Holidays!

Yes I know it is months later but we did celebrate Saint Patricks day and Easter.  I know I am very behind but I figure better late then never!!  Plus it is hard for me to find time to blog. 

 

Saint Patricks day was fun!  Scotty was on call that day so we were on our own for celebrating and I think we did a pretty great job!!

 

 The kids LOVED their little green candies and head bands and all the green food!  We gathered as much green church clothes that we could come up with and off to church we went.  Over all a pretty fun day!

Then Easter!!  The kids spent all week during school learning about spring, chicks and bunnies,  they even got a visit from the Easter bunny treats included so they were very excited!!  We of course had to counter a lot of bunny and candy talk with what the true meaning of Easter is.  We celebrated our Savior and his resurrection with some fun activities and a lesson from Daddy.  Over all such a great holiday!

 The Saturday before a friend in the ward put together an Easter egg hunt and we had quite the group there.  The kids had fun having a picnic, playing on the playground, and enjoying lots of friends!

 Barrick LOVED the robot egg!!! 

 Liam could have played all day on the play ground!

 Briony had a lot of fun people watching and smiling at anyone who would give her attention.

 For documentation purposes Lillys hair is finally getting thicker!! 

 

Then of course Easter morning.  Scotty was on an ICU rotation so we weren't sure that he would even have Easter off but luckily the odds were in our favor and we had Scotty to celebrate with us!

 

 The kids had such a great morning finding Easter eggs, eating candy and getting dressed up in their Easter bests!!  Then to go to church and be spiritually fed was wonderful!!

 Barrick LOVED finding the eggs!

 Lilly was slow like always but by far loved her pretty pink dress the most!

 

Here they are ready for church.  . 

 Pretty little girls in pink!  Ignore the mess of Pajamas, and hair stuff strewn all over the floor!! 

 Liam loved the bubbles, and this was the best picture I could get!  The boys had no interest in getting a picture taken! Got to love the piece of hair he chopped off just a week before.

 This as good as we could get of all four of them.  Liam is usually our most photogenic, oh well three out of four smiling is a success!

 See what I mean about the boys.  This is as good as we got from Barrick and being on a time crunch to leave the house by 9:30 this is what we got.

 Yes two more of these cute little ones! 

We have had a wonderful spring celebrating fun holidays and having new adventures!

Where did she get that?

We were having just a regular night, and like all parents there comes a time where disgusting photos of snot and food smeared all over your child's face is funny and you say "We need to get a picture!"

 

This is the picture we had in mind a sweet smiling baby who would hold still long enough so the picture wasn't fuzzy. This was the last picture we took.  Sweet little Briony.  (The snot stretching from her nose to her forehead had dried out at this point.)

 Yes this one was pretty good, the detail of the yuckiness on her face is a little more evident. 

 But these two pictures were our favorite!!  Seriously look at the mouth on that little baby!  It takes up most of her face!!! This is Brionys favorite face as of late and seriously is it not hilarious!  She looks like she could eat your entire face!

 We make kids with big mouths in all aspects!  They are big in size and man are they loud and never stop talking!!  I don't have the smallest mouth, and I look at this picture with Scotty and the boys and I realize our kids have no hope of having small dainty little mouths.  Oh well we like our big mouthed children! 

Kiddo Update!!

I love the place my kids are at right now.  They are so funny and full of ideas and adventures!  So the next couple of days I am going to write about each one of them. 

 Today is Barrick. 

  With teaching dance and then coming into motherhood I have been around my fair share of kids and he is the most unique, fun, crazy, kid I have ever met!!  He LOVES life and all it has to offer.  I learn something new everyday from him and have learned to love the little things in life. 

 

As of late he has quite the obsession with cars and traffic laws.  He is so curious and has every road leading into our neighborhood memorized.  He is constantly telling me the temperature,  direction we are heading, and tells me all the time which cars I need to pass!  He loves to learn about the signs, the lines on the roads, why the signs are what color, and why some curbs are painted.  He loves to learn and soaks up everything I tell him.  

This little one keeps me on my toes!   

 One night Lilly wanted to put dress ups on everyone, and being the good brother that Barrick is he let her.  Seriously look at those legs!!!  I wish I had long skinny legs like that! 

