Happy Graduation!

Van graduated from the University of Utah in International Relations and Russian. We celebrated with them by going out to dinner. Van looked so dapper in his suit. He is a very handsome man. And he's well educated, now. Johnny boy was obviously confused as to why he was wearing red instead of blue. Evelyn is always up for a good party, regardless of the color scheme. Johnny's shirt was a riddle showing Van's initials, VKM, as well as the initials of the brethren who also graduated from the U. Go, Utes. And Go, Cougars. Even Scotty showed his love from inside the womb!

Congratulations, Van! We're excited for you and Katie and what the future holds for you. We love you.

Girls Night!

My sisters totally surprised me and treated Evelyn and I to pedicures, Pizza Factory, ear piercing (for Ila and Ruby only!) and Cold Stone ice cream. Yum. It was awesome preparation for this baby to come. Evelyn kept saying, "Girls Night!" It was so cute. We only have 4 girl cousins out of 12 grandchildren on my side. Crazy after growing up with 5 girls in my family and one boy. Although I always did grow up thinking I would raise a bunch of blonde boys. Probably just because it was the opposite of what I grew up with so I thought that was what I would get. I love what I have and I can't wait to meet you, Scotty!

My boyz

This boy loves cucumbers. He will eat an entire cuke in one sitting. Sliced, whole - he's not picky.

This boy loves baths. It is almost always the first thing he asks for when he wakes up in the morning. This is not a characteristic he shares with his siblings, who have to be forced to bathe and wash their hair on Sunday mornings. I don't know what happened. They used to love baths and now they could care less. Maybe a cucumber bath would solve all my problems...

Happy Graduation, Kyle!

We are pretty stoked for Kyle to be graduating in Exercise Science from Brigham Young University. Johnny was thinking of him during his Chem 107 final. Chem 107 was the class that helped me realize that my dreams of being a Chemistry teaching major were just that - dreams. Reality was changing to become a Recreation Management major, which I loved. I got my Master's in Youth and Family Recreation and I use it all the time. No bad feelings against chemistry - I wish I could have graduated in it, but it was not to be.

What is to be is Kyle's graduation and acceptance into an OT program in his homeland of Georgia. We celebrated with him by making a Georgia peach ring necklace and a one of a kind T-shirt that was looking good on the pregnant belly. We also share a passion for Shark Tank - an awesome show where business owners present their ideas to investors who may or may not choose to invest in their ideas. KissStix was an idea from boys right here in Utah Valley. So we had to give Kyle and Collette peaches and cream to represent their acceptance into the Georgia OT school.

We love you, Kyle. We're excited, no matter where you attend occupational therapy school and we're really proud of you for getting better than a D in Chem 107 like certain people did before you...

Pass of all Passes

Shout out to Catie Vineyard for hooking us up with a Pass of ALL Passes that has so many goodies, we can't even believe it. Catie found it for $10! The crazy thing is that we were pumped to pay $30 to get it. But right before we bought them, as in hours, Catie found the deal of all deals. Thanks for saving our family money, Cate. We appreciate it.

We are stoked for all the 7 peaks and Real soccer games and Trafalga that we can handle this summer. And it will never feel like a burden to stick it out if kids get cranky (or poopy as demonstrated in our first Trafalga trip) because we only paid $10 to get them in. Totally awesome. 
 

Happy Birthday, Evelyn!

Hear ye, Hear, ye Lords and Ladies of the land

We hereby invite you to an event that will be grand

Evelyn is turning three

She's as princessy as can be

We'll have regal competition with noble reward

Lunch will be served and drinks will be poured

On the castle cake, three candles we will light

And we'll also be having a royal food fight

So come to the party and celebrate

Saturday, April 7 from 10 am to 12 pm is the date

1375 West 1460 North Provo, Utah

Let us know if you can come!

Love,

Queen Christine & Lady Evelyn

Happy Birthday, Jesus

Happy Birthday to Jesus and Grandpa Rey! April 6 is always a fun day. We just happened to go to Macey's grocery store and they dressed us up like bunnies. Here is the story of my life. Davis goes down for his morning nap at 10:30 and sleeps until 12:30. Because Johnny works from home, I pack up both of the other kids to run an errand or leave one in front of a show and take the other with me. I would never try this with Davie's afternoon nap because by then, little people are potentially more cranky. So, morning nap, it is. It makes errands much more bearable but now that I'm at the end of my pregnancy, I'm significantly less patient. It's hard to chase little people around stores. It makes me tired. It's like some invisible magic switch is flipped. At 34 weeks pregnant, it's cute to watch Evelyn pile the Cheese Nips from the bottom of the display into my cart. At 35 weeks, it's annoying and unbearable. So now I take all of my kids to Beal's house so I don't have to have any children to run after during errands. So if Macey's does a 4th of July face paint, my kids are automatically out of luck. Errands without them are so much faster. Maybe my energy will come back post-partum but my current assessment is that kid-free errands are more enjoyable. For me.

Rhymes with Sheen Shoeseum and Polling

Our dad works from home. And from libraries. And from the Anderson's basement. And from the carhouse. I love the end of the day, or the middle of the day when he takes his lunch break or the beginning of the day when we are all together in our bed, when Johnny wrestles and tickles his kids. We love to all be together. It's why we chose the carhouse lifestyle and it's why we will go back to the carhouse lifestyle after Scotty is born. I like to see my husband every day. And this Saturday, our dad worked all day and then we went out for some fun. We want to take advantage of the best parts of Provo while we are here.

The Bean Museum. Evelyn and Johnny were totally willing to pet the snake, the turtle and the bearded dragon at the live reptile show. Johnny brought me his toy turtle later in the week and asked when it would move? And who turned all those birds into statues? That's not nice, mom. I tried to explain taxidermy but he still said that was not nice and he wishes they would move. I think he thinks all of his toys used to be alive until someone turned them into statues...

Evelyn taking a rest by the arctic wolf. You can see the spikes in her side ponytail from her under-aged and unauthorized haircut. I can't get it out of them if it was Eve cutting her own hair or Johnny helping her out. Johnny cut his flush to his head, but the rest of his hair is so long, it covers it up. I keep postponing his next authorized hair cut because I don't want to expose the bald spot.

Bowling was a hit for everyone except Johnny. He sulked and sipped soda while sitting on the sidelines. So silly.

Eve dropped a bowling ball on her toe. Ouch. And you know she means bidness when homegirl puts her hand on her hip. Davis kept picking up bowling balls from the dispenser and walking around with them. Cute, but dangerous.

Iron Chef Marriott America

We stayed at Mountainside Marriott Resort, thanks to Aunt Marilyn's generosity. She let us use her week there because her plans changed at the last minute. Something about a wedding going on and needing to prepare for that...We took full advantage of watching the skiers right out our window, the hot tub despite warnings for pregnant people and children, the kids zone, the gym we walked through as the best short cut to the lobby but never used, luggage carts that we transported kids on and tums from the desk clerk when I had another stomach acid attack. Lovely trip.

We also won the illustrious title of Iron Chef Marriott America. Coconut was the ingredient. We made coconut peanut brittle, coconut chocolate chip cookies and a coconut fruit smoothie. It was fun. And out of thousands of Mountainside Marriott guests, we won! Even though the only other guest that registered to compete was a ten year old...We are the champions!

Say Yes to the Dress (up, that is...)

I love that we live down the street from each other. And I further love that everyone loves to play dress up. And the fact that Nigel was determined to fit in the 18 month old batman costume. Adorable.