My Rose Patch

December 12th-January 29th!

2012-02-10T09:11:00.000-07:00

It's been so long since I posted so I'll just put up pictures of events and a short descriptionand let you enjoy:)

Chris's Elementary Chistmas program Jocelynn's in the front row on the left and Chris is on the half court line in the second row.
Ben and I's 5 year anniversary was on December 15th. I took him on a suprise trip to Salt Lake. We ate at The Roof restraunt, took a horse drawn carriage ride around Temple Square, and stayed in the Swiss Family Robinson Room at the Anniversary Inn. It was a fun trip:)

While Christmas shopping, we ate lunch at Chilli's. Well, they had a balloon animals guy making them for tips. Peyton got a doggy, named him puppy, and loved him until he withered away to nothing.

My parents brought up our Christmas from them the weekend before Christmas. It was nice to visit.

It was a Roseborough Christmas this year! Everyone got to be there. Here we are painting fingernails and toenails. And the kids are playing twister with Grannie Annie!

The adults busied themselves with some skeet shooting.

Ann hosted the nativity story Christmas Eve and all the kids that would dress up as characters did, and LOVED it:)

After opening Christmas eve gifts at Grandma and Grandpa's, we came home and our kids got to open their Christmas eve gifts from us too!

Bentley's Santa Loot!

Peyton's Santa Loot!

Chris's Santa Loot!

Christmas Day at home!

Christmas Day at Grandma and Grandpa's!

Kenny & Kristie's Family!

Derek & Hailie's Family!

Rob & Michelle's Family!

And the whole family!

Peyton playing with the stockings after Christmas was over!

Peyton was too funny "pushing" the cart for dad.

Christmas brought us a new 50" TV and the box brought my kids tons of fun:)

We, the kids and I, took a weekend trip to Bear Lake. Peyton LOVES: "Bert-me" "Bert-me-boo" "Boob" and "Boobie". ALL of these are Peyton's way of saying Britnee!

Bentley's 1st hair cut:(

After!

KaDee's basketball games! Bret, Peyton in Bret's shades, Bentley, and Ben.

Peyton in her "Doe TaDee" shirt with Heidi!

KaDee shooting a freethrow.

Grandma Sony and Grandpa Rusty and Bentley cheering on KaDee.The whole gang! Peyton LOVES Bret and Heidi. She calls them "her friends" and wants to know when she'll see them again!

KaDee plays JV and Varsity, but hasn't actually played Varsity since being split onto both teams......until this game! #40, which ironically enough, was Ben's basketball number in high school.

Hope you enjoyed our past month and a half, and I hope to do better at posting again now that stuff has slowed up a bit:)

December 5th-11th!

2011-12-14T10:17:00.003-07:00

(5th) I've been awful at keep up on taking pictures so I'll give a run down of day to day activities. We left our kids Monday morning and afternoon and ran to Twin to do all our Christmas shopping. We got everything bought and in good time too:)

(6th) We ended up needing to go to town again the next day too so we took the kids with us and grabbed some lunch @ Arctic Circle on the way home. Bentley LOVED his ice cream cone, to say the least:)
My amazing mother-in-law found a really cool book called 'A Christ-Centered Christmas' By Emily Freeman and has been going through it with us on a few evenings since December started. We've done little devotionals at her house and with every devotional, we read about another person who played a role in the first Christmas. The 2nd chapter was Joseph and had a story that had bells in it. So as a token to go with the story, she gave us bells to put on our doors so every time we heard them, we thought of the story. Well, Bentley makes sure we hear them alot, beings that it's one of his new favorite toys:)
(7th) I had to run to the dentist and while I was in Burley, stopped by Les Schwab and had my wheels looked at because they'd been making noises. Come to find out my barrings were going out and had to be replaced. It only took an hour and I had taken 'Breaking Dawn', the book I was reading, with me. The car got fixed and I got my book finished waiting:) That evening we got to go to our ward Christmas Party and it was really good. The primary sang 'This is the Season' while some of them set the stage up as a nativity as the song went on. Chris sang really good and all the primary pulled it together quite well.
(8th) Chris got to spend an extra day at his dad's house for the weekend we we took him to Pocatello on Thursday night. We stopped in Burley on the way home and picked up a present for the whole family while we were there:)
(9th-11th) Didn't do much for the weekend except stay home and clean up and just spend time inside where it was warm with my awesome family. It was fun to relax because I knew the next week was going to be hecktic:)

November 28th-4th!

2011-12-10T16:15:00.004-07:00

(1st) I've so been slacking on picture taking, but I do have a few. After Chris got home from his dad's after Thanksgiving break, we put up our Christmas tree together!
The kids had fun helping! The were a little mad when I put the dog gate up around the tree, but with young kids, this helps minimize the distruction that occurs between now and Christmas to the tree itself and the presents, once wrapped and put under the tree.

(2nd) The next day, before Chris left for school, he let Peyton in to plug in the tree and grabbed my camera to take a picture, since he LOVES feeling big and being able to take pictures for me.

(3rd) This was the last Boise State game of the regular season at home so Ben took Chris and his parents with him. I got to ride up with them and got to go shopping with the two youngins while they were at the game! We had alot of fun:) We were a little late getting back to them after they were done at the game, so Grandma and Chris peroused Albertson's until we got there.

November 21st- 27th!

2011-11-28T14:43:00.008-07:00

(21st) Chris decided he wanted to pass off one of his scout goals and help plan a meal, set the table, and do the dishes afterwards. I was not going to stop him, by any means ;P And if Chris was helping, Peyton was helping too!
Then for family home evening, we decided to make gingerbread cookies. Peyton and I mixed up the dough while Chris finished the dishes.

Then we all used some cookie cutters to cut some cute cookies out.

Add a little frosting and "skinkles" as Peyton would put it, and you have some nice cookies made and decorated with LOVE!

(23rd) We were getting a house ready for a little Thanksgiving company, and when I say little, I mean my mom! And Peyton wanted to help! So she slipped on my shoes and grabbed everything that needed to go to her room and off she........scuffled!

(24th) For Thanksgiving day, we joined my mother-in-laws parents for their meal! Of course, Thanksgiving translates into Football for the male gender so here is Kenny, Ben, and Dayn watching what ever team didn't happen to be on commercial at the time!

My mom used up every chance she got to love on Bentley, since he is such a cuddly little boy! And he didn't mind at all that someone was around that would pick him up on his every whim!

(26th) Happy Birthday Bentley! I can hardly believe that my little guy is one. I remember so vividly his arrival into this world and the 4 LONG days that followed and it doesn't seem possible that it's been a year already! But here we are, celebrating the life of our handsome Bentley boy!

His toys were not wasted either. He has played with and loved each one......starting with the boxes:)

After we accembled the toys, all the kids(minus Chris) enjoyed the heck out of it. It was a big hit:)

Grandma Sony wanted to head home before she was driving in the dark so we all said our good-byes before she left.

Bentley was not happy about the fact that we put the cupcake so far away just to get a picture.

But the fact that we let him eat the cupcake all by himself made up for it:) He enjoyed the heck out of it! Cupcakes have always been a big hit for the first birthday parties. Here's Bentley with his.......

And here's Peyton at her first birthday enjoying her birthday cupcake:) Oh, how alike they are!

He truely liked all of his cupcake! It was licking his fingers and lips for quite a while afterwards!

(27th) Jocelynn's birthday is the day after Bentley's so we got spoiled and got cake 2 days in a row! She turned 6 and I can barely believe she's getting so big. She was only Bentley's age when Ben and I got married and now she's a smart growing girl and we're loving watching her grow!

We purchaced Bentley a new car seat a few days before his birthday and broke it out this evening to the straps adjusted and fit to him before we put it in the car! He thought the box was tons of fun!

Peyton decided to try it out and didn't to much care for it when she sat back and it rolled backwards:) So funny!

