He would only drink tiny sips of water and that was only after coughing and I could tell his poor little throat was just burning. He couldn't sleep for more than an hour at a time (even at night). And he basically spent three solid days on the couch laying around (mostly on top of me). 

Monday morning I called his doctors office as soon as they opened. I got an appointment for 11am and asked them if they thought I'd be done by 11:45 so I could pick up my son from preschool at 12. They said, yes. I took him in and they did their normal routine of asking me a ton of questions and checking him out. First his doctor thought it might be RSV. They tested him for that, strep and the flu. They all came back negative. They gave him a breathing treatment. It didn't do anything. His doctor listened to him again and said she wanted him to get a chest xray. She thought, based off of how his breathing pattern was and the fact that the breathing treatment didn't help, that he might have pneumonia. I scrambled to find someone to pick up the THREE kids I had for preschool carpool (thanks again Brooke. You were a lifesaver), and headed over to the imaging center in Valencia. The office was nice and they got him in pretty quickly, but the whole process still took over an hour. Most of which was spent waiting of course. The receptionist handed me his xrays and kind of motioned to me that she didn't think he had it, and sent me home telling me my doctor would call me soon.

So at first I thought it was all for nothing. About 20 minutes after I got home my doctor called me. She said her and one of the other doctors in the office both looked at his xrays and felt, while it wasn't severe yet, that he definitely had pneumonia and she was going to fax a prescription to my pharmacy. In the meantime, his fever spiked again and I gave him more tylenol. I got him his prescription (which he DEFINITELY does not like) and he fell asleep on the couch. A few more hours later, he got up and walked to the kitchen asking for something to eat. THAT was huge at that point and confirmed to me that the antibiotics were definitely necessary. He ate two jars of baby food (yes he STILL eats baby food) and went back to the couch. That night he slept the whole night. Only waking up once. Then the next day (yesterday) he started acting more and more like himself. Still not up at full speed, but wanting to play and allowing me to get up and do some things I needed to do. His fever has stayed down and he again slept through the night only waking up once. 

This morning I took him back to the doctor for a follow up. She said he's still pretty rattly, but she can tell it's starting to break up and that's a good sign. She gave him another breathing treatment, which didn't really help, but I requested it, so I think she was humoring me. LOL. I thanked her for listening to her gut instead of to the technician at the imaging center who told her he felt Carter was fine. I sure am grateful for good doctor's and I'm lucky my kids have one. 

I have another follow up next Wednesday when he's just about done with his prescription. Just to make sure he's all healed up. I guess pneumonia is nothing to mess around with. Even when it's not full blown.

This is one sad little guy. Oh, but doesn't he look so sweet. In a way, it was fun to just sit and snuggle with him so much....even if it meant, I got NOTHING done. Well, except I did read a 525 page book. Haha!

He was a brave boy getting his x-rays. That was a pretty intimidating room.

I don't know why this picture is side ways. It wasn't when I loaded it. Anyway, it's hard to tell, but if you look at the bottom of the left picture, you can see it's slightly more fussy. That's the pneumonia. 

All I can say, is THANK GOODNESS for modern medicine. I can't imagine not having the necessary antibiotics ready and available when needed. It was hard enough watching him be so sad. To think I couldn't do anything to help him, would be awful!

Sick boy

Carter's sick again. Leah was yesterday and this morning (she's actually acting better just recently). Ashlyn was sick on Thursday. So except for a brief (crazy) outing Friday morning, I've pretty much been in the house since Wednesday. When Ashlyn is sick she keeps to herself and lays around. When Leah is sick she cries and moans most of the day(poor girl doesn't handle pain well). And when Carter is sick he demands I sit with him nonstop. I feel so bad for my little guy. Last night was probably one of the worst nights sleeps he's had in a VERY long time and just now when I took his temp, it was almost 103. Here's hoping he gets over this little bug soon.

My poor sweet little boy. Doesn't he look so sad? So even if I am missing my friends baby shower and another dear friends oldest boys baptism(which i am VERY sad about) I'm glad I can be here for him. And snuggle with him. Even if my bum is sore from sitting in the same spot so long. And even if I now hate the show "My big, big friend". He's totally worth it.

Just Chugging along

Days move on quite quickly around here, as I'm sure they do for most people. 

Carter got sick a week ago. Pink eye. So sad. He was a trooper, but he caused us to miss our date to the temple. Hoping to get there soon. It's been a while.

So we had a date night in after the kids were in bed. I'm not too fancy, I know... but oh well. The food made up for it.

Ashlyn's girl scout activity got canceled last week and I had a sitter already arranged since it was my turn to volunteer. So I took advantage and took the girls out to Chilis. It was win/win since I had a coupon for buy one meal, get two kids meals free. 

Ashlyn started back up with her Ballet class she does through the city Park and Rec program. Leah started Jazz class with her good friend Ashlynn. These are two little sassy peas in a pod. They LOVE class though and I'm excited for them to have a little recital in June. Leah will eat it up.

Ashlyn finished reading the first Anne of Green Gables, so we watched the movie together. Such good memories. I think I was just as excited to see it as the girls were. I'm a lucky mom to have two little girls to do girly things with.

Leah had a school project where she had to create an office building for the "community" they were building. Daddy helped her since it was a "family project". So of course a little "Dunder Mifflin" had to show up on the building. Can't go without representing "The Office". One of Paul's favorite shows.

Carter's practicing his driving skills and doing pretty well. I love that we live on a pretty quiet street and can let the kids drive around out front (supervised of course, but still).

My wonderful friend Becky finished sewing my curtains for my windows as a Birthday gift and I've gotten half of them up so far. It's hard to find enough rods for all those little windows. I'm on the hunt. Just bought out Target's supply and need just 4 more rods. I love how they turned out and we are really hoping they will help with the heat in the summer.

Family night usually involves some airplane flying activity. Paul builds pretty awesome planes. I watched from the bottom and tried to avoid getting hit.

Well, off to change a dirty diaper and put my little one down for a nap before the girls get home from school. Just another regular day! But I'm grateful for them.

Oh and I finished the book "Divergent" by Veronica Roth in two days. Not sure how I did that except that I lost sleep to do it, have a pile of laundry to catch up on, and kind of ignored my family every chance I got. So I guess I know how I finished it. It was a REALLY good book (thanks to my cousin Brittany for the recommendation) and I'm excited to start the next one, "Insurgent". Just going to wait a week or two before getting sucked into another book.