I really enjoyed this last General Conference! It always gets me so excited about being a better wife and mom and has such wonderful ideas to help me! I really liked M. Russel Ballard's talk, "Daughter's of God."



http://lds.org/conference/talk/display/0,5232,23-1-851-37,00.html





I was going to list all the things I really liked, but they I realized I was listing the whole talk!! So just go ahead and read it! It is so reassuring to read this and realize that leaders of the church realize how hard and important a job it is to be a mother. After reading it, I am going to strive to do better!!

Mom on the phone + Desitin = A good time had by all!

We had the greatest family vacation this last weekend. We went up to Washington to this new lodge they just opened called The Great Wolf Lodge. It was so fun!!
We had the coolest room...there was a little built in cabin that had bunk beds plus a little day bed. It had it's own flat screen TV. The kids were in heaven! It also had a queen bed and a couch with a pull out bed. We enjoyed the fire place...since it was freezing outside!The hotel had a HUGE indoor water park. It had a wave pool, lots of big water slides...some the kids were even brave enough to go down, a really awesome kid area and a big tree house water structure. Look close...that's us standing down just as the huge bucket of water dumped on us! Here's cute little Larkin...she was not a fan of the water at all! The sick little baby pretty much slept in her car seat the whole time...which was nice so we could better play with the other kids. Don't you just love her little rash guard...whoever invented them is my hero!
Good old Arwen, having tons of fun. Her favorite place to be was in the wave pool. She was content to let her life jacket do all the work and play in the waves!Brave little Noah went down a slide bigger than this one BY HIMSELF! I was amazed. He had so much fun!
You really need to appreciate this picture...Aaron was taking some pictures of Josh when Noah kicked water at him...Aaron miraculously saved the camera!
Here's crazy Arwen again!Joshua had fun, I think. He kind of just stuck to himself and played in the shallowest of water. The naughty little kid kept trying to eat his life jacket...mmmm....tasty!
This is the greatest picture ever...Joshua would stand at the top of the slide and point his little finger and tell all the kids, "No," when they tried to go down the slide. He was cracking me up!!
Cute little girl...just hangin' out, relaxin', all actin' all cool...

After all our swimming fun, we headed north so spend a night in Seattle. We had to stop at the Bonsai Gardens on the way, of course!
This one was Arwen and Aaron's favorite...what in the world?? Looks pretty easy to recreate, huh? Who knows, maybe it's nearly impossible!!
This one was Arwen's favorite! The also had Bonsai rocks...yep...pretty much they were rocks in a pretty bowl. Now, when you come to my house and wonder why you find rocks on the piano, in all my plants, in every drawer, in the kids' toy boxes...I can say they are our "Bonsai Rocks!!"
Then we got to Seattle and walked around the city center. The kids always like to go and play by the big music exhibit.
We were lucky...we kept avoiding the rain/hail/snow. By the time we got into our hotel, we were freezing! Arwen, Noah, and I enjoyed swimming in the hotel's pool while Aaron and the little guys watched a few cartoons! Did I mention that our hotel in Seattle was gross...we got a pet room that was clean enough...except I KNEW cats had been there. I was an itchy mess!! Gross...

We woke up Saturday morning and enjoyed a yummy buffet breakfast in our hotel. Then we ventured off to play some more in Seattle. The only problem...it was 38 degrees outside...FREEZING!! Goodness, we had 86 degree weather only one week ago, what happened!! We decided to see a few sights from the car while it warmed up. Aaron took us to a troll under a bridge that he had heard about. Noah, of course, was scared to death!
It was pretty cool. The kids were really concerned that it was real and that he wasn't really dead and would eat them...Dad did nothing to convince them otherwise :)

All of the other pictures of Noah on the nose were of him crying...so be proud of this brave little boy!!
Then we decided to brave the cold weather and go to the fish market. Noah was not so sure about this place and thought it was stinky.Arwen was fascinated by the red fish! We had fun watching the guys throw the fish every time someone ordered something. We got some manilla clams and it was fun to hear them yell, "One pound of clams," and then he chucked them to the guy at the cash register!Look at all those pretty colors!! How fun would it be to live next door to an awesome farmer's market where you could get tons of fresh seafood, produce, and flowers??Look at the sign...it has Larkin's name on it!!

