Catching a Leprechaun

is hard, they're pretty tricky you know.

A few weeks ago, Zach came home with a school assignment to build a leprechaun trap that was due on St. Patrick's Day. My first thought was, YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME - THESE KIDS ARE ONLY IN SECOND GRADE! But Zach was really excited and had even come up with a design all on his own (maybe there's a little bit of engineer in him just like his mom!). So after thinking about it for a few days, we looked at his ideas and after only a slight modification, we had our design. Using some items around the house, we built our trap early last week and had it all ready to go for St. Patrick's Day.

Here's our trap all built:


Here's how it works. The Leprechaun will come up to the trap and notice the WELCOME! sign on the front, so of course he'll come right up into the box. The next thing he'll do is see the ramp with the sign tell him that there is gold this way and to go where the arrow is pointing.


He'll walk up the ramp and notice the shiny gold coin at the top. Well, since Leprechauns just love shiny, gold things, he'll really want that gold for his pot of gold. He'll think he can just walk right across that white ramp across the cup. Of course what he doesn't know is that is made of paper, so as soon as he starts across and grabs the gold, he'll fall into the cup holding on to the gold coin. But you'll notice that the gold is attached to a string which also has a round piece of cardboard attached as well. As the string is pulled, this piece of cardboard also comes down and covers the cup, trapping the leprechaun inside.


Unfortunately, we didn't catch any leprechauns this year, but Zach had a blast taking it to school and explaining/demonstrating his nifty little leprechaun trap. He was so proud of coming up with the design and pretty much building it all by himself (minus the hot gluing part!).


To be honest, what I thought was going to be really painful turned into a really fun time for the two of us to talk, plan, and build. We were really both excited and proud with the final product.

In fact, he had so much fun, he told me that he's already thinking about the changes he wants to make to it for next year. Oh boy, this should be fun! :)

Zach's 8th Birthday

Zach had a full week of birthday celebrations this year. We started off with a little family party the Sunday before his birthday. We had Nana, Papa, Ashton, Branson, Aunt Kylie, Uncle Jedd, and Libby all here to celebrate. We had dinner, opened presents, and had cake and ice cream. It was the perfect kick-off to a fun week. I didn't get any pictures because things were just crazy, but here are the fun presents he got:

Nana and Papa - Scout shirt, sports trading cards
Kylie, Jedd, and Libby - Scout belt, scout pencils
Ashy and Brans (and Aunt Shell and Uncle Brian) - sports trading card set

On Friday, Zach's actual birthday, we started out the day with a special birthday breakfast. Yes, those are blue crepes you see! We seem to have started this tradition of a special colored breakfast for the birthday person. This year Zach wanted blue crepes, so blue crepes he got.


And what would breakfast be without an "AAAARRRR PIRATES?!?"


Yes, he was pretty excited to have such a special breakfast before school!


Tate wasn't sure what to make of all the craziness that morning. He sat in his highchair for a bit just looking at his silly brother and sister. Of course, he seemed just fine with everything once I started giving him little baby bites of crepes. Yes, I think he's found a new favorite breakfast!


After breakfast and getting everything set, we sent Zach off for a fun day at school where he said they had a little party for him and he got balloons (which were apparently so much better than the ones I had hung for him at home - go figure!). Later that afternoon, Nana and Papa came back down to have dinner, cake and ice cream, and open presents again. This time I was able to get quite a few pictures:

For Christmas, Jeremiah did a fun little scavenger hunt for me and ever since then, Zach has been telling me he wanted a treasure hunt for his birthday. So I decided to put one together for him and make all his gifts from us as the treasure. He started out with one clue and then once he figured out the place he was supposed to go, off he went giggling in search of the next one.


He didn't quite get it, but every clue I came up with rhymed. I still can't figure out why I spent so much time getting the clues and rhymes just right - he was just excited to run around finding clues.


Once the "treasure" was found, it was time to open them up.

