Music and Dancin'

The last few times we have gone to Grandma's house, Jared has loved playing the harmonica. Alex always wants to do what his brother is doing and soon we found him blowing out tunes on the harmonica and shaking his hips.



Brothers jammin' and dancin'...

Is Running in the Genes?

There are a lot of runners in Robbie's family and it seems that Alex might have the gene or at least the desire to race. Jared really likes to run too. We went to watch Aimee's race at UVU on Friday and the boys had a lot of fun running around and getting muddy. Alex's starting position for racing is a little unusual. Check it out...



Now he takes off...

My Baby is in Preschool!

Jared had his first day of preschool today! He was soooo excited and had no problems with me dropping him off and leaving. We went and bought his backpack on Monday. Robbie took him to Wal-Mart Saturday night, but they didn't have any kids backpacks which he was very upset about, so when we found the Spiderman backpack he had been asking for at ShopKo he was ecstatic. And all I have been hearing since then is the following:

"Mommy, I love my Spiderman backpack."

"Mommy, I love backpacks."

"Mommy, my Spiderman backpack is so cool."

"Mommy, thank you so much for buying me this backpack."

I have heard this about 10 times every day the past three days. He insisted on bringing it last night to the open house and was disappointed no one else had their backpacks. So when I picked him up today he was very excited to tell me that all of "my kids" had backpacks.


He brought home his first project, a "J" he had decorated. He said they read stories, ate cheese and elephant ears, and a kid wearing a yellow shirt cried. He loved school and is excited to go back. I can't believe my baby is old enough to go to school! It was weird just having one child for a few hours and I think Alex enjoyed having me all to himself.

Here we go again!

You may have noticed I haven't been blogging lately, and well I actually have an excuse this time. I have been sick morning, midday, and night for the past 7 weeks. Luckily it's nothing too serious and I'm hoping it will clear up in the next couple of weeks, but for sure in the next 6 months. That's right, we're expecting baby #3 and are so very excited!

We had our first appointment today and they moved my due date up to April 5th from the 9th. That's always great news. I was excited to hear the baby's heartbeat and see her (positive thinking) on the ultrasound and to know everything seems to be progressing as it should be. Here is a picture of our little peanut from our visit today:



Only 8.5 weeks until we find out the sex of the baby, and yes I'm hoping for a girl. I love my boys and would be fine having more boys, but I just want to experience having a girl.

So we told Jared and Alex Sunday night that I was going to be having a baby. Alex doesn't understand, but Jared is so excited, and talks about it several times a day. We asked him if he wanted a sister or a brother and he told us he wants a sister like Mylah (his cousin who is 8 or 9 months). We explained that I had a baby in my tummy and that that is why I have been feeling sick. So he asked, "so there be two baby Mylah's? One for Jennie and one for us." We were like, "well yes, but our baby will probably have a different name" (especially if it ends up being a boy). So he calls the baby, baby Mylah. It's funny how he understands it. We are glad he is excited.

It has been hard feeling so sick all the time. This pregnancy is not as bad as Jared's, but worse than Alex's. I think it's because I am having a girl (thinking positive again), because I read in a book that many first time moms are sick because their body has never done this before and produces too many hormones, making them sick. Then the second time they aren't as sick because their body is like "Oh, I've done this before. I know what to do this time." That was my experience from Jared to Alex. Well, your body I assume would be producing different hormones when you have a girl versus a boy. So my body, never having a girl, is in shock again. Let a girl dream, right? Right...

So Robbie has just been amazing taking care of the kids in the mornings and playing with them in the evenings, doing the dishes, and then being a Ph.D. student on top of all of that working hard all day and getting little sleep at night. I am so grateful for his love and service. Robbie's mom has also helped out a lot. We have gone up there the last several weeks for a few days at a time, to lessen the load on Robbie. She has taken care of the kids in the morning, played with them throughout the day, fixed us meals and just been so great. I am so grateful to have family that is always there to help us. It has been hard on Jared. He will ask me if I feel sick and I unfortunately always respond yes and he will cry and say, "no, don't be sick mommy". So hopefully this pregnancy will go like Alex's and I will get better in a couple of weeks when the first trimester is over.

Anyways, I'm glad we can finally announce this since I have been showing for a few weeks now (depressing), and people may have noticed me snitching my kids' snacks at church. So, there you have it. Baby #3 here we go!

Rosarito Mexico 2008

Last week we spent the week in Rosarito, Mexico with Robbie's family. We had an amazing time and are so grateful that Robbie's parents treated us to such a fun family vacation. We drove the 12 hours over 2 days so it wasn't too bad. The kids were actually quite good, and it helped that we had Josh sitting next to Jared, since Josh is his favorite. You can see all of the pictures from our trip by clinking the link "Family Photo Gallery" on the top right of the screen. Here are some of the highlights of our trip.

As we traveled south on I-15 we saw the most vibrant rainbow I think I have ever seen. It was gorgeous.



The boys were great on our 12 hours journey to Mexico!


Here we are about to cross the border. It took a few seconds to cross into Mexico, but coming back it took over 2 hours! I wonder why?