November 14th- 20th!

2011-11-28T13:55:00.002-07:00

If you read my previous posts, I have had scheduled to have my wisdom teeth out. Well, the time finally came. My mom came up from Bear Lake to help out with my kids so I could take it easy. She was only able to stay for a day due to a fire the caught her kitchen on fire back in Bear Lake, but it was nice to have her help while I did. My mother-in-law was awesome to step in and help as well.(15th) Right after my wisdom teeth were taken out. Did you know that if your entire mouth is numb, you don't get brain freezes from eating ice cream too fast? Well, I found that out:)
(16th) I swelled up pretty good, but only on the one side that had a wisdom tooth on the bottom. No attractive way to take a picture when you look like that so a picture of just my mouth was all I was comfortable with:) All is healed not and I'm eating all my favorite foods again. We took the kids to Puss and Boots a few days after my surgery and to have to smell popcorn and not be able to eat it is a new kind of tourture!

November 7th-13th!

2011-11-18T09:31:00.004-07:00

(7th) Peyton got a treat at the store the other day and it was a baby bottle sucker with sour powder. Well, the powder some how got spilled all over the floor. Instead of coming to tell me, Peyton decided she was gonna clean it up by herself. So she got her toy vacuum and did her best to clean it up. Of course, it didn't work so I got the real vacuum out and she got to clean it herself with the real vacuum, but her solo helpfulness was too cute to pass up a picture of.

(9th) I turned some music on our computer and the kids and I danced around the kitchen. Here is Chris and Peyton dancing, until Chris's arms got tired.

And here is Bentley and I dancing. He is such a natural cuddler, I love it. He snuggles right into your neck and shoulder and make you feel like the most important person in the world.

(10th) Peyton has become very interested in me feeding Bentley baby food. So she takes her Violet puppy and plays baby with her. She feeds her and shows her how to sit in the bumbo. She is such a good big sister and will be an amazing mother some day......in the distant distant future!

November 1st-6th!

2011-11-09T15:07:00.003-07:00

Okay, okay, so I've been a slacker this week! In my defence, Bentley and Peyton have both been running fevers so nothing much going on except thermometers, tylonal, and motrin! (3rd) On October 29th, 2011, the world lost one of the most wonderful women to her battle with cancer and leukemia. Ben's grandma Roseborough was such a sweet lady and she was always postitive. Heaven knows those type of people are hard to find. Ann, Michelle, Hailie, Kristie, and I were allowed to go over and do her hair for the funeral. Okay, so Hailie and Kristie did her hair, but it was such a special time to see her so peaceful and to just remember her for the amazing person she was.
(She is the one in the middle, about 18 yrs old) (4th)We were able to attend her funeral on Friday. It was a very nice funeral and many heart warming things were said in her behalf. She will be truely missed.

(6th) The weekend held higher spirited events! We got to go to Rexburg for Rob & Michelle's adorable baby, Paxon to be blessed! Everyone was there, except for Chris. It was so nice to get the family together and visit and love on their handsome baby boy!

They are such a cute couple and Paxon is simply a perfect baby. He did so good with all the attention. It was so nice to see them so happy!

Halloween 2011!

2011-11-09T14:33:00.004-07:00

Our pumpkin turned out alright, I think! I let Chris do a little bit, but I wanted to make sure he didn't cut off his fingers too;P Wow, it was a thick pumpkin too!
Chris was Optimus Prime for Halloween! He had a school program where they danced and sang to "One-eyed, one-horned, flying purple people eaters" "Ghostbusters" and "Monster Mash"! Chris had been dancing these dances around the house for weeks earlier, but it was so fun to go watch the 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders all do it:)

Peyton was Minnie Mouse! If you've read my earlier blogs, you know that she's become addicted to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse so what better person for her to be for Halloween then one of her favorite charactors! She looked super cute, I think:)

And Bentley was Tigger! What a handsome little tiger he turned out to be! And as we were trunk-or-treating, he found himself a bag of hot tamales and was just fine to be carried around and get more candy. But oh heavens, don't try to take the hot tamales and put them back in his bucket! He'll show you real TIGER!!!!

It was a fun Halloween! Ben was driving truck for harvest and had to miss out on all the fun, but thanks to this bloggers photography, he at least got to see them:) And as is appropriate for the holiday (and Peyton's new favorite song from MMCH) It's Pete's (Peyton's) party! BOO! BOO!!!!

Oct 24th-30th!

2011-11-02T12:59:00.005-07:00

(25th) The braids finally needed to come out! She didn't really want them to, but I talked her right into it by telling her I'd let her play in the bathtub! She's a sucker for a splash in the tub! But boy was the 'fro' crazy until the splish splash!
(26th) I was cleaning up my front room (which I seem to be doing CONSTANTLY with two little ones!) and I look over to see that Bentley and Peyton have pulled down the pillows off the dvd cupboards where I had just put them and were wrestling on them, both just a giggling away! How do you get mad at that?!

(27th) My MIL gave us some home-made sugar cookies and they were to DIE for! So I got the recipe from her and made some too. I didn't make them quite a good as hers because I rolled my dough to thin, but I thought there turned out for my first try ever at sugar cookies. I probably ate half of them, they were so good.

And to be "Halloween Festive" I even frosted them slime green!

(29th) Hailie and Derek came down for the weekend and we went over and carved pumpkins! Chris had to pick the biggest one and because he couldn't carry it, he rolled it across the whole yard. Hailie got a new camera and was kind enough to share the pictures she took with me. The rest of this blog post is due to her expert photography!

Chris and Peyton has so much fun playing on the giant pumpkin!

She wasn't as sure once she was on it by herself(eye-seff as she would say it)!

One we cut the top off, way Chris went to gut it. Peyton liked to grab the guts out of the garbage and squish it in her hands!

Which Chris didn't mind doing either!

We scrapped it the rest of the way clean with our handy dandy carving kit tool and she was ready to go!

So Chris pinned the paper with the design he wanted on it and we traced it out.

Bentley had a ball with everyone down at his level!

Peyton got bored with it after a while and decided to play dress up with Grandpa. He's such a good sport!

She apparently thought it was a bonnet! Oh well, she had fun anyways. Then we had to go home so the actual carving of the pumpkin got postponed until Halloween!

Oct 17th-23rd!

2011-10-23T10:43:00.000-07:00

(18th) My daughter has become absolutely addicted to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse! Needless to say, she'll sit still for me to do her hair alot better if I'll let her watch cartoons. It took 2 full episodes of MMCH to get this done, but she looked so cute afterwards:) And she kept it in for a week too. Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it! The braids weren't falling out, so I left them in until they needed to come out!
(19th) While we were at Hailie and Derek's house, they made homemade french fries and I had wanted more ever since we were at their house. Well, I finally made the effort to make my own at home:) They were delicious and just as good as I had hoped!

(20th) My little mohawk Bentley boy;) He looked so cute with the mohawk, I had to share!

(21st) We brought Bentley's carseat in from the car the other day and Peyton thought it was fun to play in......that was until she got herself buckled in and couldn't get out! It was too funny!

(22nd) Chris had his last soccer game on Saturday! They did such a good job and tried really hard. They ended up losing 4-5. Chris made 2 of the goals and was very proud of himself.

He is turning into a pretty good little soccer player and he hope to be able to practice all summer and be really good my next season!

That afternoon, we went over to Grannie Annie's house and made carmel apples. She had apples form her tree and I had some from ours.

Ann made up a batch of carmel-popcorn carmel and we dipped away. What we didn't know was that it's not the right carmel for carmel apples!

But give us a break, it was our first time trying it. We'll know better for next time. But as for the taste, oh my goodness, they were yummy:)

And for dinner, we cooked up some hot dogs on the fire and had a good time eating hot dogs and carmeled apples:)

Oct 10th-16th!

