Millie's Parent teacher conference

The one thing great this year is that all the children's schools did parent/teacher conference on different nights. This hasn't happened for me in several years and it felt good to not feel rushed. Millie's teacher says she is "practically perfect in every way. Always quiet when she needs to be and a good example to her class. Great writer." She needs to "work on speaking up and sharing ideas." Feels wonderful to have such great kids!

Happenings at Millie's school

For the past two years my kids attended a school other than our neighborhood school. In fact, it was in another city. The school was a great school and had lots of great programs (the autistic unit, the A.L.L classroom) but it never really felt like our school. This year with Matthais moving on to Jr. High and Ian being moved to a different school I thought Millie would be better off at our neighborhood school. I am so happy I moved her! It just feels so much more comfortable, so much more like home. Last week they celebrated safety week with lots of fun activities.

The Jazz Bear came and was the crossing guard one morning.

They did a Bike rodeo. Here is Millie waiting her turn.
And they ended the week with our one, yes ONE fundraiser; a fun run. I can't tell you how excited I am to not be selling cookie dough or wrapping paper. I was more than happy to pay $15 to do a fun run. It was a mini-marathon; 2.62 miles instead of 26.2 miles and it was a lot of fun. The PTA did a great job organizing this and I am happy to report that they made more than enough money!

Me and my girl, ready to get our run on

Millie and her best friend

The girls would run for about 5 secs and the walk. They did this over and over.
I think they need to develop some endurance!

It was so nice to participate and be surrounded by so many familiar faces. It's nice to be home.

To-do list

I am a list maker. Although, I'm not a very good one. I make a list for everything I think about; my day, meals, shopping, people I need to thank, etc.. Just cause I make a list doesn't mean I accomplish it all but it feels good to cross a few things of my list every now and again. Imagine my smile when I found this in Millie's room today...it's a to-do list. Just in case it's hard for you to read I will type it below

Eat Breakfast
Ask for Gloie
NO TV
Get dressed
Play with Courtnee
Clean room
Take a bath
Finish homework
Go to school
Shoes
practice words and read for 20 minutes
Brush Hair
Get hair done

Obviously the things she crossed off are the things she's already done. Some she forgot to cross off others are waiting for her to accomplish after school. I was really proud of her that she was thinking about the things she needed to do today and found a way to organize her thoughts about getting them done. I'm also proud to think that maybe she's a list maker...just like me!

Millie's surgery

We got into the hand specialist first thing Tuesday morning and we had surgery scheduled for the next day. The surgery was a fairly simple procedure but it was something they needed to take care of. They were a little concerned that her finger was broken even though the x-rays looked good. Turns out it was not but there was just a flap of skin stuck under her nail that made her finger mimic a break. She had a deep laceration in her nail bed and they stitched it and the rest of her finger up. She was in good spirits and did a great job. The Dr. was 2 HOURS LATE and I was extremely annoyed. Who keeps a starving, bored 8 year old waiting for 2 HOURS?  I guess when you make the money that he does you get to hold all the strings. (ok, yes I would feel bad if there was some emergency that was holding him up...I just think they could have told me that so I wasn't so annoyed)

at the surgical center

before

after

I know it was nothing major and she was in and out of surgery but I think you always worry about your kids going under the knife. You just never know what side effects they might experience. Luckily Millie did amazing and even attended her first activity days activity later that afternoon! Now we have to leave the bandage on for 10 days then we'll head back to the Dr. for a final update.

Feeling a little stressed

But I guess that's how it goes when you are a mom. I've had a lot on my mind and on my plate lately. The latest? Millie will be going in for surgery tomorrow. I know this surgery is not life threatening in any way but I always get uneasy when one of my babies goes under anesthesia. She will be fine. I will be fine. In the meantime I need to take care of all the logistics like babysitting for Owen and taking the day off and getting everyone to school. I also had to shuffle Dr. appointments and get prescriptions filled. Tomorrow is also Owen's first day of preschool. Hopefully I'll be able to drop him off. There are some good things happening at our house though! I haven't dared post about this in fear of jinxing myself but Ian is 90% potty trained! He still has the occasional pee accident but we have not had a poop accident in a very long time. This is fabulous news for us and we hope that it continues! He seems to be doing really well at his new school too! His behavior has improved as well although we still see breakthroughs in the screaming and tantrums. I'll take any improvement we get. I'm still trying to pull myself together and get my life organized again. I honestly feel like a chicken with my head cut off. I don't know which direction I am going in. Before the kids went back to school I had Adam give me a blessing. I was promised that I would be able to regain control (not in those words exactly) and I know I will. Baby steps. For now I'm going to pop open a diet coke and take 5 minutes for myself before everyone gets home.

Millie's Baptism

I'm so proud of my beautiful daughter and her choice to be baptized. She had been looking forward to this day for as long as I can remember. She looked so beautiful in her white dress.

We had a great turn out even though only half of the family showed up. I guess that's what happens when everyone starts getting older. They have their own life and their own things to do. We had to do a few last minute changes with the program but it turned out really nice. After we had a great lunch at our house.

Millie's Pinkie

Millie and Owen headed out for a bike ride Friday night and only after a few minutes Millie came back crying and bleeding. She had crashed into a fence and ripped her fingernail out of her finger. Adam told me not to take her in because there was nothing they could do about it. I ran her to a neighbor who is a nurse who confirmed so we just bandaged her up and called it good.

