Happy Birthdays!

It is Birthday time again for tons of family members.

Today is my baby sister Kristy's Birthday. Happy Birthday! I hope you get a chance to celebrate in between taking care of your three children under 2. Here is one of my very favorite pictures of Kristy when she was about 3 years old. Some people have a hard time believing that her hair was once this blonde considering it is now about as dark as mine. I love you and I am so glad you are my sister!

Happy 5th Birthday to Luke on August 1st! I am excited to give you a birthday hug at your brother's baptism Saturday. Luke gives great hugs!
Happy Birthday to Dani (She is Eli's younger sister-bottom center) on Aug. 2nd! Dani is almost 2 in this picture. We miss you and hope you have a great birthday!
Happy Birthday to my husband Eli (just above Dani) on August 5th! He is almost 4 in this picture). We are going to Park City to Celebrate both his birthday and our anniversary (8/28). I'll write more about that later. Thanks to Eli's sister Candi for watching our kids! I tried to plan another surprise for Eli's birthday and he ruined it again. Oh well, I'll have to keep trying.

Happy Birthday to my mom and her identical twin Mickie on Aug. 4th! I love this picture of them together. I can't even tell which on is my mom, but I am guessing since she was born six minutes earlier and is considered the oldest twin she is probably the one in front.
Happy 5th Birthday to my niece Jennie on Aug. 7th! I can't believe she is going to be starting kindergarten at the end of the month! Kate reminds me everyday that she is glad you're not moving like Brookie did.
Happy Birthday to Tom (Dani's husband) our second favorite red head on August 7th too!
We finally get a break from birthdays until Kelly's (Candi's husband) on the 23rd! I have a great picture I could post on his birthday as well that has become a recent family favorite, but I don't know if I can bring myself to do it.

Happy Birthday Kelly 8/23, Tom 8/7 and Eli 8/5!

In addition to the birthdays we also have Eli's brother's graduation, a family reunion, and our anniversary to celebrate. We have quite a busy eventful month ahead of us. I just wanted to take a moment and blog about all the birthdays so no one got missed in all the activity.

Creative Kate

Kate is quite creative with her play and she has a great imagination. This first picture is a recycling center she made to recycle broken wipes containers. It is basically a scarf her aunt Emma made plus a few pieces of metallic confetti placed in the center of the circle.

Here Kate made a sand castle at the park. It is basically just a few sticks in the sand, but she liked it.

I thought as part of this entry I would include some more Kateisms:

The other night we had some bow tie pasta with asparagus and Kate called it butterfly pasta with spar-a-kisses.

I told her one time that because she was only three she could not go outside by herself. She then asked me how old I was and I told her 33 and she said, "I guess you can't go outside by yourself either mom."

I was putting sun screen on her arm and she started telling me how she has little fur and then she said "daddy has lots of big fur".

She calls Quesadillas "case of dias", Lagoon is "Da-goon", and Biloculars are "minoculators".

Today she was jumping up and down and she told me she was jumping on her "Go-Go stick".

I hope she doesn't ever lose her creativity and imagination. She is quite the perfectionist already, so I hope that doesn't stand in the way of her self-expression. Some times if she can do it perfect on the first try she gets so frustrated she gives up or wants you to do it for her. I keep trying to encourage her to practice and that it is okay not to get it right the very first time. I hate to see her so hard on herself and to be so much like her mom.

A Blessed Life!

Lately I have been thinking about what a blessed life I have. I was thinking about my younger years and looking forward to my life ahead and I never imagined it would be this good. There are definitely things I could change like managing my time better, being in better shape etc. However, I have two children I adore and a husband who works very hard to provide for his family (especially lately since he has had to work late every night and even pulled an all nighter). I am so proud of him and I love learning more and more each day how talented and bright he is.

