First day of school!

Two posts in one day?? I know! What is this business!? I just had to do it. Today was my first day of school... again. I am officially a beginning freshman at BYU and in order to celebrate, we took first day of school photos.

Do you remember these?? I remember them being a lot less scary and I remember being a lot cuter.

My first class started at 5:10pm. This happens when you have kids to take care of and work to deal with. Not me working, but my hubby. Someone has to be home to take care of the kids! Anyhow. I was so excited to be at class that I didn't want to be late. I arrived at 4:52 and went to my class. The lights were off and no one was in the hallway. I thought I came on the wrong day, so I went upstairs and checked my class schedule. I had the right day and time. So what the heck is going on? Let me tell you. No one comes to class 18 minutes early! Not even the teacher! I finally saw some people meandering their way down and decided to just go turn the light on in the room and set myself down. I obviously had some time to kill, so I started to write.
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"My first day of class. . . my thoughts? Why is no one talking? Why don't I say something? No, I'll just sound like an idiot. Shoot! I forgot where I parked the car already. Obviously I'm nervous. Feelings? Utter terror. My heart is pounding like crazy. Get a grip! It's only an english class! We'll just ignore that it's my very first class as a college student. Oh my gosh, I've been married longer than my teacher. She's talking a lot, I'm anxious. I don't even know what Rhetoric means. Oral Presentation!? Shoot. Shoot. Shoot! This is going to be interesting."
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My first assignment? To write a persuasive paper of any subject I'd like. You think it would be easy to come up with something right? Wrong. That's WAY too broad for me. Any suggestions on what I should write? Because I keep coming up with things like.

"Kids should not play video games until they're at least 12."
"Parents should be required by law to take parenting classes before having kids."
"Public schools should serve all healthy food."

I am excited to get started! I love school and I love that I'm finally getting back into it.

Brick Oven Balloons

We had a fun Family Home Evening event yesterday. It consisted of a nice walk to the BYU campus to buy some books for my first classes!! Yay for greater education! Boo to buying ridiculously expensive books that are useless later in life. Anyhow. We made it to all my classes to see where they were.... all two of them, then we meandered around toward the ducky pond. That place may have a lot of ducks, but that is one sick little pond! On our way home, we all decided that we were starving and walked into Brick Oven. We walked out happily full with balloons in hand.

I tried, tried, TRIED to make sure E's balloon monkey made it home in time for a picture, but alas it did not. Instead we made it home with a monkey head and the banana. . .

E just loved his balloon monkey beyond its capacity.

Huh E.

*sorry its out of focus.*

A however did make it home with a full balloon, much to his pleasure and Mommies! The pictures may not look like he was happy, but he is. He's just still recovering from that wedding hangover I was talking about earlier. 

 Spider man now sleeps above his bed and protects him from the scary monsters. And he's still mostly in one piece.

Birthday celebration!

This was one of my favorite parts of the whole trip! My Dad's birthday was on the 23rd and we were able to celebrate with him! We made a Happy Birthday Banner with two balloons hanging off as well as a delicious cake with homemade frosting. And I truly mean delicious. It was so rich I could only handle one bite of cake at a time and I loved it!

Happy Birthday Dad!!

My kids were very excited about participating in the event! You can see Ayden's little head in the corner. Anxiously waiting for the candle part.

Ethan has no idea what's going on. He's just there to chill on Grandpa's lap and be in the middle of whatever is happening, hence his stone cold stare.

We were so glad to celebrate my Dad's birth! Without him, there would be no us! Plus, he did go fishing in the morning and caught some fish for us, so he's still pretty useful. :P 

Temple Trip

My cousin was married this last Thursday. They were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple and it was a beautiful ceremony. I feel so blessed to be worthy to go to the temple with them to participate in their ceremony. It reminds me of how special and sacred the family is. It reminds me of my own sealing and how loved McKay and I were at our sealing.

McKay and I did things slightly backwards so at our sealing we had our son Ayden there with us. He was about 6 months old at the time.

I can still remember when McKay and I were sealed. We had just gone through the temple for the first time together a few weeks before, my heart felt full. Full of love and gratitude and thanks for my Heavenly Father and his love for my little family.

