Family campout

A couple weekends ago we went on a family campout up American Fork Canyon.  It was so beautiful up the canyon and I loved that it was cold in the morning.  My house isn't cool right now and I loved sleeping in the cold!

We had fun with all the neices and nephews until we built a campfire.  Then they all wanted to 'help', light matches, put wood on the fire and everything else.  My dad was sure that one of them was going to fall into the fire pit and I got to the point where I was going to help one of them fall in so that the others would learn to stay away from the fire. (I'm nice, aren't I?)

My dad taught us a new Indian saying (since he has some Indian blood he and one of his brothers has taught us 'Indian' lore). 

"White man built big fire, sit way back.  Indian build little fire, sit real close."

We had a true white man fire.  It was huge and warm and attracted all children within the campground!

Fireworks

Last night we did some fireworks at mom and dad's house with all the lettle neices and nephews. We gave the little kids sparklers to start off.  When I was a child when we had sparklers we spent time writing our names in the air and twirling in circles.  Last night, we had 5 little kids running around yelling 'stupify' and 'protego'!  We also heard lumos, avada kedavra and expecto patronum!  What fun they had pretending to be wizards.  I heard several refrences to Harry Potter while playing with fireworks.  I love that kids can take something like sparklers and pretend to be wizards!

Busy, busy, busy

Life has gotten busy and I guess the first thing to go was my blog.  I'll attempt to catch up to the present.  Dad had bought a new toy to play on - a Rzr and we have taken it out west twice to play with the grandkids.  I've gotten sunburned each time we went out - you'd think I'd learn the first time. And to my credit I mostly did.  This past Saturday when we went, I put sunscreen on my head and face (where I had gotten sunburned the first time), but neglected to do my arms.  Who would think that I would get a lobster red sunburn on my arms? Apparently not me! 

My 2nd niece turned 8 and got baptized a couple of weeks ago.  It's so fun to see her sweet personality shine through when it's her turn to shine in the spotlight.  She's the middle kid, and is really quiet, so she sometimes gets lost in the shuffle.

 

We had our auction for Friday's Kids Respite and had lots of fun.  I always forget how much work it is, until we get right in the middle of it and then I wonder what I am doing there!  It was a lot of fun and I actually won a couple of things.

 

The biggest change in my life came about 3 weeks ago when I was called as the Relief Society President.  It was not unexpected, but still nerve-wracking anyway.  Right now, I am trying to figure out exactly what needs to be taken care of and hoping that I'm not dropping anything. 

We get to watch my neices this weekend in their dance recital.  The 4 year old was doing her dance for us on Sunday and it was really fun to watch.  She's quite shy, so the recital should be interesting.  The other two are old pros at it now and have a lot of fun with it.  Let's hope the 1 year old boys enjoy sitting in the dark for a couple hours, or it's not going to be much fun for anyone.

Disneyland!

I just got back from a fun, quick trip to Disneyland with some of the family! My sister, brother-in-law and their 2 kids were going and they invited mom, me and our other sister to come join them. We had lots of fun! We started out by leaving late Wednesday night and drove through the night. Little nephew fell right asleep and stayed asleep most of the trip, little niece was good until she got sick and threw up a couple of times and lucky me, I was the one beside her in the back seat.

We rolled into town about 8 am and were able to get right into our hotel and took a little break/nap. Then it was off to Disneyland!  

Little niece wanted to meet Tangled (aka Rapunzel) so we got in line and saved her a spot.  She is usually incredibly shy but we were surprised to see her walk up to Tangled and Flynn and talk to them.  She also gave Tangled a hug when we were leaving.

We spent most of the day Thursday in Disneyland, on Friday we went back to Disney and spent quite a bit of time (and I saw my roommate who was there with her sister, brother-in-law and their children), then that afternoon we went to California's Adventure (which I had never been to) then back to Disney for the fireworks. Saturday we spent time in both parks and then that night started back home. With all the 'fun' we had on the way down, we decided to stop in Las Vegas for the night. Then we got up this morning and finished the ride home. About an hour from home, little nephew, feeling left out, threw up (and since I wasn't sitting by him he got it on my pillow for me!)

All-in-all, it was really fun and I would probably do it again (but I'd come a little more prepared for the fun of a road trip with children!)

Crafting can hurt

My mom, sister and I are making a fun Halloween craft. It's a wall hanging called Frank N. Stein. He's cute, but I don't think we are going to get him finished before Halloween. Today we were working on it and in the space of 5 minutes I had cut my finger on the rotary cutter and burned my thumb on the iron. I was then politely asked to leave the craft room.

The only bandaid mom had in the craft room was a My Little Pony one. So I was sporting that on my finger when my youngest neice came. She saw my bandaid and kept asking what happened. I think she was jealous of my cute bandaid!

Family time

We were going to have a family campout this last weekend, but other plans were to be had. My uncle passed away from cancer and his funeral was planned for Saturday which kind messed up the campout plan. We did get to have some fun anyway.

We went Thursday night and roasted marshmallows for smores in my sister's backyard. They have a little fire pit and we got to use it for the first time.