I think part of what sparked these thoughts was the lessons in church. This past Sunday we discussed the trials of the people of Ammon or Anti-Nephi-Lehi's. They would rather die than forsake their covenants. They were persecuted greatly because of their belief and devotion to Christ, but they were preserved by the power of God. In Relief Society we discussed hope and consolation during death. I was humbled to hear that the Prophet Joseph Smith endured the deaths of two brothers at age 25, one brother as a infant, six of his eleven children, his father and eventually suffered death by martyrdom at the young age of 38 with his brother Hyrum. I also thought of Lucy Mack Smith and Emma Smith who endured great loss and hardship. How blessed we are to know that this life is not the end and that our families will be together forever when we follow Heavenly Father's plan.

Today is also Pioneer Day and I am so grateful for the pioneers who helped this desert blossom as a rose so that I could live in peace and safety in a place free of religous persecution. What a beatiful place we live in and I am so grateful for the legacy of faith they left behind. I am also grateful for modern day pioneers who are willing to endure any hardship because of their devotion and faith in Christ.

Another reason I have been reminded of my blessings was in reaquainting with some high school friends and sharing blog address I learned of some of Shannon's experiences with children in Haiti. I don't know how widespread these problems are since I have never been there myself but some of the children were (hopefully aren't currently) living in a ditch suffering from Malaria and hunger and not being able to have access to education without the charity she set up to help provide them with education. For some of them it seemed like this was the only positive thing going in their lives.

These experiences were all very humbling to me and made me realize how blessed we are. We take so much for granted like have a safe place to live or having plenty of nutritious food to eat only 10 feet away or being free from illness and so on. I am so blessed to have the gospel, a family that I love tremendously, a place to live where I feel safe and comfortable, good health care and medicines, and friends and neighbors who accept me how I am and inspire me to be better. I honor our pioneer heritage and I realize that they are part of what allows me to enjoy such a blessed life.

I am also very grateful for friends and neighbors who are struggling with great trials and are willing to submit to all that the Lord has in store for them as he refines us or purifies us and prepare us to be like Him. As the Lord said in D & C 136 31 "My people must be tried in all things, that they may be prepared to recieve the glory that I have in store for them. . . and he that will not bear chastisement is not worthy of my kingdom." They are great examples to me and I hope when my it is my turn to deal with hardships I will be as strong and devoted as they have been and prove myself worthy for His kingdom.

Terrible Twos: Salty Kisses

Beck will be 18 months old at the end of next month (the 28th), however he is already starting into the "terrible twos". It is hard to keep him occupied especially when I am trying to cook dinner. Usually I let him play in my cupboards while I am cooking and his favorite place is the spice cupboard. That was also Kate's favorite place to play when she was his age.

Mostly he just likes to grab the different plastic bottles and throw them across the room. Well, this past week he got a hold of an open box of baking soda which I forgot was right in his reach. I didn't notice until Kate came to tell me about the mess Beck made in her tent. He had dumped the entire box of baking soda all over himself, the carpet and all over the floor of the tent. Luckily it was an easy clean up. I just took the tent outside and shook it out and the baking soda helps deodorize the carpet anyway. I picked Beck up to clean him up and gave him a little kiss on the cheek. Boy was it a salty kiss.

I am sure that there will be many more terrible two incidents to come. Hopefully I learn a little with each child. Like after putting Kate in the grocery cart with the eggs and she started cracking them in the cart and then jumping on top of a box of cereal. I think I learned my lesson not to put kids in the cart with the groceries-at least not during the terrible twos. Kate loved to get into the diapers and wipes. Since I was not blogging when she went through this phase I thought I should include these pictures.
Kate wore herself out making a mess of the diapers and fell asleep on her teddy. How can you get mad when they are so darn cute. How can you get mad when it is creative and funny like when Kate dumped formula all over her baby's face. I couldn't get mad because I had told her to feed her baby and that is how she saw me feed Beck sometimes.
I thought it was cute in this pictures how he is showing me his work.

I just can't get upset with this sweet face. It is a good thing they are so cute when they are making so much trouble.

What a cute little sly grin he has.

I love this last picture because you can see the little hand that caused such destruction. I wonder what this little hand is going to do next.

Water Babies

Kate is much more daring than her brother especially when it comes to water. She loves to swim, slip-n-slide, bathe, shower, "pway" in the rain, run through the sprinklers, and she even loves the waves at the surf-n-swim. She will stay in the pool even if she is freezing especially if her cousin Kiaya is hanging out in the pool with her.

