Baby Duck Eggs

About two weeks ago, I was feeding Kendall while the kids were out back playing.  I heard the loudest duck quacking, and rushed out back to see what was going on.  Sure enough there was a duck in our backyard and the kids quickly scared it by running up to it and it flew away.  The next morning, the same thing happened.  Both mornings it had been around this one bush we have, so I checked around and saw a baby duck egg!  Once I knew what was going on, we figured we better leave the mama duck alone.  She didn't come back for a day, but now she sits on her eggs everyday.  This morning, we fed her some bread and checked out her nest (that she usually covers very well when she's gone) and we saw at least 5 baby duck eggs.  We're thrilled!  And Nana is also anxious to see pictures and I know it's driving her nuts that she can't come check them out.  Sorry Nana, we'll take more pics and video once they hatch!!  p.s.  What are we going to do once they hatch?!

You can only see three here, but I counted five so far!

And here's some pictures of Andrew & Rachel I took yesterday.  I couldn't resist and gave Andrew a buzz haircut yesterday - I just love him with super short hair!  FYI - I totally botched his last boy haircut that I did myself - so much so that Brandon had to fix it and cut it really short.  I know a buzz is a summer haircut, but it's 85 degrees here already and I can't mess up a buzz too badly!

Most kissable cheeks ever!  Especially when they are actually clean.  Which reminds me that this boy has the dirtiest hands all the time, and I'm always washing them.  And his favorite thing to do is to come touch and kiss my face because he knows it drives me crazy, and I say, "NO!  Go wash your hands, they're so dirty, don't touch my face!" and he showers me with kisses and then puts his hands all over while saying, "Nice nose, mom.  Nice eyes, mom.  Nice mouth, mom!"

Static!

Visitors!

Rachel with Max & Luke at Jump Street

February always brings wonderful visitors to sunny Arizona!!

Grandma & Grandpy came to visit mid-February for the three day weekend.  It was a quick and fun weekend, and Rachel cried and cried when we dropped them off at the airport.  It BROKE my heart, so I pulled over the car, and went in the back to give her loves.  She was just so sad to see them go, and it's hard to explain to her why we so many people we love live in Utah.  I had her call Brandon so that he could see what we were dealing with.  After a good cry, she was just fine and is looking forward to our visit to Utah in May for Kyle's wedding and seeing Cade off on his mission.

A funny Rachel quote from the weekend - Grandpy came out wearing a bright green and black shirt (pictured above), and Rachel immediately said, "Grandpy, WOW!  I like your shirt."  Then she came over to me and whispered, "Mom, I think Grandpy looks like a hot air balloon in that shirt."  Maybe you had to be there, but we all thought it was hilarious!

One day, we headed to Jump Street and ran into some friends from preschool, Max & Luke (twins).  Of course Grandpy thought his parents looked familiar, so after talking to them for a minute, he remembered them from his BYU athletic days.  Apparently, the boys' dad played quarterback at BYU (and just happens to be Steve Young's brother) and she was a cheerleader.  Rachel was impressed since she dreams of one day being a BYU cheerleader!   The mom told me that Luke had a big crush on Rachel, which was news to me since Rachel never talked much about the boys before this Jump Street meeting.

Then just a week or so later, Nana came to visit us!  While she was here, we took her to the Natural History Museum, and an old mining ghost town in Goldfield.  

The biggest news of that week was that Nana GOT ANDREW TO WEAR A SHORT SLEEVE SHIRT AND SHORTS!  Huge news!  We tried all sorts of bribes, but nothing interested Andrew until he finally asked for a train ride.  Yes, Andrew, you can have whatever you want if you'll wear shorts!  So we knew of a train ride in Goldfield, and took him that very day.  We have pictures of him to prove it!  And he hasn't had a problem wearing them ever since.  Phew, that was a long 5 month phase - good thing it happened at the right time of the year!

I also asked my mom to babysit while I went to the dentist to get two crowns.  She looked a little exhausted when I got home.  Between a blowout poopy diaper from Andrew, Kendall not taking her bottle (grrr!), Rachel needing bandaids in the medecine box which was later found out back with the two big kids eating cough drops, and a walk run around the block - I had to remind her that she once did this, and her response was that she didn't have 2 & 3 so close together.  Hopefully my mom's not embarrassed - we had a good laugh about all the disasters that occurred in such a small amount of time that I left her home with them.  They may look sweet, but taking care of them is no easy task.  :)

Nana introduced Kendall to the outside swing, and she loved it.

Natural History Museum in downtown Mesa

Train ride in Goldfield, AZ and Andrew in shorts and a t-shirt!!  Wahoo, Bubba!

Goldfield Ghost Town

Seriously impossible to get a descent picture of the three of them together.  :)

Dates with Dad - then & now

Rachel is dad's baseball buddy, and as I was going through his phone photos, I found some old pictures of them on their daddy-daughter dates at baseball games.  Rachel's favorite part of baseball is the ice cream they always get.  A girl after my own heart.

A few weeks ago, she filled up a sticker chart for cleaning her room and her reward was a date with Daddy.  Her first choice was a baseball game, but there weren't any games that weekend, so she opted for a trip to the mall to take a ride on their electronic animal cars.

I asked her to tell me about her date with dad, and here's what she said:
"We got ice cream and we went to 'Wreck it Ralph'; we got sour patch kids.  We rode on animals and I got a free hat.  I love my daddy.  We talked about my birthday, and how good he was at work.  We got to eat at Chick Fil-A - we ate chicken nuggets and yellow sauce, and we got a toy, but I traded it in for ice cream.  When we went to the car, daddy couldn't remember where it was.  I told him this is just like Andrew's trip to the mall when you guys got lost on the bus, so we lost the car, it's just like that."

