Baby Love

Here is Ben and baby Mckynlee. We babysit her Monday thru Thursday.

Ben LOVES babies and willingly plays with her and asks to feed her.

Yesterday he told me "I wish she was our baby and we could keep her." Me too buddy. Someday we'll get you a little baby to keep forever.

Donuts

So, I was reading my sister-in-law Abby's blog and she made donuts yesterday for breakfast. They looked delicious!!! So Ben and I made them for lunch!!!Here is my little helper!

And here is the animal in him coming out...OK I did have him pose for this one. But the kid really is in love with donuts!

As he was eating them he said "I love donuts, they are so good for my heart!" Uhhh...not really son. But he means they make him happy, so life is still good =)

Thanks Abby! And yes, they were delicious!

My Assignment..tweaked =)

So I have kind of, OK, really gotten into this blogging thing. I haven't scrapbooked for a few years and in California I used to scrapbook at least once a week. But I really enjoy sharing pictures and journaling. So When my sister Elizabeth introduced me to blogging I was like huh...OK. But then I never really did it. Until I discovered how much I enjoyed writing about my family & my life. Some of you might get bored with my ramblings, so then don't read my blog. Wow, that was easy to solve! I found a link to another blog from someone I don't even know...weird I know! But she is very funny and I enjoy her ramblings about life. Her link is down in my list of blogs...Mama's Losin' It! She challenges readers to write prompts that she posts weekly and this week I thought I would give it a try. So I needed to find the 7th picture I took last January and write a poem...ummm...I'm not into poems so I am just going to tell the story and whatever else comes to mind. Warning: this may get long, cause I truly do ramble. Feel free to skip it at anytime. I won't know=)
This was taken one evening, January 6, 2009 to be exact, as Matt and I were out shoveling our walks and driveway. The kids were playing in the snow and needed help building a snowman. I could tell Matt would rather do that then shovel so I tell him to take a break and I would keep shoveling. He LOVES playing in the snow with the kids. Here he is covered in melted snow, frozen and as happy as can be. Wow, I love this man. I'm still not sure if I deserve him, or even what i did to snag him! He is a very good husband and father. I still think it's funny when he gets his "daddy" voice out. He tries to sound all mean and gruff, but I know it's all fake. His Aunt Rhonda told me once that Matt has one of the kindest hearts. It's true. I wish I could say the same for me, but yeah...
He will stay up at night with me if I am sick, even though he has work in the morning. He always helped me at night when the kids were babies. He would take his turn rocking them to sleep, or in Isabelle's case bouncing her to sleep! He treats me like a queen even when I don't deserve it.
He accepts me for who I am.
He accepts that I will never be Martha Stewart and that our home will never be spic and span no matter how many schedules and goals I set.
He accepts that I am creative and when I get creative the house gets a little messy and we have to shove crafting supplies to one end of the table so we can eat.
He accepts me at any weight I am. And helps haul me out of bed at 5 am (at my request!) so I can go to the gym...yes he does go back to sleep, but who wouldn't???
He accepts the fact that I have this weird urge to mix things up and start swapping furniture from room to room. He will help haul couches upstairs and downstairs.
He accepts that i will most likely never be content with my hair and I will dye it every color imaginable and cut it short and let it grow long and then cut it again. He says he likes it short now, but I think secretly he still would love it best long.
He accepts my crazy ideas and lets me run with them. And then yes he accepts the fact that he does eventually need to reign me in and not let me get ahead of myself.
He accepts that I am a VERY emotional person and lets me cry, scream, and laugh whenever I feel the need. No, I am not bipolar, but I'm sure some of you have your doubts. He is a great person to vent to. He listens and lets me get it all out. Gives me a hug and then we get on with our lives...unless I need to vent on the subject again...which does happen...occasionally.
He always tells me what a wonderful mother and wife I am, even though we are all still in our pajamas when he gets home from work, the house is a mess, dinner is just being thought about, and we have done nothing, yes nothing, all day.
I love this man. I still believe I am the luckiest girl to have snagged him and that he has stayed snagged. I hope that he knows how appreciated he is. And how much the kids LOVE playing in the snow with him too.

I think my van has a cold!

So last night A bunch of us girls from the ward were getting together to kidnap Kristen Jolley for her birthday and take her out for dessert. There were a total of twelve of us. I picked up 3 so we had 4 in my van. Well after everyone was picked up Kristen still wasn't home from work yet, (This is 9 at night just fyi) and so we decided to wait at the park just across the street from her house until she got home. Ummm...if you don't know me too well, well first of all you shouldn't be reading my blog, and secondly, you know something interesting ALWAYS seems to happen when I'm around. I think it's a curse, so you might want to rethink hanging out with me.