2011-10-16T10:42:00.000-07:00

(10th) My kids "helping" me do the dishes! It was quite the circus act to work around all the "helpers" but wouldn't trade my kids for anything:)
(11th) Chris wanted to listen to music on his Ipod and obviously, so did Peyton. It was too cute of a picture to pass up!

(13th) Ben has been driving a 10-wheeler for his boss this harvest season, just to help out. Well, he offered to have Chris come and ride with him. Chris had so much fun. He felt so big getting to stay up until 8:30 on a school night and just hang out with Ben. He talked Ben's ear off the entire time, which shouldn't suprise any of you who know him:P

(14th) Beautiful Baby Paxon got to come and visit Murtaugh for a few days and we got to see him. He is such a gorgeous baby! And very mellow!

Peyton was so excited to see her new cousin, but she really missed seeing Paxon's dad, "Bob"(Rob).

(15th) After we got to see Paxon, we headed for Rexburg to spend a weekend with Hailie and Derek. They had fun plans for us so off to Fat Cats we went. We got to bowl.

Eat pizza and cosmo mini-golfing! It was so fun!

Peyton was more interested in the blow-up pumpkin then the picture, but what else is new:)

(16th) Hailie and Derek were such good hosts. My kids sure love spending time with them. And when she's calm, Chewy too! Hailie took some picture with Bentley, Peyton, and Chewy, but they'll have to be a later posts because I haven't gotten them from her yet.

After we got home from Rexburg Sunday afternoon, we had lunch with everyone at Ann & Dayns house for Michelle's birthday. Ben got the "hard job" of watching Paxon while everyone ate!

Sleepings all the same to a baby, so he didn't mind napping the whole afternoon on Uncle Ben's lap!

Then Michelle and Paxon had to head home to Rexburg. While we packed everything out to the car, my cute kiddo's didn't mind helping with Paxon! Peyton was trying to help keep his binki in and Bentley just wanted to know what all the fuss was about!

Then it was home sweet home. Where we had the dog house we'd ordered waiting for us to put it together! Our dogs sure have liked having somewhere to get out of the wind and rain into!

Oct 3rd-9th!

2011-10-09T10:42:00.000-07:00

(4th) Cleaning time! But this time when I went in, they informed me that my 3 wisdom teeth were needing to come out:( I wasn't too thrilled, but at the same time, don't want to have to deal with the repercutions if I don't have them removed. So the appointment is set for November 3rd. Got to be healed up for Thanksgiving:D On a brighter note, no cavities:)
That evening, Ben cooked hamburgers on the grill........in the rain!!! And Peyton had so much fun wearing the hand-me-down rain coat from cousin Wyatt!

Bentley got a cupcake, but to help minimize the mess, he took himself outside to eat it. He loved the cupcake and didn't mind at all being outside.

(5th) We have been infested with FLIES!!!!!!!! So our solution is to get the vacuum out, swat the flies, and hurry and vacuum them, just in case they're only stunned! Peyton liked helping me. Guess she got over her fear of the noise!

(6th) The cold has arrived! It wasn't quite cold enough for snow, except on the mountains, but it sure cooled down quick. So we all broke out the hot chocolate and Peyton was a big fan. She had me or Chris fill her cup at least 5 or 6 times that day!

September 26th-October 2nd!

2011-10-02T15:05:00.000-07:00

(27th) I have been progressively getting worse at remembering to take pictures. I have most recently had my phone handy most of the time though. Thank heavens for technology or I wouldn't have only one picture on this post! Chris is not in scouts! And he loves it. He's technically been in it since June, but he was at his dad's house for the summer so has just started going since school started. This was his first pack meeting. He is having so much fun with scouts.
(28th) Kenny and Kristie had a breakfast for dinner get together for Isabelle's birthday and we were invited. It was delicious and so fun to sit and visit. Isabelle's getting so big and she had a fun time with her presents.

(29th) Peyton always watches out the window in the morning for "da bus" for Chris while he brushes his teeth and does his hair and gets his shoes on. This particular day, she wore his backpack while she watched. As she waves bye bye bus and bye bye Debbie, she always turns to me and says "Me too mom, I wide da bus." It makes me so sad to tell her she has to wait until she's bigger.

That evening, Ann and I were asked to take a meal to a lady in our ward who had just had surgery. Ann had gone to Montana that morning with Dayn so before she left, she brought her part of the meal to me and I was to deliver it. I ended up waiting for a few minutes on their porch so my little delivery help made herself comfortable. She felt so big getting to help me.

(1st) The BSU Broncos had another game on Satruday so Ben, me, Bentley, Peyton, and Kelby got to go to it:) And again, I forgot my camera, but it was a great time and they won again. Go Broncos!

(2nd) Sunday was an eventful day. First, Ben came home from work feeling pretty yucky, by mid afternoon, he was drained of energy from up and down and trips to the bathroom. Our solution: put him close to the "comute" isn't so far when he has to get up. This is where he pretty much lived for the next 24 hours.

While I was watching the kids that afternoon, I was laying on the couch and Bentley was scaling along the back of the couch on my side. He grabbed a remote off the top of the couch then lost his balance and fell. My face broke his fall and his fall broke my lip!

We also got the great news that Michelle and Rob had their baby! Paxon Scott Linger:) He is so adorable! They had a couple scares, but the Lord blessed us in many ways and they are all doing well now.

September 19th-25th!

2011-09-25T15:04:00.000-07:00

(20th) My two youngest kiddos newest past time is playing in Peyton's room! She has a tone of toys and stuffed animals and blanket and pillows in her room to keep them occupied for hours. It only when it get's really quiet that I have to worry that they've lost intersted in the toys and have ventured into the bathroom! Ah, the joys of motherhood.
(21st) Poor Bentley is working on cutting a tooth. I've know it was coming for a while ;), but he's finally getting to the point that he wants some relief. Solution: popcicle, or as Peyton would put it, ice pop!

(22nd) I'm sure the number of nice days left are numbered so my kids are enjoying what's left of them! Chris is blowing bubble for the other two, who are both enjoying the attention from their big brother:)

(23rd) After school on Friday, Kristie called to see if my kids wanted to join her kids for a water balloon fight, while the weather is still nice. They had alot of fun and we couldn't fill the balloons fast enough. When all the balloons were gone, they resorted to dumping the bucket of water on Chris's head.

And as you can tell, he didn't mind at all being the center of attention!

(24th) Busy day. First thing Satruday morning, Chris had a soccer game in Valley. The wind was blowing which made it quite chilly.

Which didn't slow Chris down at all:) They did well and even won their game.

Then we watched Jocelynn's game which was after Chris's then headed off to Burley's Storybook park for a picnic. As soon as we were done there and could get home, Ben and Chris headed off for Boise State game.

We were lucky enough to have snagged ourselves 4 season tickets to the Boise State Broncos Football games! Chris was so excited for his first ever BSU game. Ben and Chris met Kyle and his friend there for Kyle's birthday:) They won, of course. And Chris was so tuckered he didn't even make it out of Boise before fell asleep. Good day, good memories!

September 12th-18th!

2011-09-18T18:01:00.000-07:00

(12th) Watch out extreme couponers, here I come! Ben and I have recently become addicted to a tv show called "Criminal Minds". So we looked on A&E.com how much all 6 released seasons would cost us. Well, the 6 pack is out for $250. So he tries Bestbuy.com and finds it for $218. So we went into Best Buy in Twin to buy it. Well, they don't have the 6 pack yet. So as we're walking out, we found a display with all of the season sold seperatly. Well, hot dog, they're on sale too. Season 1-4 are $15/each, season 5 is $20, and newly released season 6 is $45. Tax included it came to somewhere close to $132! But Best Buy had a deal that if you spend $100, they'll give you a $25 gift card. So after all was said and done, we spent $107 on a $250 6 pack! Go us:)
We also had a cow processed so we had meat for the summer. We have 2 freezers this size FULL of meat. We'll be eat good this year:)

(17th) We took the weekend off and went to Bear Lake. It was Chris's weekend with his dad so we drove him down, stayed, and drove home Sunday. Peyton and I got to go down with my mom to my Grandpa Jr for breakfast and a visit.