Then my sister and family ended up having to sleep in the tent because 3 the year old was so sad about not going camping that they tried to make it better by sleeping in the backyard. She thought it was so much fun!

Since we had all taken Friday off for the campout, we ended up taking all the neices and nephews to the pool Friday afternoon. We had a lot of fun and wore the children out! I got to take the 6 month old around the lazy river. He loved the water, until he got hungry/tired, then he didn't like it so much!

Movie night

Our outdoor movie night is quickly becoming our new family tradition. My 3-year-old neice was talking about watching a movie outside at nana's a couple of weeks ago, so dad arranged a movie night on Friday night with the option of a sleepover and breakfast the next morning. With a little storm front coming in, they decided not to do the sleepover outside but 5 of the grandkids spread their sleeping bags out on the family room floor in the basement once the movie was over. I didn't want to keep driving back and forth so I slept in the spare bedroom downstairs by the kids. They were really good once the last few got to sleep and we had a yummy breakfast the next morning. I love holiday weekends!

Vacation

My mom had a conference in San Diego for 5 days. She didn't want to go alone so she took my sister and me with her. We had more fun playing in San Diego than she did sitting in her classes but we did get some time to play together too.

We went to the USS Midway and got to walk around the HUGE aircraft carrier. They had so much to see. You saw where they slept and stuff like that, then on the top deck they had quite a few aircaft from different times. Even as big as it was, I'm not sure how long I would last on one.


We found a time that mom didn't have any classes she wanted to go to and we went to visit Sea World. I haven't been since High School and it was really fun. We went to a Sea Lion show, a Shamu show,a Dolphin show and walked through many different exhibits. Then when it got dark we went back to see another Shamu show and watched some fireworks. It was kind of a long day - but a really fun day!
The next day my sister and I went to the zoo. It was a cold day but still fun to see the animals. We got to see the Polar Bears and the Panda's among many other animals.


We also went to Little Italy (and had wonderful pizza) Old Town (and had great mexican food) and the Mormon Batallion site. We walked along the water and ate seafood at Seaport Village (well mom ate seafood!). Lots of fun was had but it was kind of nice to come back home too.

Overheard last night...

My sister-in-law had her baby last night, I have a new nephew! While at the hospital to see him I overheard the following conversations between sister-in-law and 3 year old nephew.

nephew: Bye Mom!
s-i-l: Bye.
nephew: I take baby home?
s-i-l: No, baby needs to stay here with me.
nephew: (crying) But I want to take baby home!

I found it funny he didn't care if mom came home, he just wanted his baby brother home. The next conversation was funny.

nephew: Mom, does him talk yet?
s-i-l: Nope, not yet.

I think my brother and sister-in-law will have their hands full with these two!

Computer help desk...

I went to Grandma's last night to fix her computer so she could do more indexing for the Church's genealogy program. I'd tried the first 2 solutions for the problem and the next was to uninstall and reinstall the program. All Grandma sees is her icon disappear. She FREAKED out. I told her I would get her icon back, but she didn't believe me until I had it back on the desktop and had the program running again. I tried to get her to leave the room and go fix her dinner so that I wouldn't scare her again, but she didn't want to leave me. Once I got it back and running she wanted to go get dinner at the local Mexican restaurant. Chips and Salsa, count me in! :)

She likes me...

Sunday we had a baby blessing for my sister's little boy. As I was pulling into the church parking lot, my brother pulled in behind me and proceded to park next to me. As I got out to greet his children I heard that 2nd neice wanted to sit by me in sacrament. I thought "yay, she likes me best of all my sisters!" (I've been brainwashing her for 6 years and I was hoping it was starting to stick.) What I then found out dashed all my hopes. She came up to me and said "If I sit by you can we play the dot game?"


I guess she told her mom that I ALWAYS play the dot game with her when she sits by me. If you count the one time, 6 months ago, at my grandfathers funeral as 'always' then I guess I have. And now we can add the baby blessing. I did sit by her and we did play the dot game. (And that sacrament meeting went by so fast! I'm so used to sitting by myself I don't know what to do with all the entertainment!)

Check eggs...

My youngest neice is allergic to eggs and we are constantly checking the food we give her to make sure there are no eggs in it. The other day her dad was telling us a story. She had wanted a candy and had gotten permission to get a piece from the candy bowl (I would say, short of the mayo in the fridge, there is nothing else in her house that has eggs in it). She picked her candy and brought it to her dad and said "Daddy, check eggs." I'm guessing she's heard a variation of that phrase several hundred times already and she's only 2 and a half.

Things I learned this weekend...

1 - When Grandma calls and leaves a message, call her back even if it's late when you get home. Because if you don't, she'll call at 8 am on a Saturday. (and yes, I was still asleep. I haven't been sleeping well this week and gave myself permission to sleep in.)

2 - When your roommate asks if you want to substitute on the organ for her on Sunday, the answer is no, always, always no.

3 - When the phone rings on Saturday at noon - and you don't recognize the number, don't answer it. It could be the 2nd counselor asking you to speak in church the next day (even though you spoke just 4 months ago).

These things make for a not so fun weekend. Hope yours was good!

