Thankful Tree

A few weeks ago for family night we started a "Thankful Tree" and each day until Thanksgiving each of us put up a leaf with something we were thankful for. The rule being that you couldn't duplicate something someone had already put up. It was a fun way for us to see all the many things we have that we don't even think about regularly that we are thankful for. It was also neat to see our tree grow and grow as we went. I think this will become a tradition in our house. 

Making Pies

Tuesday I spent the day out at my Grandma Marshall's House making pies. It is our tradition every year. I kept Chloe home from school to help with the baking and the little kids :) We made 18 pie shells and filled 13 of them with squash pie (our family favorite)-yum. So glad we got to take one home that night and gobble it up. 

The kids helped some with the baking and it tried my patience just a bit, but I did step back and let them roll out a good share of the crusts, even though I felt like stepping in and taking over more than once. 

They spent most of their time though outside in the leaves. 

 Such a Fun Day-Glad we have these Traditions!!!

Cousins

Over the weekend Landon's sister Brenda and her kids came to town to visit for a few days. The kids were beyond excited waiting for the arrival of their cousins. It's all they talked about all week. I let them miss school on Friday since the cousins were coming to town Thursday night, which was an added bonus. Kylie and Shawna were also in town for the high-school rodeo. So Chloe and Makele spent a lot of their time over at the fair grounds with them. Chloe of course took several times riding Kylie's horse.

 It was a stormy weekend so this it what life at our house looked like for a lot of the time-the kids and adults gathered around in front of the wii. Although the boys did spend lots of time out in the garage playing baseball, and we also took and excursion to Jumping Jacks. 

 One night the big girls gave the babies a bath-they and the bathroom were both soaking wet.

  Popcorn and a movie...

 Bryce was pretty excited to join in the fun and sample the popcorn...

43 weeks old

Our boy is now 43 weeks old and such a joy to us all. I don't know what we would do without him, he has brought such happiness to our home. He literally lights up when his brother or sister walk in the room. They are so good with him. He has waved bye bye a few times in the last week, and is constantly surprising us with something he does. If he gets told no by his Daddy it breaks his little heart. He is definitely a mover and a shaker and I have a feeling that as he learns to walk I am going to have to keep my running shoes on at all times. Things he has been liking to eat this week, not in baby food form of course,  are bananas, chicken and apple jacks-YUM!!!

Volleyball and Baseball

On Saturday Chloe had her last Volleyball game of the season. She has come along way in just a few weeks. She served really well in this game and scored lots of points off of her serves. She also is getting pretty good at bumping, and I think she had fun learning a new sport.-next stop the lacrosse fields-lol (Chloe once told me that she couldn't be on team for gymnastics cause there were too many things she hadn't tried yet like volleyball, and lacrosse)

 

Tanner had ball games all day Saturday. This week he played 14U so the team consisted of the 8th and 9th graders from Dixie. He did pretty good, he is still a little tense as he adjusts to his new team, but he will loosen up over time. He played right field and made a nice double play out there at one point. He also got a couple of good hits. His team played 4 games on Saturday! They played in the Championship game but ended up losing :(

We now have no ball games to attend to for any sport for about 6 weeks. WOW!!! Whatever will we do with all of that spare time on the weekends :)

After the Championship Game we went up to some of our friends house and had a game night. It was fun and got us out of our ordinary boring rut that we are usually in on weekends of watching a movie at home. 

Making Hats

Last week we were at my Grandma's house and she was making hats for the Veterans. Chloe thought it looked like fun and asked if she could make one too. So she spent the next several days knitting on it whenever possible. She was so excited to finish it and Grandma sent it to the Veterans with hers. 

She thought it was so much fun that she decided to make one for each of her Bryce, Preslie, and Breckon for Christmas and one for Tanner too. The first one she made for Preslie was too small so she is going to donate it to the hospital. Hopefully she will be able to get them all finished by Christmas I'm sure she will if she sticks with it. :)

42 Weeks Old

42 Weeks old and isn't he sweet! He definitely has a mind of his own, and will throw a little fit if you take something away from him. Especially if that something happens to be a broom or a baseball bat which are his two very favorite things to play with right now. He is very determined and can get into lots of trouble quickly if you don't keep a close eye on him. The other day I walked in the kitchen and he had managed to get a bag of Doritos out and dump them on the floor. He and the dog were happily eating them up. He will not eat baby food at all anymore. He loves to eat most big people food except for fruit. The only fruit I can get him to eat is bananas he hates the texture of peaches, pears, or applesauce and will spit them out. He really loves to eat potatoes and carrots and apparently Doritos-ha ha!