Peyton found my Grandma Ada's dog "Laska" that she got from Alaska. She thought she was pretty cool carrying around the "goggy"!

Soon she moved on to the upstairs where there were plenty of dolls for her to play with! Ironically enough, they were the same exact dolls I played with when I was her age, in the same room that has the same bed, bedding, and furnature in it:)

That afternoon, Ben went to do some "honey do's" with Matt. We played at my mom's cabin until they got back.

Then we went swimming at Bear Lake West! It wasn't extremely warm outside, but it was warm water and we had fun.

Bentley even enjoyed it. That is until it was past his nap time. That was when we threw in the towel and headed back to the cabin.

(18th) Sunday after church and lunch, Grandma Sony and Peyton relaxed on the hammick and enjoyed the warm summer air and the beautiful view

Soon we got Chris back and he got to hang out for a bit before we had to head home. He wanted to stay longer, but we needed to get on the road. We had a great time and sure hope to go back for another weekend real soon:)

September 5th-11th!

2011-09-11T17:41:00.000-07:00

(5th) This is the feild right behind our house! And those would be the antelope that have been calling the field "home" for that last little while. And once in a while, they come out closer to the road and the rest of the town and come by and partake of the joys of living in the country:)
(6th) Our chimney needed to be cleaned so our landlord set it up for this afternoon.

This was quite the process for my kids to watch.

Our dogs thought it was pretty funny to watch the puffs of dust come up the chimney.

(9th) Peyton decided to make her own "duce" and keeping it clean she got out the cutting board to spill on.

(10th) Bentley has figured out the "mad cow face" that both my kids have done at around this age:) It's so funny to watch my kids all interact to get him to do this face too.

August 29th-September 4th!

2011-09-04T14:43:00.000-07:00

(29th) Chris's first day of 3rd grade and his first day of school in Murtaugh.
That night, to celabrate Ann & Ben's birthday, we grabbed some pizza and chicken and had a picnic @ Storybook park! The kids had a blast playing on the toys and the adults enjoyed not having to cook and the yummy strawberry shortcake we had for dessert

Kenny didn't get to join us for our birthday outting because he'd gone to Washington, but it was sure fun for all the kids to get together and play.

Here is Ben so happy to be turning 27! You can see the excitment in his smile:)

And here is Ann, 29 and holding! Loving life and being a grandma!

(2nd) Peyton, Bentley, and I have all 3 been fighting a cold for about a week. To top that off, Peyton got an ear infections. Being a Saturday on a holiday weekend, we had to take her to the ER. The checked and indeed she did have an ear infection. So they gave us a perscription for antibiotics and ear drops to help with the pain. Our poor little girl was miserable for a few days, but she bounced right back.

August 22nd-28th!

2011-08-28T14:42:00.000-07:00

(23rd) We gave Bentley a red vine to see how he liked them! I think we found out that he likes them quite a bit. The entire tub full of bathwater turned a nice shade of pink when he was getting washed off.
(26th) It was getting down to the last few days of summer vacation so we got the kids together for one last pool party to say good-bye to summer break.

Bentley and Isabelle just enjoyed being outside and gettin fresh air and watching the kids have fun in the water.

(28th) We're still working on potty training Peyton. Some days she does great and doesn't wet in her diaper, but other days, she won't go once in the potty. But we know she's getting the jist of it because she's started letting Princess use her potty! Such a sweet girl.

August 15th-21st!

2011-08-21T14:41:00.000-07:00

(15th) Our VW Passat's AC compressor went out and we had to get it replaced with a bunch of other stuff. It took a couple days so we took a few days off work and went up to Boise and stayed for a few nights. To pass the time without our car, we went shopping at the mall. Ben and Peyton went in to Build-A-Bear while Bentley and I watching the goings on from the bench out front.
Peyton named her puppy Princess. She even got to get an outfit and shoes with the deal they were having.

(16th) To send the half day it took for our car to get finished, we took the kids to the zoo. Peyton thought it was very fun to see all the animals in their cages.....which is exactally where she prefers them!

They had a fun butterfly exhibit that people could walk through. They would check you before they let you leave so that you didn't take any with you. Ben was the only one of our group that "caught" one.

By the time we were ready to leave the zoo, the kids were tired and ready to leave the zoo too. But we enjoyed walking around and just enjoying some time off together.

(18th) My dear Peyton girl is still as "helpful" as she's ever been. This morning, she thought she'd help me put her bowl in the sink when she was done with her cereal. Only problem.....the milk was still in the bowl and the counter was taller then she was.

The milk covered the floor and Peyton's face, which she didn't much like!

(19th) For my birthday, we got to go to the Cassia County Fair, eat good food, good maple bars, and watch the rodeo. Hailie and Derek came up for the weekend as well so we got to spend some time with them too. It was very hot at the top of the grandstands so Bentley was stripped down to just a diaper and Peyton was put in some capri's. The rest of us just had to stick it out.

(20th) Kyle had come home for the weekend too. He had a date that wanted to shoot guns and we were more the willing to join them when they invited us to. Chris liked to pull the mechine to throw the clay pigeons. Ben liked to shoot so they made a good team.

Peyton didn't much care for the boom, but she liked being by her Uncle Kyle so she dealt with it.

Bentley and I sat on the blanket and covered out ears so that we could stand to stay out and watch.

Derek came out and shot for a while too. I even got a chance to shoot. I missed the first one and hit the second one. I decided to stop while my hit rate was 50%.

(21st) Ann was so nice to make me peach cobbler for my birthday "cake". And she even put candles with a "2" "6" on it for me:) It was very good, expecially the crust, which is always the best part.

Bentley got to sit with Grannie Annie and eat some cobbler, but his favorite part was the whipped cream! Boy, look at him lick those lips :D

August 8th-14th!

2011-08-14T14:41:00.000-07:00

(12th) I cleaned out the left side of our garage so that we could park a car there. After working in the garage for and hour or so, Peyton and Bentley came out with me. Soon after that, we finally had the room to pull in the car. There were quite a few earwigs that started scurrying away from where the tires were sitting so I started stepping on them and saw something right next to the garage move towards the yard. I yelled "snake" and Ben came running. He hit it a couple times with the shovel and it struck a couple times, but Ben get it. As we pulled it out to further examine our intruder, we realize it's a rattlesnake! I was freaked because Peyton and I had both been walking right around where he was for 10 minutes or so. I still struggle to walk out past there without looking very closely to make sure there isn't another one.

(9th) My friend Katie, from Cosmotology school, invited me to lunch at the CSI park with her, her daughter, Paige, and another one of the girls from our cosmo class, Lana, and her little girl Kinley. We had such a good time letting our kids play and catching up with what the others were up to.
Paige and Kinley swinging!

Peyton and Bentley taking their turns on the swings.

Kinley and Peyton taking turns on the slide.

To make up for there only being 2 kids swings, and the fact that Peyton and Paige are both so skinny, we put the two together to let them both swing:)

(10th) Peyton decided she wanted to wear tutu's this day. She has a sweater on, then a leatard tutu, then another tutu on under that. She thought she was so funny.

(12th) Bentley still isn't crawling, but he is rolling all over the place. He doesn't let not being that mobile get in the way of him getting to where he wants to go.

Ben and Kenny both volunteered to work at the soup kitchen this night so Kristie and I decided we'd go in and let the kids play at the park just down the street. It was so funny to watch Bentley and Isabelle have the same reactions to swinging. Holding their breathes to grinning because they actually do like it. Baby's are so fun!