2011 flashback

2012 game

Date with dad - March 2013

February Catch Up

Skinny Minnie!  (at least compared to our other kids)

A little snooze

One day, I found them like this watching a "scary" part of a movie.  Probably "Rescue Rangers, Down Under" which is hands down Andrew's favorite movie and he has seen it so so so many times.  He chooses that one almost everytime. 

Andrew uses his three blankets as a pillow & always likes them right by his face

Funny boy.  Lately, Andrew has been saying, "I want to be a pirate when I grow up, so I can say ARRGGHH mateys!"  

We are in love with this little girl!!

I continue to be surprised that my love can grow with each new child and that there is room in my heart to love another one just as much as I do the others.  My babies are my very very very favorite.  When our family is complete, I think I'll have to go volunteer at the hospital to hold those sweet, precious babies.

Kendall is the best baby I will ever have!  She is so patient and aware of my needs, she is sweet and loving and as appreciative as a baby can be.  She is the best sleeper and I love her for it.  Recently, she's been taking one long nap during the day - about 3 hours, which is longer than my other 2 ever slept during the day - and then the rest of the naps are 30-45 minutes.  She sleeps through most nights, and if she does wake up to eat, it's in the early morning hours and then she goes back to sleep and sleeps in late.

She's 4 months now (as of Feb 28th), and for the last month, her bowel movements have been far and few between.  The first one was 7 days in between, then 10, then 13 days.  It's crazy and it's like she's a ticking time bomb.  The doctor has assured me that it's fine as long as she is comfortable and happy, which she has been.  And when she does go, it's no effort whatsoever.  However, one of the side effects is that she has bad gas (I'll blame the uncles, Chris and Chad) and it clears the room - she has the smelliest toots we have ever smelt!!

Kendall is my first baby that has outright refused a bottle of formula.  Sure, I enjoy nursing, but I do not enjoy the 15-20 extra pounds that are hanging on, in addition to all the extra calories I have to eat to keep my milk up.  I know that if I even think about diet/exercise, that I'll lose my milk, so I'm hanging on to the weight.

Rachel Faye, tidbits at 4 1/2

Rachel has an incredible sense of smell (particularly with sweets), and I laughed out loud when she was able to smell root beer on daddy's breath when he gave her a hug.

I'm not good at writing down all her quotes, but this one made me laugh pretty hard.  It was during FHE and she said, "Boys have the Priesthood and girls just walk around with babies and do jobs."  She said it very matter of factly and wasn't saying it begrudgingly at all.  Good thing, because it's kind of accurate.  :)

Rachel loves kisses, and when she got (what I am guessing) was a small cold sore on the corner of her mouth, I told her that she couldn't give anyone any kisses for a week, and that made her cry.  She especially loves to give Brandon and I kisses on the lips.  And I know one day, I'll really miss that - but for now, it kind of makes me think of my Nana who always wanted to give us kisses on the lips - trying to dodge them was the standard procedure.

She is learning to read and has good reading comprehension!  Dad has been reading her a series of fairy books (her first chapter books), and she really loves them.  She's getting better at sounding simple words out, and her preschool teacher sends home readers that we do almost daily.  She starts full-day Kindergarten this fall, and she's really looking forward to it.

A couple months ago in preschool, Miss Arlene told me that Rachel was being silly with another girl (Elise) in the classroom.  She said that both girls were having a hard time focusing and paying attention while she was teaching.  We were giving lectures at home and that wasn't seeming to help, so we were brainstorming with Arlene about possible solutions.  When she told us that Elise was the aggressor and about 70% of the problem, we came up with a new plan.  Brandon gave an awesome FHE lesson on the Tree of Life, the iron rod, the great and spacious building, etc.  Then the next day, I talked with her about what it means to ignore others - especially during classroom time - but also tying it back to the FHE lesson and how we'd need to ignore the people in the great and spacious building (sorry, Elise, but that's you).  We actually practiced what it meant to ignore others when the teacher is talking - I would try to distract her by making silly faces and saying, "Rachel, look at me!" while she kept focused on her teacher (pretending, at least).  It was super helpful to actually practice it; otherwise, I don't think she would have understood how to ignore.  I told Arlene what we had done so that she could recognize what Rachel was trying to do.  Anyway, Miss Arlene said that Rachel solved the problem completely and that Rachel has been great in the classroom ever since.  A proud parenting moment for sure!!  It was new territory for us to help Rachel remedy a problem all by herself when we were't there to help facilitate or see what was going on (and I'm sure we'll get many more opportunities to help her solve her own problems, for better or for worse).  Hard to believe that she'll be in full-day Kindergarten this fall!

January Catch Up

"Mom, yook at my moothie mustache!"

Needed haircut number 2!

Our MLK Day hike to Hole in the Rock on Brandon's day off; Andrew's looking tortured (and I just noticed his skeleton shirt, which I don't remember even being embarrassed about him wearing it that day)

I should have taken a picture of the actual hole that's in the rock.  Here's the view from the top of our .10 mile hike - it was perfect for the ages of our kids.  

Occassionally we've had some tummy naps with this sweet girl.  

New nephew - Chris & Kacie's 4th - Colson Hale, born January 11

Kennedy & Colson - we hear she's a big helper!

We designed the Hale's announcement they sent out in January - what cute kids

Catching up on some zzz's

She sometimes gets mauled by Thing 1 and Thing 2

Attempt # 6 of a picture of all three - this one will have to do

Too cool for school

I love when they play nicely together!  Most of the time, they do.  Until they wrestle - that usually ends in tears.  And they're only 3 pounds different in weight, so it's a pretty even match.