Hall Gracie is 13 months!

Watch out!  I did 3 posts in one.  My sister Anna’s favorite, who by the way has her John home right now for R&R!  And this is for my mom because even though I see her at least once a week, she still reads my blog.  Oh, and it’s for Emma who needs to just start a new blog even if her computer is slow and she can’t log in!  And it’s for Amber, Kim, Rachael, Sarah and Becca who need to post! Dedicated to Jenna who has been on the ball.  Blog on siblings and friends!

Anyways, let’s just say that I think that the littlest one in our house is dang cute.  She has these adorable dark curls, long eyelashes and quite the personality.  Did I say curls?!!  I love them!  She talks constantly and makes the funniest faces.  At church the ladies go gaga over her cuteness.  She will say, “oooh, oooh, shh dada!”  very enthusiastically when she sees anything new.  She especially loves makeup bags and all the treasures they contain.  So, I decided to take some pictures of her cute faces she makes.  There are a lot of pictures, but the cuteness deserves the space. 

The first picture is of her binky/blanky.  She has chosen.  The pink cupcake blanket from cousin Savannah won.  She squeals with excitement when it is bed time and I hand it to her.  The binky is just a plus.  She only gets her bink at bed and at church.  We cant let her walk around with it because the dog chews them up. As soon as Halle gets up we all say, where is the binky?  We have to find it before the dog does.  We budget in about $6 a month for them. Ahhhh!  But it is good because she only takes it at night or nap.

She loves to point at things and talk gibberish.  At 13 months old she can say, Dada, mama, Lana, nigh night(wants her bed or blanky), num num(hungry), guys (she says this when we say bye guys), bye,  puppa (puppy), bubu (ammon, brother), ohhh.

Love you Halle Grace.

Talented Kids

I have talented kids.  They are always drawing, cutting, creating or making up really cool games.  We have a rule at our house that if you say you are bored, you get to scrub walls or do a chore.  My kids aren’t the kind of kids that latch onto me all day, wondering what I’m doing.  They entertain themselves ALL the time.  I have to drag them out of the house to go places or do things.  I just stopped going places because, well first of all as my mom always has told me, “when you have 4 you go no more.”  Which is sooo true.  I used to go to the library, the gym, the store to wander, to kid plays or concerts, etc.  I hardly ever do any of these things anymore.  When I look back into my childhood I really didn’t go anywhere either.  Being #6 of 7 children, I now understand why.  But I’m not sad about it.  The kids are busy with music, sports and school stuff but truly we have simplified a lot.  I believe that kids NEED to play.  Kids don’t want to be rushed or hurried.  It stresses them.  They want to be home and they want to play, learn and create.  I truly enjoy my time at home with these sweet babies.  I have also been very busy with a business we are starting so I’m glad my kids are able to entertain themselves!  

Alana and Ammon made a bird house the other day out of paper.  Then they made a whole bunch of birds to go inside.  It was seriously cute.  They played with it for hours and even made a special bird for Mac to play with.

 A few days later they made hats, armor and weapons out of cardboard. 

 Of course Alana was the horse.

 He is just too cute

Ammon is just and Marrick spend more than half of their play time together building Legos.  They truly build some of the coolest things!  Ammon has an eye for creating things and making them take shape.  He is good at animals, flying machines and vehicles.  Marrick is starting to get really good too.

 I love that we kept Ammon home another year.  It has really made these two boys love and fight more.  They are better buds because of it and Ammon is too smart for his own good in Kindergarten!

 cool pyramid

 cool jet with guns

Create on, I love it little ones!

January madness

January seems to be the month where I don’t blog.  It could be the stinkin’ cold weather, back to school and life after the holidays or the fact that there are just random shots from random occurrences in January.  One of my favorite things in the whole world is the sound of Daddy playing with the kids.  I usually clean up dinner while daddy entertains for awhile.  I do dishes and laugh as the kids and dad run circles around the house, wrestle, play catch or have a pillow fight.  In the summer it usually ends up being on the trampoline.  I used to be annoyed with the noise and mess that it all created and now I couldn’t imagine anything better for the kids then to PLAY with an amazing daddy like we have!  This is from one evening after dinner.  Aaron tries to buck the kids off in this game.

This picture make me laugh.  We love something called: Pizza-dillas.  It’s a tortilla with red sauce and shredded mozzarella cheese on top, broiled and then cut into slices like a pizza.  The kids were waiting for their yummy lunch one day, fighting over who got to see the pizzadillas cooking.  And yes, Marrick rarely is wearing a shirt. 

 My sweet Ammon with one tooth missing!

 Halle Gracie girl

 I LOVE 11am church!  We never seemed to have it all together on Sunday morning by 9.  Now everyone is up, dressed, fed and have time to enjoy a Sunday morning.  I love this picture of Alana coloring before church.  She is too cute and getting too big!  I am very happy to update that our very wonderful little sunbeam, after much prayer, bribery and consistency, is now attending Sunbeams with minimal problems.  Whew.  This means that at least he goes without screaming!

 After church Halle decided she wanted to wear my necklace.  She was so funny flaunting it, pointing at it and walking around so proud of her necklace.  She was quite mad when I took it off her!  Even though she plays with trucks, she is quite the little princess!

 And quite the little chocolate fan.  At Christmas we had an M&M explosion and Halle was at the rescue.  Since her taste of good ol' chocolate, she can't get enough.  Someone left a piece of cake too close to the edge of the table.  There was a trail of crumbs leading to this sweet girl.

 Ahhhh! time to move the cereal boxes!  I promise I feed my kids!

 I love this picture.  It speaks for itself :)

 I can't believe that this sweet girl will be 9 in less than a week.  She is so grown up!  I couldn't be happier.  I love being these little rascal's mom.