Here are the big girls playing on the playground! It's so hard to get them to sit still, but this one turned out so good. They had so much fun....until they got hungry. At that point, we moved the playing to Arctic Circle where they ate, then played on the play place there. The two guys came and met us when they were done at the soup kitchen.

(13th) Ben mowes our lawn every week.....and Peyton HATES the noise. But she loves the 4-wheeler so I finally convinced her to go ride with him. She had no problem at all being on it if she could use daddy's ipod to listen too! She's so funny!

That afternoon we were invited to Kierstley's birthday party. It was a pool party and there we so many fun kids there for everyone to play with.

Kierstley had such a good birthday and we had so much fun celebrating with her.

internet soon to come!

2011-08-09T07:46:00.001-07:00

we finally have an installation date for our internet. august tenth. catch up posts to come. yay.

August 1st-7th!

2011-08-07T14:41:00.000-07:00

(1st) We struggled this day. Tried to potty train Peyton. We had a few successes, but also had a few messes. We continue to try. No picture, but it was a day to remember. (5th) I did Peyton's hair super cute for Aunt Michelle's baby shower! And she was such a big girl to sit still for me to braid it:)
Oh, she can be such a diva! But I don't think I've ever seen such an adorable diva in all my life:)

Michelle was so nice to let her nieces help her open her presents! She got alot of stuff that will be well used and some great advice for a first time mom:)

Bentley enjoyed all the many faces to watch at the shower. Kelli Watts even got down on the floor and played with him.

Another way we kept the kids occupied during the shower was to let them all go out for rides on Kenny's 4-wheeler. Here's the girls, Ben, and Bentley.

Then next it was the girls, Ben, and Isabelle's turn.

(6th) Our tree of apricot were ripe for the picking so Kristie, Jocelynn, Kierstley, Isabelle, Ann, Michelle, me, Peyton, Bentley, Ben, and Kenny all picked apricots. It seemed like a good idea, but the more we picked, the more weigh was on the apricots on the bottom of the barrel. But, oh heavens were they yummy while they lasted:)

And here is prego Michelle! She looks so cute:) She is 32 weeks in this picture.

Family Vacation July 2011!(Part 2)

2011-07-31T13:34:00.000-07:00

Continuing on on Thursday, the 28th, we had such a blast just boating around, then stopping for a bit to swim. Here is KaDee during one of our stops chilling and watching the boys play on the tube!
Here's Bret trying to get his balance so he can try a backflip off the tube!

Ohhh, almost made it:)

ATTENTION ALL: Ben IS NOT a big water person. If fact if he could go boating and never get in the water, he would be just fine with that. But we finally convinced him to take a dip! He said it was nice to cool off a bit:)

He and Bret were having fun jerking the boys around on the tube a bit, while Bentley and I enjoyed some chicken for lunch and watched!

Heidi even got in the water! It was such a nice day to spend on the lake!

Bret has been debating whether to buy a wake board or not so borrowed a friend of his board to try it out. I'm pretty sure he'll be purchacing one of them in the near future. If you notice, he's biting his tounge a bit! Such a Bassett!

Here's my Christopher showing off his stuff on the knee board. With alot of help from Bret driving the boat, he even got out of the wake for just a bit.

Then it was Jake's turn to ride! They are so little, they just pop right up:) But the little also makes it hard to get them out of the wake. But they have fun trying!

Here's KaDee taking her turn on the knee board!

During one of our stops, Bret would get his water balloon launcher out and he and Ben would lauch water balloons straight up in the air. Me, KaDee, Jacob, and Chris would swim around picking them up on of the water. Crazy enough, they wouldn't break. So we'd just throw them back at the guys in the boat and they'd launch them again. Well, here is where one that I hucked back into the boat landed.....and didn't pop! So crazy!

That evening, Tara and her kids and Dondee and her kids came over and had dinner with us. Then the kids got to ride a few rides together, then we watched the lumberjack show again. I forgot my camera this day, but Tara had her's and blog the day as well. So for those pictures, I'll forward you to her page:) http://tarasbestthings.blogspot.com/2011_07_01_archive.html#6321278752553849546

Friday, the 29th, we took the boys to the fair and let them ride rides all day. They had so much fun. Us adults also went to a Pamida during the afternoon and walked through some camper trailors that were set up for people to come and do walk throughs. Then that evening, we parked in the arena and watched the figure 8. I, of course, didn't take any pictures of this either, but we had fun sitting in the back of Bret's truck and visiting with the firefighters.

Saturday, the 30th, morning, we got up and went to the parade! It was a pretty good parade and Peyton learned how to cover her own ears with her own hands when the firetrucks honk their big horns:) She is not a noise fan!

Then we went to the park and rode rides. It was so fun to act like a kid again!

Then we tried our luck at the games because KaDee had been saying ALL WEEK that she wanted the Bob Marley Banana. Well, all our coins and a bit of cash later, we finally managed to get 3 balls in the barrels and Bob-nana was ours! We took this picture with a cell phone and sent it to KaDee, who was 4-wheeling for the afternoon. When she got home, she ran in looking for it and we told her we'd just convinced the guy to let us take a picture with it then had to give it back. She was so bumbed. She went down to her room....only to find Bob-nana tucked tightly into her bed! It was so funny to see how excited she got all over again:)

That night we had Grandma Georgia watch all the kids and we got to go to the Demilition Derby for a date. Ben & I, Bret & Heidi, and Pat & Sonya. It was a great night!

The next morning, Sunday, the 31st, Bret was off to work before we even got up. But we had to get on the road so we headed out that morning too. About 20 minutes into Yellowstone, Peyton lost her breakfast all over her clothes and car seat buckles. Thank heavens for baby wipies! I got back there and cleaned everything up. Put her in the only clothes that were clean and continued on.

And on to Old Faithful! We showed up at the PERFECT time! My kids were ready for a break from the car and I was ready for them to have a break.

And she went off only about 10 minutes after we got there!

So fun to watch Mother Nature at her finest! It's amazing to watch!

Then we hit the road again. Got to Rexburg and visited with Hailie and Derek for just a few minutes, got to see their new counter tops, and headed out again. We dropped Chris off with his dad in Pocatello and made it home with enough time to let the kids enjoy being out of the car before they had to go to bed. It was a great vacation and so nice to visit with family!

Family Vacation July 2011!(Part 1)

2011-07-31T12:16:00.000-07:00

We had the AWESOME oppertunity to take a family vacation this summer to Bret & Heidi's house in Powell, Wyoming. It also happened to be during the Park County Fair, which is it's own holiday for Bret & Heidi. So we thought we'd join them on their "holiday"! We started our trip first thing Tuesday, July 26th, morning, after Ben got done with work. We stopped in Rexburg long enough to pick up and order for Ben, grab some Arctic Circle, say hi to Michelle, and head back out.
Our quickest way to Powell is through Yellowstone so we got to see a few animals while we were traveling as well:)

We got to Bret & Heidi's around 5:00pm and had a chance to visit and up pack a little before we headed off to the fair. We grabbed some dinner before Bret had to leave and work his last graveyard shift before his 4 days off. Ben and Bret had what was called a "Country Burger". It was a glazed doughnut, cut in half, with a cheese burger put in the middle. Sounded so weird, but was tastebud confusingly good!

Then it was off to watch the pig wrestling! KaDee and a few of her friends had entered and because Bret is a volunteer firefighter, we even got to sit in the back of the truck right in the arena. Here is the before picture....

And here's the after! They did a good job, but the mud was just to slippery and the pig a bit to heavy for them to get him in the bucket in the 60 second time limit.

One of the girls was even nice enough to share some of the "mud" with Jacob as she walked past to go get washed off. This was the inventive way they came up with to wash off the pig wrestling contestants. Firehoses!