* Nana and Papa gave him a scout book
* Uncle Bubby and Aunt Afton sent him some monster trucks and some basketball shorts
* Hailey gave him a Buzz Lightyear Operation Game (I'm not sure who was more excited to play it, her or him)
* Tate gave him a whole bunch of sports trading cards
* Jeremiah and I gave him a mp3 player/microphone, Trios, and a tie





Tate spent most of the present opening time with Nana and Papa because that wrapping paper was just too tempting and he kept putting it in his mouth.


Once we finished opening presents and had everything cleaned up, he wanted back on the floor, so that's where he went and proceeded to roll ALL OVER THE PLACE!


A little bit later, it was time for cake and ice cream. This year Zach just wanted a simple cake with blue frosting and red sprinkles (what a relief, I'm definitely not a fancy cake decorator!).


After lighting the candles, singing Happy Birthday to you, it was time to blow them out. Zach can not seem to do that without smiling!


For his birthday, Zach decided he wanted to have potatoes and gravy for dinner, so instead of going out to eat, we just had dinner at home where we could make it just the way he liked it. Jeremiah of course had to do something wacky, so he put green food coloring in the mashed potatoes. I meant to get a picture, but they were gobbled up before I even had a chance!

He also decided he wanted to go to the Nickelcade again (the same as last year). Instead of trying to go on Friday night, we decided to go on Saturday afternoon in between Tate's naps so that we all could go and have fun. It was really loud, but Tate didn't seem to mind. He loved riding the little merry-go round, ...


... the truck with his brother, ...


... and numerous other driving games with his dad.


The kids just love to do the driving games. It's so fun to see the two of them sitting there playing. Hailey was hilarious though, she spent more time watching Zach, Tate, or anything else than she did to watching what she was doing. Ironically, she took 1st place more times than Zach did, go figure.


One of their favorite games to play is skeeball. They probably got this from me, becuase it's one of my absolute favorite games as well. I was really impressed with how well Zach did - he got the ball in so many high point areas, he's really got good control with rolling it up the ramp. He definitely takes his time and makes sure he's good and set before letting the ball go. Hailey on the other hand, is much more spuratic. In fact, I don't think she was even looking half the time before she threw the ball. Notice I said "threw" not "rolled" - she hit the outside cage more times than not. Another few trips there and we'll probably owe them a brand new skeeball machine!


Another favorite is the air hockey game. The kids loved playing this. Zach won by quite a margin, but that's only because accidentally hit the puck into her own goal a couple of times. But regardless of the score, they had a blast!


After finishing up at the Nickelcade an hour and a half later (that felt more like 10 hours later), we drove down to the Krispy Creme Donuts to watch donuts being made and get a little treat.

And thus ended another birthday for our big boy. He kept telling us how much fun he had and how he can't wait until his birthday next year.

I can't believe he's 8 already - where did all that time go? Next up for him is his baptism next month. He's so excited and can hardly wait!

Tate Is Nine Months Old!

Yes, that's right, I said nine months. Where on earth did all that time go? Our little baby has really grown up, in fact, he's not so little anymore. Just ask the doctor, here were his stats at his nine month appointment:

Length: 29 1/2 inches (~90th percentile)
Weight: 24 lbs, 9 ounces (~95th percentile)
(Yes, I have to lug around a 25 pound little bundle of chub everywhere I go!)

I knew he would be big and I was right, just about 25 pounds. I wish I could say it was beefing up my muscles, but all it's seemed to do is make my arms really, really tired all the time. Good thing I love that little monkey!

Here are a couple of fun new things that Tate is doing or about him at nine months:

- He now has 3 teeth, two on the bottom and one on the top. He's the cutest when he smiles and you see these tiny little teeth popping up from his bottom gums. Getting them in wasn't the most fun, they all 3 popped through in about the space of 2-3 days. Luckily other than being a bit cranky, we didn't have too much of a hard time, although I'm sure it wasn't very much fun for Tate. Now that he's got some teeth, we are on to the fun part of eating, namely teething biscuits. Both Zach and Hailey loved these and it seems Tate is not exception. He loves to eat them, smear the goo all over everything, and make a tremendous mess!