 This picture is a little more Barrick:)

 

 

   I have never seen him love someone like he loves Briony.  I truly believe they made some kind of pact in heaven to be together.  They both adore each other.  Where you find one at our house you will surely find the other.  When I was in Utah Briony got sick and was throwing up and just so sad!  Nothing and Nobody could get her to smile.  I pulled a picture up on my phone of Barrick to show my mom and sure enough the second she saw it she started smiling and grabbing my phone.  I love that they LOVE eachother!

He also went through a scarf phase.  He insisted on wearing this scarf everywhere!!  I just look at this picture and it makes me giggle.

 Barrick is quite the planner.  He had been talking all week about having a sleepover with all of the kids.  He had games planned, treats, and an episode of each of their favorite shows ready to go on Netflix.   He wasn't very happy when we told him Briony still needed to sleep in her bed, but they still had a fun night! 

  This last week they had a preschool field trip where they went and visited the kindergarten classes.  He had so much fun and came home so excited for next year.  He also LOVES reading!!  It is so fun to see him learn, and he is a really good little reader!

 This is Barricks version of Monopoly.  It is very intense, full of busting down buildings, earning points for being patient, money for being smart, and in the end using the money to buy books at his bookstore.  Like I said he has the biggest imagination and brilliant little mind.

 I found this picture on Scottys phone. This was last week when Barrick was sick he just wanted to be snuggled.  He slept on the heater almost everyday, and this day he insisted I stay with him.  We got to enjoy a little nap together:)

One day he came to me and told me he wanted breakfast in bed. He was very specific about the flowers tray and show to watch.  I adore this cute little thing. 

Some of you may notice those tacky fake flowers.  They are on display in my kitchen and I am sure have made people take a second look and a question as to why I have them out.  The reason why I proudly display these is because while shopping for his own birthday gift the only thing he wanted was these flowers for me.  Such a sweet little boy who brings so much joy to everyone around him, and I am lucky he is mine! 

Sick Barrick!

This last week our Barrick boy was sick, sick, sick!!  Fevers, coughs, febrile seizure's and a visit to the emergency room.  Barrick rarely gets sick but when he does it is always TERRIBLE!!!  He was down all week long! 

 

All week he had been running a fever, but Thursday night Barrick woke up in the middle of the night and had a febrile seizure.  Those are never fun, but I got him to calm down and go back to sleep.  Then at 7 in the morning he wakes up screaming and he was out of control!  The scary part was he would not move his head, and his neck was completely stiff.   This carried on for 45 minutes, and we thought for sure he had meningitis.  So I headed into the ED to get him checked out.  Luckily by the time I got there he was doing a little better and moving his head around.

A friend of Scottys took care of Barrick and it turns out he had Influenza B, and yes he was vaccinated.  The flu virus has been nasty this year!!



Here is my poor little guy!  His eyes were blood shot all week and they would just water!  He kept telling me, "Mom I am not sad but I keep on crying!"

Here is Barrick in the ED.  He was also very dehydrated so they decided to give him some fluids.  He was so brave getting his IV, and quit the bleeder. 

He was so happy to get the IV out!!  This started last Tuesday, and he finally went back to school today!!  He is still a little weak and lost over a pound but back to his normal happy self!!  

On a happy note Briony has learned how to wave and does it ALL day long!!  Every time a person walks in or out of the room she has that huge grin and hand waving along with it!  So here is a little wave from this sweet baby girl! 

Briony and UTAH!

For Christmas Scotty gave me a ticket to fly back to Utah over his vacation this last week.  He took on the three older kids why Briony and I spent a week playing, shopping, eating out and enjoying family! 

The flight out there and back were wonderful!!  It is amazing to fly with just one kid.  Briony cried maybe a total of 3 minutes on the flight out and didn't make a peep on the way home.  She just smiled and laughed for everyone around us then snuggled up and slept the rest of the time. 

 

Here she is sleeping on my lap on the way out.

 Once in Utah I had a list of many things I wanted to do and I think I did them all.  This night we went to a Chinese program of my nephews.  Kellen did amazing, and Briony stayed with Gpa the whole night.  The evening was followed by dinner and dessert at my sisters. 