Then next day, Wednsday, the 27th, my cousin Jessica happened to have a dr's appointment for her broken ankle and my aunt and grandma got lost getting her there that Bret saw them and they came back to visit us while Jessie was at her appointment. They had her 2 adorable little girls with them. This is Cassidy. She had just turned one and Bentley is 8 months! Difference is.....Cassidy is walking all over and Bentley hasn't even started to crawl yet!

Here is Ben, Peyton, and Maddie, Jessie's older daughter, playing on the tramp. While Jen and Cassidy watch.

Here is Bentley's Great Grandma Iris! He wasn't so sure he wanted to give up his toy to set on her lap for a second, but you can't pass up oppertunities like these:)

After our visit with Grandma and Jen, we headed off to Cody to go mini-golfing. It was an activity we could all do and enjoy!

Even Bentley didn't mind it:)

Peyton thought the mini-golf yard decorations were fun to play with as well.

That evening, we let Jacob and Chris go ride the carnival rides while we sat back and watched the lumberjack show. It was awesome to watch. Very entertaining!

Then we caught up with the boys and they rode a few rides with the little kids:) Here is Chris and Peyton in the purple/red car and Zack is in the lime/green car behind them. Pretty sure he was trying to pass ;P

We had a stroller for Bentley, but after a while, he wanted some attention. Aunt Heidi was more then glad to take on the challenge. He sure loved all the commotion!

Bret and I got to ride the Carousel with Zack and Peyton without having to get a ride pass. Peyton wasn't sure at first, but she sure warmed up when she relized she could say hi to daddy every time she came around!

Thursday, the 28th, morning we got up and watched KaDee's friend Baxter show her steer. When I said this was Bret & Heidi's "holiday" I meant that they enjoyed EVERY aspect of the fair:) We did have a good time watching the different steers come and go.

Then it was off to the lake. Bret & Heidi got a new boat at the beginning of the summer so we had to test it out. We dropped Peyton and Zack off at Heidi's Grandma Georgia's and headed up to Horseshoe Bend. There was hardly anyone on the lake and the water was so high that we could get to places that are usually dry land. We swam, shot water balloons from a balloon launcher, and tubed.

Chris and Jacob were the first to get to go on the tube!

July 18th-25th!

2011-07-25T10:29:00.000-07:00

(22nd) When we got home from Twin Falls, Ben's cousin, Kelby was out at our place to visit. He started Chris's 4-wheeler project clear back in May in Delta and wanted it finished. He and Ben stayed up pretty late to get it going. Oh, I so wish I had had my camera at the ready the first time they got it going. They gave each other an impromptu congragulatory high-five that was priceless.

(19th) Chris was here for the weekend and so we got his pool out to play with and pass the hot day faster! (18th) We went for a walk just down the road and back and to relax afterwards, we soaked our feet in the pool and cooled down. It sure was nice to have a walk and great company while I did it:)

(18th) Ben smelled something rotten coming in through our ac vents while we were in town today so he popped the hood and this is what he found! It's a pack rat! Backed and decomposing in our engine. Blowing into our car every time we started it up! Yuck! I had to pull him our, not it one, not in two, not in three, but probably 5 bigger pieces, then had to scrap the remaining hair off the tubes.

(18th) We wanted to do a few fun thing while the girls were with us so we decided to go to Shoshone Falls! Even though we'd all seen it before, it was flowing faster and higher then any of us had ever seen it.

(18th) To add to the fun of the day, we grabbed a Costco pizza and had a picnic by Shoshone Falls! And for helping us out while they were at our house, we bought the girls a couple shirts each for school clothes.

(22nd) My mom, Tara, and Cody came up Thursday afternoon and we had a pool party with 4 little pools set up around Ann & Dayn's yard for the kids to play in. Kristie and her girls came over and we made an afternoon of it. The next day, my little group drove into Twin to check out the DI and let the kids play at Hop 2 It! They had so much fun! Here is Peyton and Chris playing basketball!

(22nd) Britnee, Peyton, me, and Jaycee at the bottom of the big slide @ hop 2 it!

(22nd) Britnee and Jaycee trying to figure out how to get Peyton to the top of the big slide!

(21st) Peyton looking "cool" in Grandma Sony's sun glasses!

(20th) Peyton's first night in her "big girl bed"! She only slept for about an hour then woke up crying. From there forward, she got lost in her closet, put back in her crib, then fell out of the crib. So by 11:30, Ben and I were done dealing with it so she ended up back in her crib, exhausted. The next night, she slept in her big girl bed with not one bit of trouble!

(22nd) While we were running around Twin, we decided to cun past the Twin Falls Temple and take some pictures! It is so beautiful there!

(22nd) And here's one with my mom in it:)

(22nd) Back at hop 2 it, here is a few of our gang coming down the medium slide! Bentley wasn't so sure what he thought of it:)

July 11th -17th!

2011-07-17T10:01:00.000-07:00

(15th) For 3 weeks during the summer, the school puts on lunch that's free for kids and only $3 for adults. It was a nice break up to our day to go down and have some lunch and visit.
(13th) My neices rode up to visit us for a few weeks. I have so much fun when they're here. They help me with things around the house and my kids and I get to do their hair all I want! Here was just one of the days I got to do Britnee's hair.

(13th) I was trying to show Bentley how crawling works since he hasn't quite figured it out. Well, Peyton hoped on and starting singing "Horsey horsey on our way". What a funny little girl!

(12th) Not very often does Ben reliquish his tv to anyone else when he's home, but he was well entertained by our attempts at playing Dance Dance Revolution!

(16th) We have all sorts of fruit trees out in the yard of the house we're renting. 2 types of cherries, 3 pear trees, an apricot tree, an apple tree, and 2 more tree's with stuff growing on them that kinds look like green plums so we aren't sure what they are. Well, one of the cherry trees was ripe quickly after we moved in. So we went out and started picking like crazy. And up near the top of the tree, this is what we found! A nicely built birds nest with 2 hungry baby birds. Every time we bumped their branch, they'd sit up with their mouths open ready to eat.

(16th) Here is Ben and I picking cherries. Britnee was up there too, but we didn't quite get her in the picture.

(16th) Peyton thought that the ladder in the yard was super fun!

(15th) It was a nice summer day so we invited Kristie and her kids to come over and play in the pool with us. Peyton and Kierstley were a little hesitant at first of getting into the cool pool.

(15th) Here is Britnee, Jocelynn, me, Kristie, Isabelle, and Bentley enjoying the water and the sun!

July 4th-10th!

2011-07-10T09:33:00.000-07:00

Order problems again! (6th) Peyton loves her brother. And he giggles so hard when she'll take the time to play with him.
(4th) We had a few firework that we let off in the yard the night of the 4th. Not all the kids were thrilled. Bentley and Kierstley ended up in the house soon after the fireworks started.

(6th) Peyton and Bentley. You'd think he'd have a problem with this, but he thought it was so funny! Sibling love:)

(10th) Kenny and Kristie had just moved into their house and didn't have their dish installed yet. So in order to watch Big Brother, they joined us at our house to watch it. Then kids played and the adults watched:)

(10th) Isabelle enjoying Big Brother!

(4th) The morning of the 4th, Murtaugh had a big breakfast. We went and enjoyed and it was really yummy. Here is Peyton, Grandma, and Grandpa chatting after breakfast was eaten.

(4th) Always depend on Bentley to show his enjoyment! He really did enjoy the pancakes at the breakfast:)

(4th) Peyton found herself a friend and they had a ball walking up and down the fence line:)

(4th) Kenny and Ben preparing all the fireworks for our enjoyment!

(4th) Peyton's hair for the 4th of July! I try to get inventive with her hair so that I'm not doing it the same way over and over again. Well, in celibration of the 4th of July, a STAR:)

Soon to come.....

2011-07-06T15:35:00.002-07:00

i have been struggling getting on the computer since moving to idaho, but am hoping to move into a rental soon and should be able to catch up. so please stay tuned and we will see how it all works outs. hopefully you all have not stopped visiting me.