Pots and Pans

One day last week Bryce discovered the pan cupboard. He had the time of his life. Somehow he managed to get a hold of spoon and you couldn't even hear yourself think-lol. At first I thought I wouldn't have Landon childproof this cupboard, so Bryce could have a little bit of fun, however after days of putting away every single pan about 20 times I changed my mind. So now there are nice childproof locks on the pans and Bryce is so sad every time he tries to get into it.

Veterans Day Funny

Last Monday was Veterans Day. When Chloe got home from school she told me that she had been having a pretty fun day at school because all they had been doing all day was learning about veterinarians and writing letters to them. Now if you know Chloe she loves animals, so I was like really that's fun was it like career day or something, did one come visit your class? She told me a few more things before I finally realized she meant Veterans not veterinarians-ha ha I wondered why they were writing letters to veterinarians. Funny Girl :)

Volleyball, Soccer, Baseball and Conference

Well we once again managed to cram an extraordinary amount of things into our Saturday. 

We started the day out at 9:00 am at Chloe's volleyball games. She has come along ways in a few short weeks. She was a star server during her games and is starting to move around more and get good at bumping the ball when it comes to her. 

Next off to Baseball and Soccer Games...

We dropped Tanner off at his game and then went to watch Chloe's Soccer Game as it was her last one of the season. WOW! It was a great game. The teams were both exceptional and for most of the game they were tied. It came right down to the last few minutes and the other team scored a goal an won. Sad thing Chloe was playing goalie :(. She isn't the best goalie in the world, but she does a pretty good job, also her team was so tired because they had no subs, that no one was back down on Defense to help her, so her coach told her it wasn't on her. She only played goalie for about the last 10 minutes of the game. Before that she played both offense and defense. Her Defense was spot on as usual. I really think Defense might be her best area. While on Offense she came really close several times to making a goal. It was sad to end the season on a loss, but the team has had a great year, and really learned to play as a team and play their positions. 

Then back to Tanner's baseball game. He did alright and had a lot of fielding time, but he struck out both times up to bat. The kid was 16 though and seriously throwing a legit 80 mph so we weren't to upset about it. During Tanner's game Bryce was sitting in his stroller and some little boy just walked up to him and smacked him in the head for no reason as hard as he could. Landon and I were like what the heck where did that come from? Poor Bryce got the saddest look on his face and started to cry :(

After Tanner's game we rushed the kids home and headed to the Adult Session of Stake Conference. It was a great way to end the day as we heard some great messages and were spiritually feed. Even better when we got home both of the older kids were asleep for the night, we had Bryce with us of course. 

An Afternoon at the Park

Chloe had been begging to go back to the park by my Grandma's house to play ever since my sister took them there last week, so after Tanner's ball games on Friday we headed over to it.

Tanner came along with us and spent the time throwing, catching, and hitting balls around....                         

 Bryce had fun playing with Brother's bat...

 Chloe and Brydee climbed around like little monkeys and thoroughly enjoyed themselves..

It was a nice relaxing outing and we all just enjoyed being outside in the nice weather.

41 weeks old

41 weeks old. Time sure does fly. Bryce has gone on strike against eating baby food. In fact it has become pretty hard in general to put anything in his mouth. He has to make sure it is good first and he really prefers to pick it up by hand and eat it himself. If you let him do that he will eat most anything. He is a terror at times and keeps us on our toes as he is into everything!!! He decided to try eating a dishwasher tab the other day and so now all of the cupboards, except for the pan one-he needs to be able to have a little bit of fun, have childproof locks. The dog food and water has been moved to the garage as he loves to get into it. And we have to keep all bathroom doors closed at all times as he loves unrolling the toilet paper. We are wondering how in the heck we are going to have a Christmas Tree this year? This is a new challenge for us as we have never had a 10 month old at Christmas Time. We will definitely need to be creative. Landon suggested hanging it from the ceiling.-lol