Alex loves jumping off the ledge. We have to make sure though he is close to it, because often times he will be too far back and just start falling forward. He loved swimming and would ask to go whenever he saw the water.

Grandma Ann got Jared these "chido" (cool in Spanish) dolphin "googles" (how Jared says goggles). He wore them all the time, even when we weren't swimming.

And of course, the boogie boarding. I don't participate in this. The Pacific is way too cold for me. I thought about getting in for a second when Robbie's mom and dad got in, and I have never seen them get in the other 2 years we have come here, and Robbie's mom doesn't even get in in Cancun. But then, when I was taking pictures the water cam up about mid-calf and it almost took my breath away it was so cold, and my feet ached because of the cold. I have no idea how Robbie and his family can do it. They say you just go numb after awhile. Anyways, Robbie had a good time trying to catch a wave in.

Jared loved playing in the sand and making animals and temples (sand castles).

Jared and I made a sea turtle.

Alex shared the same sentiment I did on the ocean. This is him running away from the water.

It is a family tradition to go to this great restaurant called La Fonda. They have these great flour tortilla chips and salsa and a view of the ocean where we always see dolphins.

This year the dolphins really put on a show for us swimming in the waves and jumping out of them. It was great and screamed like a little school girl it was so exciting.

All of a sudden all of the boogie boarders got out of the water. JAWS had appeared. Robbie's dad and sister Aimee both thought they saw a shark. It swam straight and never came up for air, so let's just say no one got in the rest of the day and the next day they got it after they saw some dolphins swimming nearby and deemed it safe to go in. No one wanted to watch Jaws then until after we left Mexico. I can't imagine why.

Alex usually spent his beach time taking a nap. Isn't he precious?

Jared and Robbie watching the boogie boarders.

Uncle Josh bought Jared a popsicle which he thoroughly enjoyed.

My niece Mylah (with her mom Jennie) is tougher than me and absolutely loved playing in the ocean. She would get so excited and jump and kick her legs when the waves came. Look at that bathing beauty!

She also loved the sand and decided to try some. Every day though she would eat less. Here she just ate some sand and thought she would follow that up with her cousin Alex's toes. She is such a cutie!

The boys had fun playing frisbee. And they say white men can't jump...

We finally got Jared to run out of the ocean.

The family on our morning walk.

Our last morning walk on the beach. This year was a lot better since Jared would actually walk on the sand. He really enjoyed the beach. Alex liked riding on Papi's back and would get the backpack in the mornings to tell us he wanted to go.


The gorgeous waves we enjoyed for a whole week in Rosarito, Mexico. It was a great year for dolphins. We saw them every day. I absolutely loved it!

Fun at the Park

April 25, 2008 It was Robbie's last day of the semester and so he got off early and we all went to the park. Alex had so much fun going through the tunnels, he even went down the big slide with Jared. We thought it was pretty cute when he then tried to start crawling up it.

Let's Go Fly a Kite meets Let's Go to the E.R.

On Saturday May 17 we were about to go fly a kite and Jared, having just learned how to unbolt our front door, opened the door and Alex raced out so excited. I hopped up and was 5 feet behind him, his little legs were getting faster and faster as he was so excited to be outside and I knew he wasn't going to be able to stay up. I saw him go down. His forehead hit the corner of the cement stop. I finally got to him and and picked him up and his head was spurting blood. I started crying and Robbie came out and took him and I ran inside to get a rag to put pressure on it. Robbie said he couldn't see where the hole ended. Alex was screaming. This was so not good. Jared started crying, and was worried about Alex. When we told him he was going to be ok, then he started crying because he wanted to go fly his kite. So, it was bad enough that we needed to have it looked it, but I didn't know if we should have a plastic surgeon sew it up or not. We had to take Jared to the ER three weeks before this because he woke up just before midnight, barely able to breathe because he had a severe case of the croup. He had gone to bed perfectly healthy. It is frustrating, because I knew what he had and all he needed was some steroids, but since it is after hours it ended up costing us $150, what would have cost us $15 if he would have gotten sick during the day. We were like we can't afford to go to the ER twice in one month. So I call my dad, no answer, my mom, no answer, my aunt (whose kids have had a few visits to the ER), no answer. We got a hold of Robbie's mom and she thought we would be ok to just go to urgent care. My dad called me when I was on the phone with her and he said since it was less than a cm in length they would just glue it, since he is so young. So we took him to urgent care, and by the time we got there he had stopped crying and when we walked in there was a big train set and all he wanted to do was play with that. Surprisingly, the bleeding had almost stopped. And can you believe that before we are seen we have to spend 10 minutes filling out paperwork? I just feel like it is so ridiculous that I have to call around and figure out where we can afford to get care for our son? Healthcare is just really screwed up and very frustrating. Anyways, they were thinking they would put 2 stitches in, but I asked about the glue, since my Dad said that is what they usually do, and the doctor was able to do that since it was straight and had almost stopped bleeding. So they glued it shut and put the tape on it and he was as good as new. We went to the park after that and we all had a good time flying the kite. Aunt Rebecca even came along for the fun.