The sun came out and we went to the Kobota Gardens. The little kids were sleeping so I took Noah out to take a few photos. He pretty much told me he was freezing a million times, so we didn't get too far!
This was a really pretty little pond we found!Arwen was pretty entranced with a dead mouse she found on the edge of this rock...so much for the beautiful scenery!!What a cutie! We drove home after this. We had a great time!!

Here's our beautiful Sparkly Larkily. ("Larkily" because she's Larkin Emily.) She is the sweetest, most kissable baby ever. I read "Peter Pan," by J.M. Barrie a few years ago. Right at the beginning of the book, the author describes Mrs. Darling, Wendy's mother. "...her sweet mocking mouth had one kiss on it that Wendy could never get, though there it was, perfectly conspicuous in the right-hand corner." I have pondered on that sentence for years, never quite understanding it. But, Larkin makes this face that I adore and one day I realized that she has that one kiss there on the right-hand corner of her sweet mouth that I can never get! The last picture is the face I am talking about...though it's a poorly taken picture. But you can almost see that one kiss!



You see? There it is! Don't you just want to try and get it?? Good luck :)

Noahisms: I took the kids to play at a friends house this last week and Josh was whining and clinging to me the whole time (turns out, the poor baby was sick!). Anyways, Noah come into the room and said to me, "Shosh is murmuring like Lamen and Lemuel."--this from the King of Murmur!!



Yesterday, Josh swiped one of Noah's treasures (a pink eraser he found on a hike with Aaron) and Noah was trying everything in his power to convince Josh to give it back. The best was when he said this: "You need to repent, Shosh!"



FYI: A few people have asked if we use any special books when teaching our kids the scriptures stories. We actually just use the Book of Mormon/Bible. Instead of reading the verses every morning for Family Scripture time, we read key scriptures and tell the rest of the stories in our own words. Then we ask the kids lots of questions to make sure they understand what the scriptures are trying to teach them. It has been working so much better than just reading directly from the scriptures...at least until they are a little older and better able to understand the verses for themselves.

We went to the zoo with some friends today. We thought it was going to be nice (dry) weather, but we got drizzled on the whole time. It was really fun though! The kids were really well behaved (only ran away from us a few times!!) and we saw lots of animals without any crowds due to the wet weather.
Here are all of the kids. This is the only picture I got with all of the kids actually facing the camera! Too bad Noah's eyes are shut!
The kids had fun watching the polar bears. Noah decided he actually was a polar bear and made this crazy face in all the rest of the pictures.
I'm not quite sure what look Arwen was going for here, but I thought it was a cute picture!
Good old Arwen has her "camera" smile. I couldn't get her to look natural for anything!
Yup, here's my vicious polar bear again! Noah cracks me up! What a fun trip! Larkin was so good and slept in her car seat in the stroller the whole time. Joshua rode in the stroller half the time, and then decided to join the kids walking! I kept asking him if he wanted to get back in the stroller and he would shake his head and say,"No." He LOVES to tell me no!! So cute!! Ha! I just noticed that there is only one animal in any of these pictures...well, I guess there were 6 cute little animals in all of the them!!

There is a song that I hear on the radio all the time and I really like it. It's kind of a dumb song, but it's just one of those that I get excited when I hear it. The lyrics are dumb and the message is not one that I believe in..."It's too late to apologize." BUT, Noah is in trouble all day, everyday it seems lately. And I find myself saying, "It's too late to apologize," as he's yelling, "Sorry...I WILL be good." So, enjoy this song while you think of me and carrying Noah up over my shoulder to his room for the 100th time that day. (it doesn't work if you are using firefox...at least it won't for me...but it loads up just fine in explorer.)