We also went to visit great gma and gpa Nelson.  They had not met our sweet little one so we went and spent the afternoon chatting and loving on Briony!

One with all of us!

 

 I also did as much with my sisters as possible.  I went to visit each of them at their new houses since I had not seen them.  We also went to the new City Creek mall and went shopping, and also had a fun lunch date at Zupas. (YUMMY)

 

 Here we are at Ashtyns house. Briony and Prestyn are two weeks apart and had so much fun playing together!  Ashtyn also had us over one night for dessert, thanks Ash!!

  Ariane had us over for dinner after Kellens performance, and also watched Briony for me one night so I could go out with my parents.  We went to Legacy theatre and saw Arsenic and Lace.  It was such a fun play and a wonderful night!  Obviously Briony was spoiled!

Angie was wonderful and even in the midst of moving to Washington the last day I was there she of course made time to spend with us.  I was so grateful I was able to see their family before they moved.  I love you guys so much and will miss having you in Utah when we go back to visit!

 

 

We also had one last big family dinner before Angie and Ryan moved and it was quit the night full of laughter, crying, and a lot of fun!! I was just so grateful I was able to be there. My parents now have only two out of the six kids in my family living in Utah.  That is why I put into place the Disneyland trip in 3 years.  You better all be planning on it!

 

 Some of my nieces loving on Briony.  Weird to think I was about their age when they were born.  Kylee, and Lynnie I am serious about you guys coming out here, bug your parents everyday about it!!:)

 

 

Me and miss Paisley.  We had fun little one, and call me anytime you want!

 Of course we had to have one with Gma Nelson.  She was spoiled by grandma love the whole time we were there!

Briony could not get enough of the dogs!!  Both of my older sisters have dogs and she followed them everywhere.  Each of the dogs were nice enough to lick the food right off of Brionys face and she couldn't get enough of them!

Of course last but certainly not least Gma Stewart and Aunt Leslee!!  Dinner was such a blast and man alive could that little Lakai be any cuter!!  Briony thought he was pretty special and chatted him up all night! I just wish we could have gotten together more.  Thanks for such a fun night!!

 

Of course this little peanut!!  She is nine months today!  She is such a joy and we are so in love with this sweet girl.  She is cruising and moving and getting into everything, and since getting home she has figured out that she is pretty good at climbing the stairs.  So the baby gates have come out! We love you little one! 

Spreading the LOVE!

Valentines day is a holiday that I love!  There is nothing better then celebrating LOVE.  I grew up with parents who taught me that Valentines day wasn't about couples but about showing those around you that you love them.  So like many our day was full of flowers, heart attacks, a little gift for each kid, and giving lots of hugs and kisses!  I surprisingly got one picture yesterday, and that was of Scottys car to show him in case all of the hearts blew away.  We had a wonderful Valentines, along with a nice quiet evening and take out for Scotty and I.

 The kids LOVED decorating daddy's car I let them climb on the back and they were giggling and laughing, it was quit the spectacle!  Barrick was convinced Scotty was going to come out and see us so he put Lilly on daddy watch duty.  Like I said the one and only picture I got, it was a busy day with one thing after another so I felt good I at least got this one.

 My beautiful flowers!  Ever since I had Lilly and Liam some family sent me Lilies, and they have been my favorite flower since.  I should put up a picture when they bloom, they are BEAUTIFUL!!

 I also love the aftermath of Valentines parties, fun to see how excited they get about all of their Valentines.  I LOVED each of the bags they made at school and it described each of their little personalities.  Barrick was given a hand full of letters to use on his bag, he was insistent on spelling words out of them.  So he came up with tub, and the green behind it is a picture of our tub, the r ya is pretty self explanatory.  He told me he did all the L's at the top because love starts with L.  Silly boy!  

Then Lilly and the color pink!  She talked about painting that bag pink all week long.  She adores this bag and carries is everywhere!

 

Then Liams of course had a bunch of letters piled up on it, but it didn't make it back to our house in one piece.  The second we got in the car he tore it open ate his favorite candy and gave the rest to Lilly and Barrick before we made it in the house. 

 

Hope you had a wonderful Valentines too!