- Tate absolutely loves being in his megasaucer. He will jump up and down and spin around in that thing for quite a while, which is nice if I need to get something done and need to have him stay in one place. He also loves this little singing monkey toy Hailey gave him for Christmas (I love that smile!).



- He discovered his tongue quite a bit ago, but he's just recently figured out he can twist it around in his month. It's darling to watch because he always has the funniest expressions on his face.



- He is really mobile now. Even though he doesn't crawl, he's figured out how to get himself around by using his feet to turn his body and rolling to get where he wants to go. He spends a lot of time on his belly and sometimes wiggles himself backwards, so we're probably on the verge of crawling.



- I quite often will lay him down in the center of the floor and will look back maybe 2 to 3 seconds later and he will be all the way across the room. His favorite thing to do is get himself situated near a wall where he can kick it. He will usually lay there and kick the wall forever!



- He is finally done with his acid reflux! Something I am so grateful for since it seemed he was going to be spitting up into his 30's! Now that he's off his medication and not spitting anymore, it's been so much less stressful even doing some of the ordinary things in life!

- He loves to eat big people food. In fact, the doctor said that he's now able to have some table food as long as it's small and soft. This means more potatoes and gravy, ice cream, and his recently discovered love: crepes!

We certainly are having fun with him and seeing him do all these new and exciting things. He is such a joy to our entire family, we are just loving everything about him!

Vroom Vroom!

That's right, after a long and crazy week, we finally purchased a new truck last Friday. It was a little more than we wanted to pay, but we just couldn't pass up the good deal on such a new and hardly driven vehicle. So without further ado, here's our new truck:

2008 Nissan Frontier with just under 27,000 miles on it.


This isn't the best angle and it's a little dark, but it gives you an idea of how long it is.


We are so excited about the bed cover - it will be so nice with the snow and also if we ever need to transport things in the bed, this cover is going to be so nice!


It was previously owned by one person and they kept it so very nice - inside and out! Here's the front seat...


... and the back seat - something we've desperately wanted for a couple years now! The best part is that all 5 of us can fit into the new truck - this will be so nice instead of having to take 2 vehicles any time we need to transport anything big and all of us need to go.


Jeremiah's the lucky one since he's the one that primarily drives it, but I'm so happy that he loves it and it's nice to be able to get him something that he's so happy with. Hailey's happy about it too. If you remember her fascination with red cars, then you can only imagine how happy she is that we actually OWN a red car now. In fact, it was priceless to see her face light up when Jeremiah drove it home on Friday to show us. You would have thought it was Christmas all over again!

Yes, to say the least, we are all THRILLED with our new truck.

Valentine's Day 2011 - interesting to say the least!

I wish I could say our Valentine's Day was full of fun and excitement and all sorts of neat things. Unfortunately, it was anything but that. For those of you that haven't heard, Jeremiah was in a car accident last Friday. He's fine and the speeds were very slow, so no worries about him or the other driver. So while the insurance company sorted everything out, we patiently waited all weekend for news on the final outcome. Unfortunately, because our truck was so old and the angle at which the collision occurred, it would have cost more to fix the truck than just total it.

So we were basically left to say goodbye to the truck that has served us well the last 5 1/2 years and begin gearing up for buying a new one. Of course because we were now down to one car, I began the tedious task of getting Jeremiah to work (which is in Spanish Fork and a good 30-35 minute drive one way on a good day with no traffic) and getting each of the kids to school and their various activities.