One Republic Apologize Lyrics

I'm holding on your rope


Got me ten feet off the ground


I'm hearin' what you say but I just can't make a sound


You tell me that you need me


Then you go and cut me down, but wait


You tell me that you're sorry


Didn't think I'd turn around, and say...



It's too late to apologize, it's too late


I said it's too late to apologize, it's too late



I'd take another chance, take a fall


Take a shot for you


And I need you like a heart needs a beat


But it's nothin new


I loved you with a fire red-


Now it's turning blue, and you say...


"Sorry" like the angel heaven let me think was you


But I'm afraid...



It's too late to apologize, it's too late


I said it's too late to apologize, it's too late



It's too late to apologize, it's too late


I said it's too late to apologize, it's too late


It's too late to apologize, yeah


I said it's too late to apologize, yeah-


I'm holdin' on your rope, got me ten feet off the ground...

Apparently Daddy was way too nice in allowing the boys the toys he did after Friday night when they went into DESTRUCTOR mode. They did it again! Since there were only a few toys left in their bins, they just decided to knock the bins over. AND, they crawled under their beds and got out the legos and lincoln logs! Yippy!! They tore more clothes out of their drawers and pulled every piece of bedding on the floor!! I cleaned everything up, AGAIN, and made a LARGE pile of things for the DI. What am I going to do?? I am losing my mind...

Wait, I KNOW the solution. I keep thinking that giving all their toys to the DI will solve my problem. I'm going about this all wrong. If you have a problem, you need to go to the SOURCE of the problem....THE BOYS!!! Get ready DI, you have two DESTRUCTOR boys coming to join all your junky junk this afternoon! I feel so much better about life!! ;)

Yesterday, me and Arwen went on a little date before tap lessons. We decided to go out for breakfast at the IHOP across the street from her dance studio. To our surprise and happiness, we saw that they were doing Dr. Suess food. They had green eggs (scrambled eggs with broccoli) that look yummy, but, when Arwen and I saw the Who-Cakes, we knew they were meant for her! There were 5 delicious pancakes topped with pink and blue gooey goodness! Chocolate sprinkles were on top of that. And it had a lollipop in the middle of all that sugary goodness! It was really fun! Me and Arwen decided to surprise the boys and make that for their breakfast today. (We used gogurts instead of making the boysenberry and blueberry sauces...but other than that, they were about the same!)

"I am the king of the universe!!" Pretty much the only thing Josh ate was the sucker!
It's that look again...I think it must mean..."I am so looking forward to this tastiness!"
Thanks Arnie for all your help to make a fun breakfast!

Okay, so this picture does not even come close to displaying the badness of my boys (well boy, really...Joshua just goes along with whatever is happening...be it good or bad). I have a set of those colored toy bins in each of the kids' rooms...you know them...they have 12 plastic colored bins. I like to keep the kids' toys somewhat organized, so they can find what they want to play with without having to search too hard. The boys dumped out every single toy from the bins THREE times this week, just for the sake of making a mess. The last time I helped them clean them up, I warned them that the next time it happened, I was going to pick every single toy up off the floor, put it in a garbage bag and then keep them for myself. Well, last night, when they were supposed to be sleeping, I heard the extreme badness going on up there. FIRST, they opened up their drawers and threw out all of their clothes onto the floor. We told them to stop and go to bed. THEN, they DUMPED the toys AGAIN!!! I told them that in the morning I was coming in with a garbage bag, unless they picked them all up. Needless to say, they didn't pick them up.
The camera battery died, but this picture shows a small magnitude of the mess. AND, notice how the boys don't have blinds anymore...that's because destructor boy Noah TORE them (they weren't blinds really, but papery type window covers). Why, I ask you are boys so destructive...and I don't want to hear if your boy isn't...I like living in my fantasy world that all little boys are just as naughty as mine!! I need some suggestions. I told the boys they can earn their toys back...what's a good way to do that?? (I am really tempted to throw them all away!!!)