Sitting Pretty

Luke's newest trick is to crawl over to something, halfway sit up, walk his hands around, and pop up into a sitting position. It's proving quite useful - especially when his older brother is about to attack!

Everybody Dance Now!

Liz just began a new tap dancing class. This was her second week in the class and she is already learning a routine! Mark your calendars because her performance will be June 6th - yes, 4 months away. Let's hope she can learn the routine by then!

Here she is tapping her toe. Seriously, little girls in their dance clothes are so adorable!


And here she is learning the oh so difficult shuffle step (she could do the move - but her foot never touched the ground - kind of defeats the purpose of TAP shoes...):


Finally, here is a sneak peek into her routine - buy your tickets now! :)

Totally Tubular!

Danny was asked to chaperone a young men/young women activity to Big Bear this past weekend. He decided he would bring Jared along for the ride! The whole family was invited but it was an evening event and they wouldn't be home until after midnight so we decided that just Jared would attend. Needless to say when we finally told Jay about it (about 1 hour before they left) he was super excited! Danny asked him if he wanted to go tubing in the snow and he asked, "At Big Bear?" Apparently a girl at school told him the mountains in the distance are Big Bear. This kid cracks me up.

Here's our Bishop who spearheaded the event - he's hilarious!:


Jared decided to give the crazy hair a try - what do you think???:


Here's one of Dan's best buddies, Alan, who has also been great with our kiddos:


And two of my favorite boys - aren't they adorable?!:


Here's their first ride down:



Eventually it got close to Jared's bedtime and he drifted off to sleep - in Daddy's arms since it was so cold out there! He slept through the last hour of fun.


The group then headed to Denny's to eat a late night snack. Jared slept through the entire Denny's experience!!!


Dan said Jared didn't move during the entire restaurant visit - even though the group was sitting right next to him noisily enjoying their evening! I guess he was tired! They arrived home shortly after midnight and Jared walked in the house saying, "Hi Mom!" He had gotten a second wind and was awake long enough to tell me all about the fun he had. We all crashed in our beds shortly thereafter!

Happy Chinese New Year!

This is Mom's Birthday

Jared came up with the title for this post. It was my birthday last week, and I was debating whether or not to put it on here. I decided it would be fun to document how we celebrated and what the kids made for me so here's my birthday post in all its glory!

First, Danny showed up at my work in the morning completely surprising me with a dozen multi-colored roses. I didn't take a picture of them if you can believe my ingratitude! I must have been thrown off since I was working. Here is a weak sample of what they sort of looked like. Of course all of the women in my office were in awe of my amazing husband - myself included!


Then right before I was supposed to leave work Danny showed up again to pick me up. He had arranged for my Mom to babysit so we could enjoy a dinner sans children! We drove to Long Beach (wasn't that trip an adventure in itself, Danny?!) to a beautiful restaurant called The Reef. It was right on the water, and as we ate dinner we watched the day turn to night. The night view was just as beautiful with the lights reflecting off of the water. These pictures don't do the view justice!


After dinner we went outside for a bit to check out the view and then headed toward home. I was anxious to see the kids since they had been so excited in the morning that it was my birthday. When we got home everyone was still awake! The kids had made a cake for me earlier in the day with Annette. They met me outside and made me close my eyes and be led into the house. They led me to the table where my cake and homemade cards were waiting! We sang, everyone helped blow out the candles, and then we tasted the cake. A perfect ending!


Thank you Danny for making my birthday so incredible! I loved every minute of it. I couldn't have planned a better day for myself. I love you!

Getting it Down

Shortly after we started Lucas on rice cereal he developed an interesting habit. It's pretty ingenious if you ask me, but I'm his mother so no one is asking me. When they started eating, Jared and Lizzie's little tongues usually pushed most of their food back out; they just didn't quite understand the whole swallowing thing. Learning from his siblings' mistakes, Lucas has developed his own system to make sure that food goes where it's supposed to.

Step 1 - Open mouth wide:


Step 2 - Accept food when offered.


Step 3 - Immediately thrust thumb in mouth and suck food down!


Step 4 - Repeat Steps 1-3.

The kid is brilliant, right?

Rockin' Her Sunbeamness

This post is somewhat belated but Liz became a Sunbeam a few Sundays ago. She was VERY excited about moving up to Sunbeams. I was glad because when Jared moved up he was not happy about - within ONE week of attending Primary he was very aware that he had said goodbye to free playing time in the nursery and hello to structured learning time in Primary. Plus he said there weren't any snacks. I digress.


Jared and Liz walked into Primary holding hands - I love when they rely on each other! The only problem was that Liz refused to sit with her class - she wanted to sit 2 rows back with Jared. The Primary president said that was fine for the first day. I told them to come and get me if she refused to go to her class after singing time. They never came to find me though because she was fine to leave with her class when it was time. (Side note: this past week she was even willing to sit with the Sunbeams - I could tell Jared was a little disappointed!).



When we got home I took some pictures of her - she's starting to look so grown up to me all of a sudden. Not toddler Liz anymore. The first few pictures were very serene; she had her hands behind her back and was smiling nicely. Then she started rockin' her sunbeamness and doing crazy poses. I've included a sampling of shots. She would do a new pose, wait for me to snap the picture, and then change to a new funky pose. At least she keeps me laughing!