Science Fair and birthdays galore

Neil LOVES to read books and have stories told to him.  At bedtime he is continually seeking for willing story tellers so he can stay up later…. Dad, Jessie, Abbie and Mark being his favorite victims of the the requests for just one more story.  He is not really partial to any particular kind of story and his most favorite changes every couple of weeks.  Some of them have included: Go Dog, Go!, What Do You Love, The Hungry Caterpillar, Me and the Bears, There’s No Such Thing as a Dragon, What Was That, My Brown Bear Barney, Bear Stays Up for Christmas, Bear Wants More, Fancy Nancy, Masiy Makes Gingerbread and his new favorite You are Special.  I can’t believe he enjoyed You are Special so much – it is so so very long!  Ken and Spencer have read it to him the most.  He also currently loves wearing his “not so warm” pajamas over the top of the ones Mom makes him wear.I had a little 24 hour flu thing and missed our family’s Sunday dinner with Ken’s parents.  The kids all came home raving about the delicious soup Grandma had fixed for them.  So delicious they even brought me a picture so I could “enjoy” it too.Mark has been practicing and practicing the piano in anticipation for the 6th grade talent show.  He is learning his first Jon Schmidt song, Song of the Ocean.Because of the overwhelming support of our children, the email for the district science fair asked all participants to limit their fan clubs to one or two people; so Ken was our family representative.  And his report of Mark’s grin, from ear to ear, when his name was called to move on to the Utah Central science fair at BYU was exciting.  The kids were all totally excited for Mark and Jessie ran upstairs to get some paper and markers to make a congratulations sign to hang up for Mark before he got home.  Everyone chipped in and helped decorate some letters and we were almost done when he arrived.

Jessie’s sunset picture.Ken read this to me so I asked him for a copy.  A reminder to all of us!After 14 years our trash can gave up the ghost.  It was mostly dead quite a while ago, but just one of those things you get around to later.  Our new kitchen garbage can is white, the color of our recycle bin.  That’s a problem especially if you visiting….ahhh…..which can should you use?  Jessie and I fixed that problem in the most colorful and fun way we could think of.The kids new “school” pictures that I took way back in October…..well I finally got them edited and printed.  Yeah me.  Ken took a set to work to put under his desk glass.Neil, Isaac and I went over to play and have lunch at our friends after we helped with Abbie’s spelling group at school.  We had a great time and even though she said lunch would be simple and easy….it looked pretty fancy to me!  Neil had such a great time that on Monday when we went to help with spelling again he said to me, “and after we can go have lunch at the Albertsons.”

For Christmas Spencer got Jessie a cake ball pan.  We were so excited to find an occasion to try it out – our monthly family get-together.  At first we thought we’d make some brownie “cake balls”…..bad idea!  For our second try we followed the recipe on the back.  It worked great.  Although we changed the frosting recipe idea they had and made our own chocolate frosting.  Mark got to stay up and help Jessie dip and decorate them.

Spring is coming….It had been a long night.  Isaac and Neil had both been up and Neil had spent awhile in my bed sleeping and now it was Sunday morning.  Isaac was up again and ready for breakfast. Ken was already gone to his early meeting.  The house was quiet when I woke, except for Isaac’s crying, so I pickup him up and he immediately fell silent and put his sweet little head down on my shoulder.  We crept downstairs to tally up those who had woken up ahead of us and this is what we found.  Jessie and Neil sleeping on the couch and Spencer just falling back asleep in the rocking chair.  I guess after Neil had woken up in my bed and discovered that Ken was gone he had gone to Jessie and they had come down together.  Pure sweetness.  I fixed Isaac his bottle and we went to the living room.  When he was mostly done Abbie crept downstairs trying to sneak up on us and then Spencer woke back up and the rest is history.

We kind of threw together a last minute BBQ dinner for Rachel’s birthday a few days early because that’s when everyone could come.  But last minute or not it was FABULOUS!!!  Burgers with the works – bacon, grilled pineapple and pepper jack cheese.  French fries, Waldorf Salad and Smoked Sausage hot dogs.  We ate until we popped.

Then we sang Happy Birthday to Rachel doing the wave with the birthday sign I had printed but not been able to put together into a banner yet and Rachel made a wish and Neil helped blow out her candles and we enjoyed a small piece of Apple Spice Bundt Cake with Brown Sugar Frosting in the small space still left in our tummies.  Happy Birthday Rachel!Isaac enjoying the sunglasses that he will keep on for about 25 seconds and then want you to put back on him again and again.  We got these sunglasses from Ken’s friend way back when Jessie was born.  Can you believe it?Isaac came up to SLC with Ken and I to Ken’s Annual Meeting for the Utah Credit Union Association.  He needed a change during dinner and with no changing table in the men’s rest room the counter in between the sinks did great.  It even had built in entertainment since the sinks had motion sensors.Everyday is a little more spring like and the kids are loving it.  Although maybe someone should have told the kite that it should have loved the beautiful day too.

We joined all my dad’s family at Brent’s house to celebrate Grandma’s birthday.  It was really a ton of fun.  We talked and laughed and saw Brent’s amazing swing set he built himself, and Brit’s new baby and told stories about Grandma and all the fun memories we had of her.  I think Jessie’s memory was about the best with the snail shell necklaces, but Geoff’s about coming home from school early was pretty good too.  We love you Grandma!

And lastly here’s some fun pictures Jessie’s took looking into Spencer’s kaleidoscope.  Don’t they just make you feel that little kid happiness inside?