Bikes, Potties and Stairs

What are these you ask? These are the things that have been going on at our house. Paige can ride a bike without training wheels!! Johnny is finally potty training (I know he is almost 4, he is needs more training then most). And finally Coen has climbed both flights of stairs. A lot has gone on in the past few days. Paige is so excited that she can finally ride her bike with her friends on the street. Johnny stayed dry all day today. He didn't have one accident at all. We have only been training sense Friday. This is all because of my good friend Korby. Korby has worked with autistic children for several years and knows how to deal with potty training with children with special needs. She came to visit from Vegas a few weeks ago and gave me a potty plan to follow for Johnny. She told me to wait till we could stay home all weekend and start it. So I picked this past weekend with UEA and being off track and it has worked great. He has had accidents but he is doing so good. She said that she knew he would be easy once I started him on this plan. Thanks Korby!!! Today Coen made the trip from the downstairs to the upstairs all by himself. Up until today he has climbed a few stairs but then made his way back down. But today he was downstairs with me and the next thing I knew he was upstairs with Paige. I couldn't believe it. He climbed the entire 14 stairs all by himself. My kids are growing up so fast!

(Korby and Johnny)

(As you can see she is riding a boy bike. The bike that was given to her was a little too big so being the money conscious person I am I decided to buy a little boy bike for her to ride for a while so she could get use to it and then switch back to her bike. Seeing as I have two little boys and no other girls).

Pumpkin Patch

Today the kids and I went to a Pumpkin Patch with my mom, my sister and my sister's kids. We have done this the past few years and they kids love it. Last year was not as fun due to the fact that I had a three week old baby and had to carry the pumpkins and the wheel barrel because my sister was six month pregnant and it was too heavy for my mom to do it. So need less to say I hurt a lot after that. This year was great. Coen loved being out in the stroller and looking at all the pumpkins. Johnny and Paige loved picking their pumpkins out. Now all we have to do is carve them with Daddy.

Gotta Love This

I was checking out Michael Savage's website yesterday because John wants one of his books for Christmas. I came across some t-shirts that he sells and found this baby tee shirt. I thought it was so funny. When I told John about it he told me I need to get one for Coen. So next time you see Coen he may be sporting one of these babies.

All of us born after 1973 could wear this shirt but I'm not sure if they come in bigger sizes.I might have to check on that. Maybe the whole family could have matching tee's! Maybe we could sport these in our Christmas picture (Just Kidding)!

"Where Is My $5.00?"

Last night while Paige and I were doing her reading we came across a part that talked about canoes. Out of no where Paige says "You owe me $5.00" I was like "what"? She then told me about a bribe that John and I made with her at the family reunion this year. We told her that if she rode in Uncle Jared's canoe that we would give her $5.00. We pretty much knew that our scaredy cat Paige would never do it. Well she did after her father forced her into the canoe. So we are debating if she really deserves the money since she didn't do it under her own free will. We are leaning toward just giving her the money it is the least we can do with the emotional damage she has from the whole event (Just Kidding). You gotta love that girl!

Tickle Me Johnny

In 1996, the Tickle Me Elmo was the "must have" toy. Many parents literally fought other parents in North American toy stores to purchase one of the toys for Christmas. The short supply of the toy, due to unexpected demand, meant that stores hiked the price on the dolls drastically. Newspaper classifieds even sold the plush toy for hundreds of U.S. dollars. People reports that the US $28.99 toy fetched as much as $1500.-Wikipedia

I remember when these toys just had come out and what a hit they were. Luckily I didn't have any kids at the time because I would never have paid those kind of prices. And luckily I didn't buy this toy because I have my own personal "tickle me" toy. His name is Johnny. Johnny has started to come up to John and I and ask us to "tickle" him. And when you do the laughing that ensues is hilarious. Then he asks if he can "tickle" you. I is pretty funny. Maybe I should buy Johnny one of these for Christmas because he would definitely enjoy it. That boy is pretty funny.

Elder Andrew Black (A.K.A Rad Dog)

This past Wednesday John and I had the opportunity to see his brother Andrew off at the MTC(He is going to the Mexico Tijuana Mission).I had never been to the MTC so it was a new experience for me. I agree with the MTC Mission President when he said "The spirit that you feel here in the MTC can only be found here and at the temple."The spirit there was so amazing. It was so special to be surrounded by missionaries who voluntarily serve 18 months to 2 years of their lives for the Lord. They have such an amazing spirit about them. Andrew is such great kid. We will miss Andrew immensely. Our kids just love him. He was always so good at playing with them when we came down to visit. It is strange to think that when he comes home Paige will be 8, Johnny almost 6 and Coen 3. It is still hard for me to believe that Andrew is old enough to go on a mission. When I married John, Andrew was only 11. He was still in primary. I have seen Andrew grow from a deacon passing the sacrament, to getting his first job, to driving a car, from graduating High School and now to going on a mission. We will miss you Rad Dog!! The people of Mexico should count themselves lucky that they get such a great missionary to serve and teach them!

I am SPEECHLESS

(DOW down 679 today. Dow closed at 8579)

"Can I Have Your Change?"

Tonight Paige found a baggy full of change mostly pennies and asked if she could have them. I asked her what she wanted to do with the money and she looked at me with a completely straight face and said "I want to save for my house, you already have a house and you don't need another one." It took all that was in me to not start cracking up. At first I was wondering why she was worrying about her house. But then I realized she actually is a very intuitive child. She knows that a house takes money and to get that money you need to save. So why not start when you are young. We have savings accounts for all of our kids. We deposit money into their accounts every month, and if they get birthday money it goes straight to the bank. Paige knows this. I hope that she remembers this principle when she gets older. You have to save in order to get things that you want. For now she is saving her pennies and maybe one day she will have enough to buy her own house!

Happy Birthday Coen(A.K.A.-Coey)!!!

It's Coen 1st Birthday today. It just seems like yesterday I was at the hospital being induced. When we decided to have a third baby I was really afraid that I would not be able to handle another child. But it has not been as bad as I thought. I am not saying it has always been easy but it has been more manageable then I thought. This is probably because Coen is the best baby. He hardly ever cries and is so easy going. This kid had four teeth coming in all at once and he only woke up once a night while this was going on. When I was not producing enough milk I had no idea because he never fussed. The only reason I knew he wasn't getting enough milk was because he was losing weight. He even puts up with the constant pestering from his older brother. Coen also can entertain himself for a long time. He will crawl around the house just finding things to play with. He loves to throw things. Anything that he can get his hands on he will throw. He also likes to play ball with his daddy. Here is a video of Coen and his daddy throwing a ball.

Isn't Coen cute? This kid's laugh is so contagious. Every time this kids laughs or smiles I just want to squeeze him. His favorite person is his daddy. Whenever John comes home he wants John to pick him up and if John doesn't he lets you know he is not very happy about it. John of course loves this. He is such a joy and brings such a sweet spirit into our home. We love you Coey!!

Paige's Note

Paige started Ballet class on Monday. She was so excited. I haven't seen Paige this excited in a long time. She loved it and has been reminding me about next weeks class ever since. Before she went to class I had to tell Paige that since she has class on Monday's she would not be able to play with her friends after class because we would be getting home late and would be having dinner and family home evening right after class. As soon as Paige heard this she got busy writing notes to her friends. This is one of the notes that she wrote...




I started laughing so hard when I saw this. I had no idea what she was writing to her friends until she showed me the notes. I guess it is really important to her to let he friends know that she can't play on Monday's anymore. Kids are so funny!