Hey, Remember Us?

Holy Moly, life has been crazy. 

I am not sure what else to say.

Life has just been absolutely crazy.

I feel like I just bounce from one thing to the next without even having a chance to look up or catch my breath. Whew!

My grandma passed away Aug. 7th. It was hard to say goodbye but she is in a much better place now. She was 93 years old and was sick with cancer and was ready to go.

School started. Wow. Kind of a shock to our system this year. We are all having a hard time adjusting to the homework and the schedule but it is gradually getting better. 

It didn't help that we got a bad flu bug the first week of school. I had it the worst. I am not going to lie, it was horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible. It got all 6 of us but the boys, BY FAR, had it the best. They didn't throw up at all (well, T did have one tiny incident, but that was all). Me and the girls were sick a lot. Did I mention it was horrible?

Soccer started. Kayla and Evan both signed up again this year so we had practice on Monday (Kayla), Tuesday (Evan), Wednesday (Kayla) and Friday (Evan). Then some friends of ours called and they were short a few players on their team and asked if Hailey wanted to join. She said yes and guess when their practices were - Monday's and Thursdays. So now we have practice every. single. night. of. the. week. How dinner and homework are suppose to get done, I have no idea.

So, soccer, school and the flu all hit us at the same time. No wonder we are going nuts. Crazy. Just crazy.

Anyways, here's what's been going on around here the last month or so. And these are totally out of order but I didn't have the time, or the energy, to put them in the right order. Sorry.

Mid July - Trevor got a marker out of the cabinet and marked on the cupboard door. I asked him to go get a wipe and clean it up. He promptly obeyed . . . by licking it clean - but notice, he does have the wipe!

Good times with big sissies!

End of July - This wasn't so fun. Somehow that little boy threw a glass stone thing at the fireplace hard enough with his LEFT hand to break the glass. We lived for several weeks with the glass missing but it is all fixed now thanks to my handy hubby.

Beginning of August - One of the activities Kurt did with the young men from our ward was to build cardboard boats. They had so much fun that he decided to build them with our kids too.

Kurt found all these HUGE boxes and brought them home and they lived in our family room for a few weeks until he actually had time to build the boats. They were castles, forts, houses, schools and hours and hours of entertainment for the kids. They just weren't the best decorating items we have ever had.

And of course, I don't have the finished product pictures because those are on Kurt's phone. Maybe one day I will get those and get them on here. We took them to the lake and the kids set sail. The kids had a BLAST and the boats actually worked. It was a lot of fun!

Late July - Trevor discovered the joy of playing dress up.

Now we frequently have a lion or spider man running around here. (Luckily all the girls princess dress ups were passed down long ago or he may have suffered the same fate as Evan. . .)

Last week - T got a hair cut. Oh how it hurts me to cut off the curls! But his hair was getting to be clown crazy all the time so it was time for a trim.

He is adorable now too but I miss the curls.

August 13 - I have been a bad, bad mommy in regards to birthday parties. Just don't get them organized and pulled off lately. Kayla wanted to have a get together for her friends before school started and so we decided to have a pool party at Papa's house. Hailey invited a few friends and Kayla invited a few friends and a party broke out!

I let the girls pick their decorations. They did a good job!

Hailey and her friends.

Kayla and her friends.

August 8 - 11 We went to San Diego for a White family reunion. Long drive. Long, long, long drive. It took us 13 hours to get down there thanks to hitting LA at 3:30ish in the afternoon. Driving all day + hitting traffic at the end of the trip = long trip. But we made it and had a great time.

Friday we went to the San Diego Zoo. Beautiful! These . . . uh, gorillas? or monkey things (ya, not coming up with the right word so on we go) were right at the glass. It was pretty cool to see them so close.

Ah! Orangutans! That's what they were! I knew it would come to me!

This bear was really active. That was fun to see!

He was walking all around and sniffing the air and pacing back and forth.

He even got up on this tree limb that stuck up in the air and that was really cool. To bad I wasn't fast enough with the camera!

The kiddo's riding a lion. Hailey is still at that age where she bounces back and forth between being one of the kids and being too mature for things. Apparently she isn't too mature for jumping on the back of a lion with all the kids!

And here is Margo. She got to ride this super cool scooter around and Hailey and Evan just would not stay off of it. Margo was such a trooper! Margo's family had just moved into their new house the previous week, she had surgery on her foot and here she was hosting a family reunion and cruising all over the zoo. 

Trevor learned to trust his floaties while in San Diego. Since he broke his arm this summer, he hasn't had much water time and despite the fact that he is a total dare devil, pools are the one place he is scared and he does not want to leave the step. Kayla and him ended up being the only ones in the pool one afternoon and she got him to trust her to leave the step and eventually for her to let go of him. 

Now? He is a total maniac in the pool and swims all over. Guess he conquered that fear.

July 24 - Ah, yes. So when T broke his arm and I took him to his primary, the dr. said 4-6 weeks with a cast. When I took him to get the cast, that dr. said 3 weeks. I questioned the difference in durations and the cast dr. said "ok, we'll do 4 weeks." Urgh! I was just asking and if 3 would do it, lets do 3 but he scheduled the removal date for 4 weeks out.

Well at 3 weeks exactly I thought he was getting a sore under the cast and wanted the dr. to look at it. I took him in and since he was at the 3 week mark they x-rayed him and deemed him healed enough to take the cast off! YES! I was so happy. Casts are no fun and it was really cramping our summer plans so I was beyond thrilled to get that stinkin' (literally) cast off.

He did so good and laid so still!

Man as soon as that cast was off his arm went straight and he just laid there with his arm straight in the air for a long time. It was so funny. It was like he was shocked that it could straighten. It had to have felt sooooooo good!

And boy was he one happy boy when he got home. The dr. said it usually takes a few days for them to adjust back to being able to use their arm again. Nope, not T. He was right back on his bike.

And we even let him do the dishes that night. Finally he got to play in water again.

Life is good!

So that is a little snippet of what's been going on around here. Next Saturday (the 7th) soccer games start. 3 kids with 3 different soccer games at 3 different locations but usually all at about the exact same time. Uh, funny how that works. Looks like our Saturday's are going to be just as crazy as the rest of the week. I guess we better get ready to HANG ON!