Turns out they were wrong. I took her to the Urgent Care today (for a sore throat) and he told me she needs to go into a hand specialist. Unless we don't care if she ever grows a nail again she needs to have the nail bed put back into the finger. Ugh. I knew I should have followed my motherly instincts that night and just taken her to the doctor. Now it will be a bigger deal than it would have originally and will probably cause her more pain. And...It may not even work.

First day of school for the other two

Well, it's the day I've waited for all summer! They are back at school! Well, actually it will be tomorrow before the three oldest are back and next week before Owen starts but I'll take what I can get! I had this great plan this morning...I was going to get Ian on the bus at 8:40 (the pick-up time) take Misty to school and be back by 9:00 to walk Millie to school. Ya, right. Ian's bus never showed. Well, actually it finally came at 9:15 long after I had already taken him. Misty was almost late and Millie walked to school by herself. So sad. I feel like a loser mom sending her that way but I didn't know what else to do! I talked to the principal at Ian's school about the bus and she said she'd take care of it so hopefully it will be on time tomorrow. I'm really excited about this year especially for Ian. I hope and pray this is just what he needs! I am so excited school is back in session,I finally feel like I can BREATHE! but, I have hours of housework to catch up on...sigh. The good news is that what I clean will actually stay clean for more than 5 minutes Yay!

Birthday Bash 2010

This post is kinda late. I had it all typed out and all the pictures loaded and I don't know where it disappeared to. So, here is the story. I had an opportunity to borrow some of those big, blow up water slides for Millie's birthday. She had originally wanted to go roller skating but I talked her into a water party instead. With Owen's birthday only days after hers I couldn't let her have a party and not him so I decided to combined party. I made invitations and put them in water balloons so the kids had to pop them to get the invitation. It was lots of fun. Two days before the party I watched the news and much to my dismay the forecast was for rain. Great. It was suppose to rain all day Wednesday and Thursday but Wednesday wasn't too bad so I crossed my fingers. Early Thursday Becca and Amanda came and set up the water slides. The kids were so excited and couldn't wait until 1:00 when the party would begin. At 12:30 this was the sight...

Dark clouds, wind, thunder, lightening, and rain. Time to come up with plan B. I had 20 kids invited ages 4-8, both boys and girls. What could we do to entertain them all for 2 hours? I quickly got on the computer and came up with a scavenger hunt.

It was a little stressful having that many bodies running through my tiny house but the kids seemed to have a good time.
We did cake and ice cream and opened presents.

And then, HALLELUJAH! The sun came out so I sent them all out for some water fun!

I think they all had a lot of fun! Here is the whole load of them, minus a few who refused to get in the picture

Happy Birthday Emilia and Owen, I hope your day was wonderful!

My Sweet Baby Girl Turns 8!

She is such a joy to have in our lives.

8 years old, I can hardley belive it! Some of Millie's favorites:

Color: Magenta

Food: Grilled cheese sandwiches

Activity: Playing with friends

Best Friend: Lezlie and Courtnee

School Subject: Art

Isn't she a beauty? I feel very blessed to have her as a daughter. She is very obedient and very loving and kind. Happy Birthday Millie!

Hair

When Emilia was born I was surprised to see a full head of hair.

My boys weren't bald but were definatly lacking in hair. But, they were boys! I was excited and thrilled that my first (and only as it turns out) girl had hair that I could do in many different and fun ways. Believe me, we've had a lot of fun with that hair! When she was around 8 months I started putting rollers in her hair to make it curl.

By her first birthday we could already do pigtails...

Now here we are six years later and I still love to do her hair. However, she has decided she loves to do it herself even more. I'm having a hard time letting go of this special (well, special to me I guess) thing. For one...I hate the way it looks when she does it. Second, it means she's growing up and becoming less dependent on me. Part of me is glad that she is learning how to do this so early so that maybe she'll have it mastered by time she hits Jr. high but another part of me would love to do her hair for at least a few more years. For now we compromise. I let her do it occasionally and most days I at least let her choose how I'll do it.

Today as she insisted on doing her own hair I thought how it's not fair that part of teaching these young ones independence also means letting go! I don't think I'm quite ready.

Get 'em while they're hot!!

Hot Shots annual spring concert is May 27th at 7:00 p.m. at the Covey Center for the Arts. Millie will be preforming in two numbers; one tap, one ballet. You can buy tickets now at the Covey Center in Provo. They are $5 each. I think you can even call and order tickets: Ticket Office 801-852-7007 . I was also told you can buy them online but I don't see that up and running yet. You can check back. http://www.coveycenter.org/ These recitals are always so much fun!

Lions, tigers and bears! Oh my!

Millie's final kindergarten project was an animal report on bears. We read a couple of books about bears and she made a diorama (with a little help). This is what she learned about bears (taken straight from her report!)

*Bears have fur. It can be white, brownish-blackish, brown or black.

*Bears walk on all fours but can stand on two legs.

*polar bears live in the Arctic. Others live in forests.

*Bears eat insects, fruit, other animals, roots, nuts, fish, berries and honey.

*Bears hibernate or sleep all winter.

*Except mothers with cubs, bears live alone.

She did a great job and her diorama is now on display in the school library!