And then there we were; Kneeling across from each other on the alter. The room was filled with people we loved; Mom, Dad, Aunts, Uncles and Grandparents. As well as treasured friends from the community. The spirit in the room was abundant. I am sure there were others there from the other side supporting our decision. It was all I could do to keep from not crying.

And then she, dressed in white, brought my 6 month old son in. By this time there was not a dry eye. He was dressed in white as well and fast asleep in the arms of his caregiver. She delicately brought him to the alter to us. I could barely see, I was so overwhelmed by the spirit and love in the room. I know my Heavenly Father and Savior approved and still do approve of my decision to make my family an eternal one. During the entire ceremony Ayden didn't make a peep. He just lay there peacefully with us. I am so grateful that we were worthy and still are worthy to go to the temple. It truly is a little piece of Heaven on earth.

I am so glad that I was able to attend my cousins' sealing just so that the feelings felt at my own could be remembered.


I did get a chance to take some photos. I'm sorry to admit that I did not even get a chance to take one single photo of the man and woman of the hour, but I'll have to say that I was too preoccupied with own kids to really get a shot of them while I had the chance.

  We had some time before the sealing to walk around and take pictures and look at the beautiful scenery. Anyone, LDS or not, would appreciate how beautiful Temple Square really is.

Check out my awesome shoes!!! You know you wanted to see them. Admit it.

Oh look at that handsome smile. There's my little model man right there.

Their reception was very nice. It was at the top of a massive hill in Salt Lake. I'm pretty sure my car wasted about $10 worth of gas getting there. But the view on the way up was worth it. We had a view of all of Salt Lake City and the salt lake. I almost had the potential to meet Elder Uchdorf too. I guess someone saw him taking a walk outside, if I were at all creepy, I might have ran outside and followed him just to say hi. But I'm not. Lucky for him.

Ayden and 'tappa tappa' were best buds during dinner!

Ethan was hardly ever at our table. He was flirting with everyone in the room. I think he sat on about 4 or 5 individuals' laps before he made the rounds back to me.

The last photo here is one Ayden took. He is very proud of his work. Usually he ends up just flashing himself in the face, but this time he actually almost made a regular photo!

After the Fact

We had a beautiful  wedding this weekend for my cousin Joe, BUT I'll post pictures of that later. For now I have my family over and actually do not want to spend a lot of time on here. SO, post wedding. I had my kids there with me the entire day. From 11am to 11pm we were out; and the result of that was this:

A wedding party hangover, 2 1/2 year old style.

I'm just not feeling it

Its starting to warm up, this is what I wanted. I said it would all be better when the sun came back. I'm supposed to be relieved and relaxed! WRONG! My bad days seem to be more often than my good ones. Perhaps its just that I let the bad moments of my day overwhelm all the good.

Today I can only think of what went wrong.

•  This morning Ayden peed on the floor before I even woke up. For those of you wondering, that is one of the WORST ways to start a day.
•  Ethan will scream if anyone pushes him in any direction.
• Ayden POOPED his pants after his nap and soaked his bed. He's potty trained and he's going backwards for some reason! What the heck!?!

• Ethan doesn't want to eat anything we give him without screaming about it first.
• McKay is too sick to help me. That's not really new news, but it does make me very tired and frustrated. I just wish he was better.
• Ethan in fact, just seems to scream no matter what. Fingernails on a chalkboard is nothing. His guttural scream is worse than any noise I've ever heard anything make. 

I feel like I'm burning out at both ends. I have no patience for the annoying 2 1/2 year old that keeps pooping his pants because 1. He wants US to take his pants off for him. or 2. He's not big enough to get that if he has to go to the bathroom he can out of his bedroom for nap time! How hard is that to internalize!!!

'Mommy will get mad if I leave my bed early during nap time, but Mommy will get even MORE mad if I poop my pants. Soooo.... I'll go to the bathroom and THEN I won't get in trouble for getting up early.' I've only shoved that idea down his throat about a thousand times, I wish he would just swallow it instead of spitting in up.

Mom- I am so sorry for whatever you had to suffer raising us four children. I'm sorry for being so bossy and for pushing emotional buttons. I'm sure that was me and I'm sure I did things so annoying that I don't even know about. I apologize for Melissa just causing problems for the sake of causing problems. And I'm sorry for whatever the boys did. :) They did do bad things, I'm sure of it, I just can't think of anything. haha.