However, Beck hates the water. He cries in the shower and will grip the sides of the bath tub with his hands and feet in terror. He did slip under the water one time several months ago and just does't seem to be able to get over it. At the surf-n-swim the only way I could get him to stay in the shallowest part was to point out all the little babies enjoying themselves in the water.

It was pretty hot on the day of the slip-n-slide and Beck finally resorted to getting his hand wet and then rubbing it through his hair. That is really the most he was willing to do.

I even tried to get him in the pool at grandpa's, but he cried the whole time even if I was holding him. Eli has better luck with him in the pool. He must just feel safer with Daddy there to hold him. I really hope he will grow out of this fear of water and that it is just a phase.

Maybe he will learn by watching his sister and cousins having so much fun in the water.

Bella loved the pool once she realized she could wear kittie Kat floaties.

Claire wasn't so sure at first, or maybe she was just worried about getting such a cute outfit wet. Eventually she decided it was worth it :)
Elle is the definition of water baby. I think she'd stay in the water all day if she could. She doesn't even mind if the spinkler for the slip-n-slide is spraying her directly in the face. Nate was a good sport to help out with the babies.


Sam and Liz live in Arizona and have their own pool (you'd have to living in Arizona). I am sure they spend plenty of time in the water as well.

Julian is just content hanging out with Aunt Kassie in the shade as long as he has his bottle.

Cherish every moment

This weekend we celebrated Eli's grandparents 60th wedding anniversary with a big family party. We were in charge of making a carrot cake for the celebration and Kate was very excited to help me. She kept saying over and over "I'm a good maker momma".



She loved wearing my apron, cracking eggs, pouring ingredients and especially licking the beaters. It turned out pretty well, but I have to give the credit to my grandma Anna Hart since it is her recipe.



A lot of the family wanted to have the recipe for the carrot cake so here it is.....

2 cups flour 2 t baking soda
1 t salt
2 t cinnamon
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 cup oil
2 cups grated carrots
1 can crushed pineapple (drained)
1 cup nuts (optional)
Bake at 350 for 45 minutes

Frosting:
1 pkg cream cheese
1 cube butter
2 cups powdered sugar
1 t vanilla

I did two batches of cake and two batches of frosting for this triple layer cake.
It is delicious and a very simple recipe that is hard to mess up. Enjoy!


I forgot to bring my camera to the party, but here are some pictures of Eli's grandparents when they visited us when Beck was born. They use to live in ST. George and recently moved to South Ogden. It is nice having them so much closer. We are grateful for their love and support. What an accomplishment to be married for 60 years. Eli kept joking that we are only a 10th of the way there. Since I didn't get married until I was 27 I will be 87 years old at my 60th anniversary if I am still around for it. It was nice visiting with Eli's aunts, uncles, and cousins that we don't see very often. He has a great family and it all started with these two people or as the quote goes "all because two people fell in love".
His grandparents mentioned that it went by so fast and I can believe that since time seems to pick up faster and faster each year. I was just mentioning the other day that it seems like yesterday was memorial day and now it is already the middle of July. I visited with my dad the other day and he was saying that he feels a bit meloncholy because his children grew up so fast and he misses having his children young and always around. It made me appreciate the fact that I get to stay home with my children and try to make the most of every moment. How sad it would be to lose those precious moments with my children while they are small with me working and them in day care. You only get one chance to enjoy them while they are young and I am so glad I won't have any regrets about not spending enough time with them because of other obligations. I hope I never forget how time flies and that I will always try to cherish every moment.

Celebrating the 4th of July

I have mixed feelings about the 4th of July this year. I am usually super patriotic and I start celebrating memorial day and I don't stop until the July is over. This year it seems I have been too busy or maybe just distracted to really get into the true sentiment of the holiday. I usually read some favorite patriotic quotes, stories, etc. to sensitize my spirit or reawaken my loyalty, gratitude and love of the country and the blessings God has bestowed upon us. I usually feel that I have the opportunity to remember those devoted ancesters, pioneers, and veterans who came before and sacrificed so much for all that we enjoy today. This year I feel sort of numb and distant from those usual patriotic and spiritual feelings.

