Good Kids

Most people think that teenagers are a group of people that are to be endured until they muddle through to adulthood. However, we have really enjoyed Haylee's teen years, most of the time. Haylee is a good kid with her head on straight, she knows who she is and befriends those around her. Our church had a formal youth dance last weekend and they all had a blast. Out of this group of kids, Haylee invited 3 non-members. I am grateful that Haylee has such a good group of friends that support her and are striving to be good in an ever increasing wicked world. With Brady turning 12 in a few weeks, we will have 2 teens in the house. Bring it on, we are ready.

A New Look

Haylee has been contemplating a new look for a little while. She has loved being a blonde, and even though she was born a complete toe-head, that brilliant blonde turned into dirty dishwater blonde over the years. Today was the day for change, and I think it turned out rather nice. The kids were shocked to see her at the salon and didn't think it was her at first. It will take some getting used to, but so far, we like the new Haylee.

Quirky Girl

The other day, I came downstairs to find this:

We had gone to Costco and was in the process of putting everything away. Apparently, the toilet paper hadn't made it's way to the pantry yet, so Jolee must have thought the TP would make a comfortable bed. She does look rather comfy. When Jolee saw me break out the camera to capture this typical JoJo moment, she went into shy mode. First, the bashful face...

Then the don't look at me face, otherwise known as the if I can't see you, you can't see me face.

Then she decided to play pirate with the lens cap.

Jolee is such a funny girl. Lately, she is showing some great organization skills. She likes to arrange things in order and often I find random objects stuffed in her "spots". The other day, Aaron opened the container of wipes and found Maycee's shoes, a pair of Haylee's earings, some Polly Pockets, and Brady's ipod. She makes me just shake my head and laugh.

Hey Mom, Look What I Can Do!

When we were in the process of designing, then building our dream kitchen, I told Aaron I would cook amazing meals all the time in our new kitchen. While I grew up eating awesome meals my Dad would create nearly every night, I didn't take time to learn how to make those awesome meals. As a result, I am not the domestic goddess I would like to be. I don't sew, cook, can home grown vegetables, etc. BUT, I am trying...

So here are some things I would like to learn how to do better this year:

1. Grind wheat and make bread with that wheat

2. Learn how to sew so I can make some cushions for my breakfast nook (this is going to be a real challenge) any help would be greatly appreciated.

3. Grow a garden and can those veggies (I do garden, but want to make a bigger one at the new house).

4. Follow recipes so the resultant meal looks and tastes like what it is supposed to.

I think this list is daunting enough, so we will see how I do.

For Sunday dinner, I made Thai chicken lettuce wraps, and HOMEMADE buttermilk rolls...FROM SCRATCH! I know, I even amazed myself. I have left the roll making to mother because she is really good at it, but she lives 3 hours away, and it's time I stopped being afraid of yeast (I usually kill it). I found this recipie on a great cooking blog and I decided to go for it. Here are the little, buttery jewels baking in the oven.

And look! I didn't even burn them! They were so good that my family ate 2 trays worth.

Don't I look lovely? Scary, but Aaron snapped this for evidence showing that I do cook from time to time.

Here is my finished product. The wraps were awesome and quite healthy too. Jaron even tried some lettuce which is a HUGE milestone for him. The last time he tried it was 2 years ago and he threw up. Okay, you can stop laughing at my beautiful meal presented on a paper plate. Baby steps people, baby steps.

It was nice to see the kids enjoying the product of my labors. I also made cowboy cookies for dessert. I think it's going to be a bad week at weight watchers.

5 months, plus a few

Okay, I totally blew by Maycee's 4 month pics, and we are a solid week past her 5 months, so here we go. Can you tell she is the 6th kid? Anyway, Maycee is continuing to eat, eat, eat, and grow, grow, grow. She is well over 15 pounds, (I don't have exact stats because we don't need to go to the docs until next month). Maycee's personality continues to be easy going and oh, so sweet. She is happy 99% of the time and always has a huge cheeky grin to give. We love her so much!! Her new favorite trick is blowing raspberries and she has become quite good at it. She drools all the time and I am expecting to see some teeth popping through any day now. She is learning how to hold her own bottle and is showing interest at trying food.

I took pictures of Haylee and Brady standing against the couch when they were about Maycee's age, and I wish I could get those pics on here. It is freaky how much Maycee looks like them, especially Brady.

Besides smiling, this is one of Maycee's favorite faces. She loves to stick her tongue out which is cute now, just as long as she isn't still doing it when she is 3. We love you Maycee!

Let's go Bowling

We decided to take the family (all except Haylee because she wasn't feeling well) bowling for family home evening. Because our family's schedule is so chaotic, everything we do needs to kill lots of birds with one stone. Therefore, bowling was a needed break for our family, counted for FHE, plus Jaron was able to work towards his bowling belt loop for cub scouts. We started the night with dinner at Carl's Junior, not my favorite pick, but they have a decent grilled chicken sandwich and the kids love to play in the playland. After watching the kids play for over an hour, we were tempted to just call it a night, but we had to work on that bowling belt loop, so off to the alley we go!

How cute are these babies!! Yeah, doesn't get much cuter than this.

Jaron has his own "special" technique. He throws a great curve in the ball, but when it lands in the center of the isle, the ball usually ends up in the gutter by the time it gets to the pins. See the yellow ball? J ended up with a 53 score. To earn his loop, we need to go 3 more times and see if his average improves.

Jaron had to congratulate me after I bowled a strike. I ended up with 4 strikes in the game, it was a good night.

As with most new things, Chloee was quite timid about bowling. After Daddy helped her a few times, she got more comfortable and ended up having a great time. She even let me help her a time or two.