June 27th-July 3rd!

2011-07-03T08:00:00.000-07:00

Pictures are out of order again. (30th) Kenny & Kristie got a chance to move into a nicer rental house without mice to took it. So Ann and I took the kids for an afternoon so that they could move without the kids to take care of.

(27th) Ann and Dayn had a sparrow's nest build on their entry way. This was our way of telling if it had eggs in it or not. Reach the camera up and snap a picture then look at the picture. As you can see, 5 eggs:)

(30th) As part of the keeping all the kids occupied, Ann and I took them to Arctic Circle in Kimberly. This is how happy Bentley was to be there! J/K! He was just ready for his nap. A man did ask me when he saw Bentley and Isabelle if I'd had twins! LOL! Oh, heavens, I don't think I could manage twins!

(2nd) We had a lunch before Chris's baptism to get all our family together and congratulate Chris. Here is Peyton deciding on what she would like to eat!

(2nd) Chris decided that he wanted Grandpa Dayn to make liquid nitrogen ice cream for dessert. It was delicious.

(2nd) Bentley had not napped in the car on the way down very well so was super tired. Tara was trying to walk him around and settle him down. He wasn't having it.

(30th) Jocelynn and Peyton playing on the play area at Arctic Circle. I couldn't for the life of me get all three playing girls together in one shot.

(2nd) Chris's quilt all finished! He ABSOLUTELY loves it! He chose to have soccer balls on the back because he loves soccer right now. Ann did an amazing job on the quilt and it turned out beautifully. Chris will always remember where he got his first full quilt!

June 20th-26th!

2011-06-26T07:03:00.000-07:00

(21st) Chris's baptism was quickly approaching and we were running out of time to get the quilt done before the big day. So Ann and I spent many many hours next to the quilt. Peyton and Bentley played in the "fort" (under the quilt) and they thought it was fun for just a short time, but once they'd spent 3 or 4 days next to or by the quilt, they sure were ready for us to be done.

(25th) Grandpa Dayn and daddy were out in the garden putting the soaker hoses in the garden so Peyton and Bentley went to watch. When I asked Peyton if I could take a picture, she decided she needed to hold Bentley for it and he didn't much care for that.

That day was also the Merrill Family Reunion @ Minidoka dam. Ben played the big kid and played water balloons with all the kids.

Here is Kenny and Ben getting ready to help the kids pick up the candy from the candy cannon.

(21st) Grannie Annie got the granddaughter's all new shirts. They were so cute, she just couldn't pass them up. Same shirt, different colors:) Peyton sure has loved her's and loves Grannie Annie for giving it to her!

June 13th-19th!

2011-06-19T07:02:00.000-07:00

Out of order, again. (13th) Peyton has become Grannie Annie's little helper. Though I'm not sure how much help she was. I'm sure she was a little bit of a hindrance, but made up for it in being good company.

They planted flowers all over the yard and Peyton would get tired to she'd ride in the stroller with the flowers to plant in the shade hood.

(14th) We got home from town late this night and I put Bentley on the chair while we put groceries away. Peyton sat right in front of him and he started kicking her off the chair. She started squealing and didn't think it was near as funny as Ben and I did. Ahh, sibling rivalry!

(16th) Chris is spending the summer @ his dad's in Bear Lake and was old enough for coach pitch. We were able to make it down to watch one of his games. Kristie was in Mud Lake visiting her parents so Kenny was available to ride with us so we could picked up our VW from my mom's. Tia had been borrowing it and had left it in BL when she picked up my dad's Tahoe. On the way through to the game, we picked up Jaycee, Britnee, and Cody to come to the game too. Tara came over a little while after us. It was cooler then expected so I was unfortunately unprepared with no jacket for Peyton. So I sacrificed mine and I sat in the car and watched.

He is getting pretty dang good at baseball. I love that he's found something that he enjoys and is good at:)

(19th) Father's day. I had done Peyton's hair in a cute pony tail the day before and didn't take it out when she went to bed. Well, this was how it ended up the next morning. I thought it was pretty cute that her hair made a <3 heart<3 right by Ben on Father's day so I couldn't pass up the photo op!

Here is Peyton helping Ben open the gift we got him for Father's day. Oh, the joys of being a parent!

Here is Kenny, Ben, and Cody watching @ Chris's coach pitch game. Told you, way out of order.

June 7th-June 12th!

2011-06-12T07:01:00.000-07:00

The pictures are out of order, sorry. (9th) While staying at my in-laws, I have had to opportunity to help Ann with all her fun projects. She had already started Chris's baptism quilt before we moved in so I just stepped in and helped where I could.

(11th) Bentley is getting so big! He is learning so much and sure is Mr. Smiley, most of the time! He is 7 months in this picture!

(9th)Kenny & Kristie's daughter was in t-ball this year and we were able to make it to most of her games. She did pretty well for her first year. Hailie's husband, Derek, was taking a motorcycle class all weekend so she came up for a visit and was able to come to a game with us.

(12th) Ann is getting new glasses and wanted everyone's opinion on them to make sure she got the one's that worked the best. She looked beautiful in the all, but these were the one's she decided on.

(7th) Kierstley and Peyton wanted to play ball at the t-ball games too, so this is Kenny keeping them occupied so that they weren't on the field!

Chris is 8!

2011-06-06T07:00:00.000-07:00

My Christopher Brett is 8! Still hard to believe:) He is getting so big so fast. But I'm enjoying watching the young man he is becoming. He is starting to become more responsible and learning more and more of life's lessons! This year, we happen to be living at my in-laws while we looked for a house to rent. So when Grannie Annie asked Chris what kind of cake he wanted, he told her he didn't want cake, he wanted cherry pie! Well, she aims to please and baked up 4 cherry pies.

Chris's present from us was a small swim/slide pool. He has had some fun with it and we get it out every chance we can while he's here.

Along with being 8, Chris also had the choice on whether he wanted to be baptized or not. He decided that he did, which I am so proud of him for. He really does enjoy church. He is such a smart kid. I admire his knowledge and his decision to make the right choices. I love you Chris!

May 30th-June 5th!

2011-06-05T20:00:00.001-07:00

I will apoligize for the sideways pictures. I am not on my normal computer and that throws everything all off. (30th) This was the day before the big move. Here is how we contained Peyton and Bentley for a few minutes until we could get the Bowflex out of the house.
Kyle and Ben worked really hard to get the Bowflex out of the house without taking it ALL the way apart. It was a struggle, but they did it.

That night, Ann and Dayn made it down to help us clean the house. Ann tackled the huge feat of the kitchen! Bless her heart.

Dayn did the windows and blinds. I have such amazing in-laws to come and help us move:)

(31st) MOVING DAY! We got up super early to get everything done so we could get on the road for Idaho! Here is the last picture of the house before we pulled out for the last time. Dayn drove the U-haul, Ben drove our Suburban with our utility trailer, Ann drove their Suburban, and I drove Ben's work Trailblazer.

(1st) We kinda took it easy and relaxed a bit. We unloaded the U-haul into Ann & Dayn's shop so we didn't have to rent a storage unit. Then Kenny & Kristie came over for dinner.

(2nd) Kristie had to take their car into town to get a chip taken care of in their windshield so we got to have the girls over to play. We played games and puzzles and had a ball. It's so fun living closer so our kids and their cousins can play together! That evening, we got to go down town in Murtaugh and watch Jocelynn's 1st t-ball game:) It was a bit windy and cool, but fun to watch!

(3rd) Friday morning I caught Peyton "helping" Bentley put cortizone 10 on his eczema spot on his head! Such a sweet girl! Then the kids and Ann and I drove to Pocatello to get Chris for the weekend.

(4th) We hung out at home Saturday morning until the "dads" could get done with work. Then that evening, we went to Burley to Storybook Park and let the kids play! I completely forgot my camera and hated myself for it. It was so fun. I am loving living close to family.