So rather than a relaxing Monday morning, we woke up the kids early, got them fed, dressed, and in the car by 7:20am so we could get Jeremiah to work on time. After that we headed home, fed Tate, and got Zach off to school. I then spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon working, talking with the insurance company on the phone (numerous times), and taking care of Tate and Hailey. We then got a call from Jeremiah saying he was ready to come home, so as soon as Zach walked in the door from school at 2:45, we all jumped in the car and headed back to Spanish Fork to get him. We then flew back to Lehi to get Hailey to cheerleading at 4pm. We dropped her off and then headed over to the towing company to clean all our stuff out of the truck, drop off the keys, and give them permission for the insurance company to take it. Then we went back to the Legacy Center to pick up Hailey (it was now 5pm) and we headed home. Once we got home, we fixed dinner, ate dinner, got homework done, and did a little mini-Valentine's Day celebration (it was less than 15 minutes long) as Family Home Evening before reading scriptures, saying family prayer, and getting the kids in bed on time. After that we were so exhausted from the day, that Jeremiah and I were in bed and asleep around 9:30pm.

So that was our Valentine's Day. Nothing like we were hoping, not even close. But as I reflected later than night on the day's activities, I decided that we were blessed just to have made sure we had everyone where they needed to be and home and we all were healthy and together. I've come to realize that sometimes blessings come in the form of not having any more bad news! So we're content that the day, although extremely hectic, was a success and more importantly - OVER!

To let you know where we are right now with things, I wish I could say we found another vehicle right away and everything is now back to normal. But we're still looking and we're hoping that we find one that suits our needs and budget in the next day or so. In the meatime, the rest of this week has been a bit crazy. Luckily, with some help from my wonderful mother and father who have been on hand as needed, we were able to send Jeremiah our other car Tuesday and Wednesday, and my mom watched all the kids while I dropped off and picked up Jeremiah yesterday, and they both even went to Zach's game last night to support him while I was at my Relief Society Activity. She even watched the kids for a few hours on Wednesday afternoon so Jeremiah and I could go look for a bit. I really don't know what we would have done without them and all their help!

Luckily our only activity that required us to have the car today was cancelled, so we were able to send the car with Jeremiah again. He's hoping to get off a little early today so that he can drop by a few dealerships on the way home and check out some trucks we saw online. So we're hoping that by tomorrow we'll have a spiffy new vehicle for him to drive around. I sure hope so because next week is going to be crazy as well and I'm not looking forward to trying to get everyone to where they need to be with just one vehicle. I'm hoping it won't be much longer until things are back to normal around here (at least the chaotic normal we're used to)!

Wish us luck! I have a feeling we're going to need it!

Zach - Basketball 2011

It's January and February and for us, that means another season of Zach playing ...

BASKETBALL!

We were so impressed at what he remembers from the last couple of years. As usual, he is a top scorer on their team. The very first game, he scored 7 baskets. Every game since then, it's been at least 5-7 baskets. He is having so much fun and we are having a blast watching him.

Dribbling down the court to score.


Guarding his assigned guy.


More guarding (he's really good at this!).


Last week Awa, Jedd, and little Libby came down to watch his game. It was so fun to have them there and although it was loud, little Libs was great! Hailey had more fun watching and holding Libby than she did watching the game.


Since we know the still shots don't do our little basketball man justice, here is some video of him playing:

Shooting and Scoring (of course).



And guarding.



I think we have a basketball star on our hands! We're already more than half way through the season and we have all had so much fun watching, we'll be sad when it's over.

Way to go ZACH - we are all so proud of you!

Rolling Over!

After much anticipation and patience, we finally have a little baby that can roll over! He rolled from his front side to his back side on Monday, January 24th. It was really special since all four of us were there watching him and saw it the very first time. I had some video, but it was really blurry because I was so excited and the lighting really wasn't good at all since it was evening. So after a few days, I finally got him to roll over when I was ready with the camera. So for all of you out there dying to see it, here it is:



Most babies roll over earlier than 8 months, but due to Tate's acid reflux, we haven't been able to put him on his belly very often, so he hasn't had much practice or opportunity to do it until recently.

It was so cute to see him roll over. He really doesn't like to be on his belly, so I think he just all of a sudden decided to get off of it himself! He has also rolled over from his back to his belly once on Friday, January 28th - but I think it was more of an accident and he wasn't happy to be on his belly, so that might not happen very often for now. But at least we know he can do it.

Yes, we are quite proud of our big boy!