I think part of the problem is physical as well as emotional or spiritual. The week before the 4th of July Kate got pretty sick. I took me a few hours to catch on because she is such an easy going little girl. she didn't complain much eventhough her throat looked like it was almost swollen shut and was covered with white pus. Once I looked into her mouth after my prodding her if she hurt anywhere because she was acting unusually tired and kind of out of it she finally admitted her neck hurt. I thought for sure it would be strep with her throat the way it looked plus a fever of 103, but it was negative. The next day she was fine like nothing had ever happended. However the rest of us got sick just in time for the 4th of July. Not only was I sick, but I was also very hormonal. I managed okay with the cold, but Eli was really sick and didn't join me to hang out with family on the 3rd when we let the cousins play with the slip-n-slide together and then had dinner at a park nearby and then watched the West Point fireworks from my in-laws drive way. I was pretty tired from fighting off a cold, and trying to get the kids to eat and chasing Beck at the park was frustrating, but I knew the kids were enjoying it so that makes it worth it. However, the hormones made it difficult not to want to feel sorry for myself or take everything out on my husband. Being hormonal made me want to punish him for being sick at the same time as me instead of being compassionate and understanding. Don't you love those irrational thoughts and behaviors. "how dare you be sick at the same time as me" or "How dare you sleep when you are sick". In situations like these, I am always hoping that people realize we were not our usual selves and we are not always that ornery with each other.

On the fourth we went back to West Point for the parade we were late because they started earlier this year, but it was fun to watch Beck as he enjoyed his first parade (last year he was too small to really know what was going on). I was glad it was a little over cast to keep it a bit cooler. Then in the afternoon Aunt Emma watched the kids while we helped Dani and Tom (Eli's sister) move a few final items from their house. We had a BBQ at Eli's parents house then Aunt Emma bought some kiddie pools for all the kids. Emma was sick too, so she was a great sport to come help out so much with the kids. This was the hardest part for me because the exhaustion of being sick and still doing so much set in and I turned into a lazy oaf. I just dozed off in the camp chair for a while while Kate played in the kiddie pool and Daddy was napping with Beck inside. I didn't even have energy to get out of the chair to join in the water balloon fight with the nieces and nephews. All I had energy to do was tie balloons once they were filled (I stilll got plenty wet when a few of them burst in my lap). Kate loved the water balloons and she got quite attached to her balloon. I had to babysit it for half the afternoon.

Emma was letting the kids feed her dog some treats. Beck was very interested so she gave him one and the dog took it from him. Beck was very upset that the dog stole HIS snack. It was pretty funny.

We went out for chinese food for dinner then we decided we were all too exhausted to wait until dark to light fireworks. Dani and Tom needed to leave for Denver at like 6am and Jed had to work early as well. We decided to call it a night and then we had to say our final goodbyes to Dani and Tom. That was hard! We will really miss them.

Eli and I went home and put the kids to bed and watched Juno. I don't know if that was such a good idea in my condition. I cried again! Saturday we spent the whole day cleaning which needed to be done with all the neglect from being sick and gone with family celebrating. I don't know if it was the hormones, being sick, saying goodbye to Dani and Tom, all the crap I ate or the lack of the usual patriotism that left me feeling kind of empty after the holiday? I guess there is still more of July and pioneer day to try to get some of the meaning back into the month of July.

Here are a few words to a patriotic song I like that usually express my feelings during the month of July ". . . I'm proud to be an American where at least I know I'm free and I won't forget the men who died who gave that right to me. I'll gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today. 'cause there aint no doubt I love this land. God Bless the U.S.A. In addition, here is a simple yet profound scripture about liberty ". . . where the spirit of the Lord is, there is Liberty" 2 chorinthians 3:17. I hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July celebration. I am grateful for the beauty of this nation, the freedoms we have, and especially for our forebears who sacrificed so much for these priveledges and blessings we enjoy today.