It makes sense now why parents go grey early. I think internally I've stressed myself to about 50 or 60. If brains exploded when they were overloaded, mine would have been gone around the time Ayden and Ethan realized they could fight.

Two kids is plenty for me. Ask me when I'm done with school if I want more kids, because right now, they're too much for me to handle. Talk about being in the most high maintenance relationship EVER... time TWO!!!

Cuddling

Cuddling. Doesn't that word just make you smile. You get to be all cozied up to someone you love and just lay there content. I'm usually watching a movie when I cuddle. That seems to add to the contentment for me. Unfortunately in our house, cuddling for long amounts of time is a rarity. I'm specifically talking about cuddling with my kidos. McKay and I could cuddle all night if we wanted. Granted we'd both wake up feeling like we'd just slept in a heated oven, but we could do it! Our cuddling usually only lasts until both of us are ready to actually go to sleep, making it not very long, but also not a rarity and thank goodness for that. Because no offense kids, but I like cuddling with your dad the best.

During the day, the last thing on my mind is when to find time to sit down and cuddle with my kids. Maybe it needs to be higher priority? I not sure. I just know that between getting them food every few hours, constantly cleaning the house, playing with them, trying to take me time during nap, maintaining obscure parts of the house (washing windows or walls), cleaning the messes they make and then cleaning the messes I make..... cuddling seems to get lost in the fray. So when we do cuddle its rare! and its even more rare that I get photos!!

He was trying to tell McKay that he wanted to take the picture.

 Doesn't that just make you ooze of precious feelings!!!

Ok for reals now Ayden, lets watch the movie.

*snicker snicker!*

Ok! One more picture!

Blankets

I don't know why he does this, but some days Ethan brings me his blankets. Its usually after his naps or during a movie. On one such occasion he brought me three separate blankets one after another.

Each time after he brought me a blanket he would proudly say 'day doo!' and run for the next blanket. Finally we settled for one blanket and wrapped him up like a little burrito!

We just love our blankies around here!

McKay thinks its like a peace offering or kind gesture in his mind. I'll get him up from his nap and he'll hand me his blanket. Maybe he's trying to appeal to my better nature so I don't eat him. Although... I don't think I've ever given him any reason to think he's the next one on the menu.

Bridal Veil Falls

I'm having de'ja'vu right now. I could have sworn I've already written this post! And if I have and have completely forgotten about it. I apologize. So here goes.

The boys and I along with some friends went to Bridal Veil Falls, us for the first time! I have to admit I was slightly surprised. I had envisioned something completely different than what I saw.

This is what I'm used to as far as waterfalls go. Long hike to the top. A nice spot for a picnic up there. Lots of little trails you can go off on.








This is what I found instead. A nice short flat walk. The waterfall is right off the trail. No spot to really sit and picnic. At least not by the falls. BUT it was still beautiful. It was still a nice lovely day and I still had great company.

Ethan sat at the bottom of the falls and made his own little pool of water.

Step 1: Find an ideal dig site.

Step 2: Make sure you're sitting in a dry seat and watch your hands turn red.

Step 3: Dig a bigger hole and continue to observe your hands turning purple now. :)

Step 4: Finish your masterpiece half frozen.

While Ethan was working on his hole Ayden and Chris played in the falls. McKay was too sick to come. :( We missed him very much, but we were glad that Chris was there to play with Ayden and show him cool man stuff... whatever that is! Bugs, dirt, rocks.

After they had finished playing, Ayden joined Ethan on the ground.

The boys really had a blast! Ethan sat in the same place mostly the entire time working on his ice pool and of course once Ayden saw what he was doing he decided to fill Ethan's pool.  Mommy decided that instead of annoying Ethan that we would throw rocks in the other direction.

Problem solved.

And Ta-Da!!! Here is the only picture of the kids looking at the camera! I couldn't get either one of them to look up until we were about ready to go. Ethan was so focused the entire time that his cute little face is absent, so we have only Ayden. But he's cute enough for the both of them.

We're just happy its warming up!