So we are all having a good old time when my car shudders and a great big whooshing sound, followed by a hissing sound emits from under my hood (a giant sneeze). We all look at each other and everyone hops out of both vans to come and take a share in my utter humiliation. Yeah, it seriously looked like a glow stick exploded in my engine (yucky green snot). Lovely....WE JUST BOUGHT THE STUPID THING!!!!!! So one girl gets her husband over fast and another girl calls one of the guys in the ward who is close by and knows a thing about cars. I called my husband and he was like, "well Casey and Dave are there, so you should be fine." WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!? You have got to be kidding me. I tell him to grab our neighbor to sit at the house just in case one of the kids wakes up and to get his little rear over here. He.doesn't.come. So I call him again and tell him that his wife is sitting at the park where the van exploded and to move it mister! Apparently he didn't want to wake the neighbors, but I assured him Gary was awake and would not mind sitting at our house for 10 minutes. So he did end up coming to my rescue. Good man. So I leave with the girls and we go out & I am sick to my stomach, cause how the heck are we going to pay for this? So we think that the air conditioner blew something (apparently using the defroster uses the air conditioner, cause I was definitely NOT using the a/c!). A bolt was broken, so either the bolt was old and cracked or something built up enough pressure to break the bolt sending freon spewing into and out of the hood. I think it looks sick.

But it might just be faking, so it is in timeout in the driveway for the time being. I would spank it, but would probably break my hand. Stupid van!

Sledding + boys = TOTAL FUN!

We went sledding yesterday at the walking park by the elementary school. Isabelle didn't go...she's in school now...booo! Sharon Bee had texted me the day before saying she wanted to go sledding. I didn't say a word to Ben cause I wasn't sure if I wanted to go or not. So the next day, which was yesterday, the appointed hour was drawing near...Ben was going insane being cooped up inside. He kept asking me if he could go play in the snow and even started getting his snow clothes on. So then I texted Sharon and said we HAVE to go. Ummm....she was like "oh well I'm paying bills, so I am wussing out." WHAT?!?!?

Well here she is with little Rachel....Yay for convincing her bills can wait! Rachel really is smiling, she just REALLY wanted to eat the snow on her gloves. Kristen Peer and Jordan were there too...but I do not have a picture because Peer doesn't listen when i say "Stop, I'm taking your picture! HEY! STOP! STOP!" Apparently she thought I was talking to one of the kids. In a way, I guess I was! Hahaha love ya Peer!

Adorable James Bee. And yes, he is wearing 3 hats! Man, I love this kid. He is as shy as can be, but somehow around me he lets loose a little. =)

Here's my Benny! He was so excited to be out in the snow with the boys, and Rachel too. =)

I even went down a few times, can't let the kids have ALL the fun!

After we picked up Isabelle we went to see Marilyn at the Care Center. But she was in the shower so we went hunting for hot chocolate...the place I wanted to go has super yummy peppermint cocoa for only a $1.25, but yeah, they were closed for maintenance. BUMMER! But we finally found some at The Quilted Bear, and it was only $1. Plus they have yummy cookies! Afterwards we did go back to see Marilyn, so that was fun too. Ben wanted to sing for her. Oh man, he is a cutie!

Better Late Than Never...

Since August Matt has been working for a company in Salt Lake City, Galileo Processing. He LOVES it. My friend Sharon Bee's husband got hired a couple months before Matt did and that was how we found out about the company in the first place. So for the company Christmas party they held it December 3rd at the Grand America hotel in Salt Lake. Formal attire was requested....I was on cloud 9!!! I have been wanting to go to a formal for years! I think the real last formal gown I wore was my wedding dress, so yeah, it had been awhile.

Here I am with Sharon...sorry about the fuzzy picture but the lighting wasn't bright and well it is a cell phone picture so what do you expect!

Here I am in all my formal glory! I LOVED IT! Matt looked super nice too in a new shirt and tie. Plus new slacks...the man truly needed them! Sorry no picture of him...I don't know what I was thinking.

The Grand America hotel is like super swanky...I don't believe I have ever been anywhere fancier. Such a fun night...delicious food, good friends, formal attire, handsome date..what more could a girl ask for?

OK, I would probably ask for dancing, but beggars can't be choosers. I will just have Matt bug the party planning committee about that one =)

A new decade

Happy New Year Everyone!!!

We had a super fun night. The Peer's, Jolley's, Bee's, and of course the Robertson's all got together for the night. We hired two Young Women in our ward to watch all 9 children at the Jolley's house...who by the way have the smallest house of the bunch, but I guess that just made it all the more interesting! The adults went over to the Peer's house and played games...It was SO much fun! We relieved the babysitters at 10 pm so we could ring in the New York new years celebration with the kids.

They had poppers to pop and were screaming with excitement. Then they all ran to the door and started yelling "Happy New Year!!!!" It was so funny!
In all of the excitement I managed to snag a couple pix of the kids! You can see the boys still going to town with the poppers in the background...

This took me like a million tries to get a semi decent picture of Ben. I also happened to snag Kristen J's bum in the back which has made this picture just that much more special!

Jordan Peer & Ben wrestling. I totally don't understand boy's need for wrestling. But if there is a boy over playing with Ben, there will be wrestling involved!

Happy New Year toast with Matt! We had sparkling apple-peach cider & it was sinfully delicious.

We were going to watch the movie "Land of the Lost." We hadn't heard anything about it, but we both remember the show from growing up. So we thought that would be a fun new movie to watch while we waited for 2010. Ummm....vulgar...horribly vulgar! We watched about 15 minutes max and then shut it off. Thankfully we only paid a buck at the Red Box for it. Except now I remember we forgot to return it...and it is after nine...so let's make that 2 bucks...dang it!

Happy 2010!!!!