Catching up

Wow, time sure has flown by lately...

I took the week of Thanksgiving off and decided to take my youngest niece to the Children's Museum at the Gateway. We had lots of fun, once she decided it was okay to play. We had lunch and went to Build-A-Bear to look around before going back home.

At Christmas, I had 2 weeks off. Before Christmas, I borrowed my niece again and we went to see “The Princess and the Frog”. We bought popcorn and she was so cute. We got to the theatre and sat down and she put her napkins in her lap and pointed to the bag of popcorn. She was really good through the movie and just kept asking for popcorn. I think she ate more than I did!

We had a really good Christmas and it was fun to have everyone together. As usual, Mom went a little crazy and spoiled us all.

The Monday after Christmas my sister went in and had her 2nd baby. So my youngest niece now has a little brother around the house. She wasn’t sure she liked him when we took her to the hospital and she was a little afraid of her mom in that big hospital bed, but she warmed up eventually. When I was holding him, I got her to come look at his little feet, but she wouldn’t get too close. With the new baby, I now have 3 nieces and 3 nephews and 1 nephew on the way.

New Year’s Eve I got to hold the little guy. His sister got a little mad telling us he was mommy’s baby. I’m sure there’s been a discussion about how she shouldn’t pick him up. She’s a little rough with her baby dolls and my sister was a little nervous about it.

It was a great end to the year!

Tattaling

A couple of weeks ago the whole family was at my parents house for Sunday dinner. My youngest sister was telling what she thought was a funny story about me, that wasn't that funny. I could hear her and went in there to ask her to knock it off. There were no neices or nephews in the room so I told her 'shut-up, it's not that funny'. All the sudden I hear this little 2-year-old voice from the stairs. "Mom, Amy said shut-up." It was in a 2-year-old whisper so I heard the whole thing, but what's funny is he was tattaling to my sister-in-law on me! I told him I was sorry and wouldn't say it again. It's not fun when you get in trouble because of the 2-year-old!

Movie night

Dad has wanted to do an outdoor movie all summer long and we finally got around to it this weekend. We hung a cloth from the rain gutters on the back of the house; set up the laptop, projector and speakers; and popped a couple baches of popcorn. We brought out most of mom's blankets and pillows and got all the kids (and the adults) snuggled in to watch Kung-Foo Panda. It was great fun and I can't wait until the next movie night! Once the movie was over, my youngest neice and I danced to Kung-Foo Fighting - we couldn't get anyone else to join us in our dancing.

Books!

This summer, Barnes and Noble did a summer reading program for kids 1st - 6th grade. If you read 8 books you could go pick a free book. I got some papers for the 3 oldest nephew and neices. They had finished reading their 8 books each and I took them to the bookstore to get their free book. We had a lot of fun picking out books for each of them (and buying one for their younger brother). When we were done at the bookstore I took them to get an ice cream cone. When we pulled into McD's, I asked who wanted ice cream. I heard this chorus of 'I do!', 'Me!' from the back seat. And then the youngest neice with me, age 6, says, "Aunt, you don't have to spend so much money on us." It was so stinkin cute! I told her since I hadn't spent anything on her yet because her book was free, I would buy her an ice cream cone. So we all went in and ate ice cream and talked and had fun!

Fun in the Sun

Yesterday my sisters and I took all the nieces and nephews to the swimming pool and played all afternoon. The youngest niece was being a little pill when she woke up and her mom had told at 8:30 that morning that if she was good, she could go to the pool. So she promptly put on her swimsuit and wore it all day while asking every 5 minutes if it was time yet. She and her mom were the first ones there! We had lunch in the park and then went to the pool. It was a great afternoon and I've got the sunburn to prove it!

Elephant rides

At our house the nieces and nephews love getting elephant rides. Two adults each grab a hand and a foot and the child gets to swing back and forth while singing the elephant ride song. The youngest niece especially gets excited for them. On Sunday she kept asking for 'a ride, a ride!' so my sister and I gave her a ride. After each ride, she always asks for more, more. So we do it until we get tired and then I tell her '1 more time' while holding up 1 finger and she gets excited because she knows she gets another ride.

On Sunday, instead of asking for more she held up her pointer fingers on both hands and said '1 more time!'. I'm not sure she knows that it means only 1 more, because we let her talk us into 2 more but it was really cute that she learned '1 more time'.

Weekend fun...

I had an amazing weekend full of fun. My mom, aunt, two sisters and I went to sunny San Francisco. Since we couldn't get tickets to Wicked when it came to Utah, we decided to go watch it in San Francisco. My office has an apartment there and we got to stay there for free. It was beautiful and had an amazing view of the Bay Bridge. (the photo was taken looking out the bedroom window)

The play was great and it was fun to go with my sister who hadn't seen it. (all the rest of us had) She was funny about it. I don't remember being that amazed by it, but is sure was good.

We walked along the wharf, saw Alcatraz (far off in the distance), saw the Golden Gate bridge (again, far off) and went to Ghirardelli square and bought chocolate (would you expect any different from 5 girls?).

I did get some blisters on my feet from all the walking but it was so much fun! I'd go back in a second and do it all over again!