I’ve been terrible about blogging but I thought I’d put a few recent pics and vids up in an attempt to at least have some of this archived. The weather this year has been rainy, rainy and rainy. It has hardly stopped raining for months. The pictures and videos below are all taken on some of the few nice days that we’ve had. It’s been flooding everywhere lately, including Anders room in the basement. Luckily we got that taken care of. We had a major hail storm last night with hail the size of marbles pounding down and filling the yard – turning it mostly white. It’s late May – I expected this to be over by now. Oh well.
The kids are doing great, all working hard in school and sports. We’re busier than ever but life is really pretty awesome. We’re blessed with perfect health, a great place to live, good employment and we’re all together all of the time. Life is good.
Recent highlights:
- Addie is a reading machine – she blows me away with how smart she is. She’s reading chapter books, doing some advanced math problems and really just making leaps and bounds scholastically. And she’s six. She’s also a-friggin-dorable. She’s a very pretty girl and, though very strong headed, is very obedient and tries to be helpful.
- Anders is also quite the kid. He’s a very loving boy – always appreciating the compliments we send his way. He’s also a little genius. I know every parent thinks that’s true of their kids but I’m really astonished at these smart kids of ours. They must get it from their Mom. I think Anders has read more books at the age of 8 than I had at the age of 20, and I’m not exaggerating. He reads his scriptures every night and is in Mosiah right now. He gobbles up science books and craves additional facts about everything – he’s like a learning vaccuum – he sucks it all up and keeps it. He’s about the sweetest boy you’d meet, too. Very affectionate and very anxious to please. Quite the kid, my Anders.
- Aani is our little ham. She’s always funny and making us all crack up. She’s too big for naps but too small to skip naps so she falls asleep all over the place – even sitting up at the dinner table. She wakes up every morning and says “What day is it?” and when we tell her she replies “What does that mean?”, looking for a rundown of who’s doing what and looking forward to her play group on Wednesdays. She’s sweet but sassy, loving to push the limits. She’s pretty responsive to the 1, 2, 3 counting method but is hard pressed to do something the first time you ask. If I get mad at her for doing or not doing something she looks up at me and says, “But Dad, I’m fwee [three]!” Right she is. She also eats almost anything we give her. At the dinner table she’s our favorite. We know we’re not supposed to have favorites but when we see her light up with joy when dinner is served while the others start to whine and sulk, she’s our favorite. Sorry.
- Ava is such a little turkey. She’s hilarious. She tries to copy everyone and is starting to say funny little words here and there. Last night we were getting ready to tuck the kids in. We said prayers, read books, read scriptures, brushed… all that. We told the kids to get in their beds so we could go tuck them in. Ava looked in their direction and yelled “GO!”, pointing toward the door. We must yell that too much. Then she did it a few more times and we were all rollin’. She waddles through life either clinging to Katrina or wishing she was. She’s a total Mama’s girl and is very sad when Mom’s not around, though she’s pretty cool with Dad, too. We love our chunky little Ava.
- Katrina’s doing well, considering all that she has going on. She’s a soccer mom, counselor in the relief society, serving on the stake girls camp committee, school car pool driver, chef, maid, exercise enthusiast, husband therapist and hotty all rolled into one. She’s got a full plate but she keeps her cool and still manages to make us all feel loved and happy. She’s a keeper, that one.
OK, without further ado, here are those good lookin’ kids of mine.
Addie plays her first season of soccer - age 6
Anders in his 2011 Soccer season - age 8
Anders is big enough to mow the lawn! Happy day for dad.
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My kids LOVED this book. They laughed throughout the whole thing. Much of that is due to the fact that the poodle in the story is name Poo-Poo, which they found hilarious. The author is very good at making fun of him/herself and going off on comical tangents. The big mystery on this book? The author. In the iTunes Store it says it’s written and illustrated by Tom Watson. If you search for the book online, however, it shows Melissa Phillips. Hmmm. I’m gonna go with Melissa Phillips, though, because she has a sequel – Stick Dog Wants a Frankfurter. That one’s not in the iTunes library but it is available for
This one is an actual app – it’s an interactive story that is ready by a child with a very cute voice and you is lightly animated. Teddy’s Day is aimed more toward smaller children but my 7 year old enjoyed it, too.
This one is a long one – 257 pages. It goes pretty quickly when you just read a chapter or so at a time. It’s illustrated like an old version of the current day Winnie the Pooh, but only because it is exactly that. The original copyright is 1926 but it still captures my kids’ imaginations.