Dixie Debut

Tanner was extended the opportunity to start practicing with the Dixie High School baseball team. He was super excited. As part of this he has also become part of the Dixie team which is kind of like the 8th Grade or Freshmen team. They participate in tournaments and stuff in the off season. Tanner decided that he would rather be on this team so he is no longer playing with the Gators. This last weekend was Tanner's first time playing with Dixie. They didn't have a younger team in this tournament so Tanner ended up playing 16U with the older boys. We think he did great, for playing 3 years ahead of his age group. On Friday he didn't strike out once, although he did get out on base a few times. His first time at the plate he got hit-how is that for luck-lol. Saturday he struck out but the kid pitching was probably seriously throwing at least 80. Tanner also got quite a bit of time in the field-so it was good experience. We weren't sure if he would really get to play at all since he was the youngest and newest on the team. Love Baseball. Love our Boy.

Sick Baby Boy

Okay well I have made references to Bryce being sick in several of my previous posts, so here is the story. Wednesday, the day before Halloween Bryce broke out in this rash...it was all over his knees, hands, feet, and diaper area. I thought it was weird but he had a doctor appointment the next day anyways so I didn't worry to much about it. At that time he started to being really fussy and continued to be for about the next week. The next day at his appointment the doctor checked him over, and thought everything was good, he assumed the rash was just some sort of viral thing that should clear up so he wasn't real concerned cause he didn't have anything else going on with it. Well a few days later the rash started to heal, although it kind of went all scabby. Then he developed a fever and was super fussy. We thought okay he is teething. He fought his fever for three days and was just miserable- finally it broke. The day after it broke he was still being super fussy, and then he broke out in another rash all over his back. I was like okay that's it and I took him into the instacare since it was late at night. Well the doctor on call there took one look at him and said there is your problem he has had Hand Foot and Mouth Disease. He said that there were sores in his mouth that were starting to clear up and probably had developed just after the doctor saw him the week before, he could also tell from the scabs from the old rash, and he said the new rash was just an extension of it. WOW!!! Poor Baby. To bad we went a whole week without really knowing what was going on. A few facts about Hand Foot and Mouth Disease that the Doctor shared with me. Most children gets it sometime between the ages of 1-5. Adults can get it as well but it is usually less severe. Children's symptoms manifest in different ways and some cases are more severe-in Bryce's case his rash was pretty bad, in many cases the parents might not even realize they have it. It is kind of like the chicken pox and you usually don't ever get it again once you have gotten it. Lately there has been an epidemic of it. Well that's the story and luckily our little guy is feeling a lot better now :)

Volleyball and Cousins

Last Saturday Chloe had another volleyball game. She is getting a little bit better every time. This year it is kind of more instructional than anything. All of the teams practice and warm up together and then they split into teams and play there games. The girls for the most part just stand there unless the ball comes right to them-lol-but they are learning and having fun and that's what matters.

Later that afternoon we went out to my Grandma's house and had a little birthday get together for my sister Mandy (who was in town for the day). Of course the kids had to play for awhile after it was all over. My sister Tiffanie took them to the park. They had a blast. While most of the cousins were at the park Landon took Tanner and Gavin over to the baseball fields to play a little ball. After that all the cousins came to Aunt Tia's house to play, while parents were shopping, until it was time for Mandy to get back on the road home. The kids love spending time with their cousins :)

40 weeks old

Our little guy is 40 weeks old. I can't believe it!!! Every time someone see's him they are like WOW! he is almost a year old can are you sad. Yes I am don't remind me. I don't want him to grow up so fast :( He has the cutest little chipmunk cheeks and is usually such a happy pleasant baby. His new thing is that he loves to jump in his crib he pulls himself up and bounces away. He is also into everything so I am working on childproofing things-it's been years since I've had to do that! One of his favorite things to do is to help me when I'm loading the dishwasher or I guess help is a relative term-he pulls out the silverware and plays with it while I loaded it.

On Wednesday he had his 9 month check up. He didn't have to have shots, but he did have to have a heel prick. The doctor said he was doing good and that his healthy looking cheeks make him look bigger than he really is. He has reached all of the appropriate milestones. His stats are that for height he is 29" long which is the 73th percentile; he weighs 17 lbs. 10 oz which is only the 8th percentile (my 6 month nephew is 4 lbs bigger-lol). The only concern was a rash on his knees and diaper area, but the doctor thought it wasn't a big concern cause he was good everywhere else, so just to keep an eye on it-more on that to come.