(5th) Church here right now doesn't start until 3 pm so we had that morning to cebrate Chris's birthday a little bit. His birthday is the 6th, but we had to take him back to his dad that day so we wanted him to get to choose his "birthday dinner" so we did it the day before:) He chose to have cherry pie instead of cake and he loved it! He got a mini-water fun park for the yard, a soccer ball, 2 base balls, and a new bat.

May 23rd-May 29th!

2011-05-29T20:00:00.000-07:00

(23rd) Last full week in this house! It is so bitter/sweet. I was doing dishes and Chris wasnted to help me. Well, Peyton does what Chris does so she wanted to help too. And Bentley just likes to be included so he joined us as well:)
(24th) Ben had a b-b-que for ym so it left just the kids and I to eat at home. Peyton LOVES grapes....and now so does Bentley. We have a little netted passy that lets the juice out when they bite, but not the chunks. Ben thought to try it for Bentley and he loved it.

(25th) While I was picking some of our stuff in the front room, Peyton found my beanie and put it on. Then went to chill in the swing, basking in the sun light:D Such a character!

(26th) Thursday was Chris's last day in Delta! He had a half day of school then we took him to his dad to start his summer. He has sure loved his bus driver, Lori. So before he got off the bus, he gave her a card saying how much we'd miss her and a big hug! She said she had a suprise for him, but it wasn't finished so she'd mail it to him. Such a good lady.

(27th) Bentley had his 6 months check up:) He is still growing like a weed. He is 19 lbs 12 oz (86%) and is 28 inches tall (93%). He is rolling over, grabbing stuff, and sometimes will go up on his knees like he is thinking about crawling. He's getting so big, so fast that we are all just trying to keep up.

I also go the chance to go have lunch with my good friend, Jaime. I am sure going to miss her and so many of my friend from here in Delta. It was so good to catch up with her one last time before I move.

(28th) Ben's brother, Kyle, came up for the weekend to help us finish packing and load the U-haul. Peyton loves her uncle Kyle and needs no warm up time.

(29th) Pretty much the whole house is packed, except the stuff we'll need until the morning that we move. Beds, clothes, certain foods, bathroom stuff! Crazy how boxes that fill a half of a room can fill a whole house and make it a home!

May 16th-May 22nd!

2011-05-22T20:00:00.000-07:00

(16th) I was making dinner and I can hear Peyton, not see her, hear her say "stuck"! I walk around the bar. And low and behold, she'd gotten herself into the entertainment center and couldn't figure out how to get out:)

(17th) I was making dinner on the stove when Chris and Peyton wanted to keep me company! Peyton wasn't so sure if she trusted Chris, but she wanted up.

(18th) I've been packing room by room, day by day, and here is where Bentley has spent alot of his time, and enjoying the heck out of it!

(19th) Peyton is the funniest eater! She likes to dip her cheetos in ketchup, smear it on her bun, and then eating all three!

This past week has been rough with my foot. Ever since I stepped on the toothpick in February, I've had a callous on my foot. Well, it really started hurting. I went to the dr this morning to have it checked out. Yeah, she had to lance it, gave me antibiotics, and give me tetnis shot. It hurt like heck! But low and behold, Saturday, the 21st, the little piece of toothpick came out. Now I'm on the mend and things are feeling much better:)

(20th) We cooked hamburgers on the grill Friday evening and enjoyed the sun that finally peaked past the rain clouds. Well, we enjoyed the sun, but Bentley didn't know how to handle the brightness of it:)

(21st) While the weather was nice, we decided it was a good day to pack up and clean out the garage for the move. We packed quite strategically and did quite well to fit in the trailer all that we needed to.

(22nd) We relaxed and caught up on sleep! My kids sure love each other. But apparently don't know how to look at the camera AND smile!

It's official!

2011-05-16T07:05:00.003-07:00

We're moving! We have loved living in Delta, but it's just too far from family! Ben and I have lived here for 3 years, 2/3rds of our marriage. And Peyton and Bentley were both born here. There are so many friends that we will miss, but we are moving on to the next chapter in our lives and are very excited about the possibilities!

May 9th-May 15th!

2011-05-15T20:00:00.002-07:00

(9th) The Delta Cheerleaders do a fund raiser each year that they have a photographer from up north come down and do family pictures. You donate to the cheerleaders and get an 11 X 14 for free. Then you can buy different packages if you'd like to from the photographer. Well, Monday was our appointment and we'll get the picture back around the 20th so..... May 9th's picture to come:)

(10th) Here is our first attempt at french braiding Peyotn's hair. The back of her hair is getting pretty long, but the front isn't growing as fast. Needless to say, these braids didn't stay in for very long, but they sure were cute while they lasted!

When Chris was a toddler, he would suck on fleece blankets! And occationally, I still catch him sucking on the sleeve of his shirt or something. Well, Bentley is just like him in that he likes to suck on material. Here is the seahorse getting his wrath!

(11th) We got some funnel cake batter from a neighbor for one of her fund raiser. Well, we decided to break them out and try them! They tasted really good, but I wasn't very good at cooking them. Ben made a few after I was done attempting them and they turned out pretty good! His actually looked like cakes;)

(12th) Ben's cousin, Kelby, was headed down to Cali to work for the summer and decided to stop for a couple days and visit us! Chris was so excited because he loves Kelby! Well, Kelby was taking his Kinect with him so we convinced him to let us play for a little while. Chris had so much fun with the games! He was so bummed when he had to got to bed!

(13th) Peyton is quite the shy little girl. Kelby had tried VERY HARD while we were up in Idaho for Easter to get Peyton to like him, even tried to bribe her with oreo's:) She just didn't warm up to him. Well, that all changed when he came to her turf! She LOVED him! We got her some Skittles and I'd give her 2 or 3 at a time and she'd share one with Kelby (Belby), then one with daddy, then another one with Kelby. She was so funny with him!

(14th) After joining us to take Chris to his dad for the weekend, having dinner in Provo with my cousin Kiley, and working on Chris's little ATV to get it working, Kelby finally had to get back on the road to Corona. Peyton stood on the drive way and blew him kisses as he drove away! So cute!

(15th) We picked Chris up at Lagoon and then went to Springville and had dinner at Ruth & Terry's, a couple that Ben was good friends with on his mission that had moved out this way. We are going to miss not living as close to them. They love our kids and are great company! This is Peyton and Chris watching Transformers 2 on the way home. Chris is working on loosing his 7th tooth so his wiggles it all the time!

May 2nd-May 8th!

2011-05-08T20:00:00.000-07:00

(2nd)Chris has an interesting way of entertaining himself! He has used the regular swing as a step stool to get into Peyton's baby swing!
(3rd)Here are my kids in the evening. We usually read bed time stories with Chris as part of his reading for school and it's a good wind down for my other kids too!

(4th)Peyton has climbed on Bentley and is helping him swing:) It was so funny. He was giggling right out loud, but as soon as I got up to get my camera, Peyton stopped what she was doing and then Bentley wouldn't laugh again! Typical!

(5th)Bentley is getting into stuff already! He's figured out that his hands work and he grabs everything within his reach now. I did have the lid set on the jar of peanut butter, but as you can see, he knocked that right off.

(6th)Chris and I are playing catch and enjoying the warm weather. Peyton is picking dandy lions and just enjoying the heck out of being outside.

And Bentley is laying in the shade watching us play ball!

(7th)Our neighbor, Howard, flooded irrigated our feild Saturday morning so also flooded our front lawn too:) My kids sure loved when they do this because it's a free pool for a little while! This was the first time Peyton got to play and she was in hog-heaven!

It was cold water, but that didn't seem to slow my kiddo's down at all! It was 10:30 am and 80 degrees or so already and they played for dang near an hour!

Ben and I were working in the garden. Ben was tilling and I was raking the weeds that got tilled and putting them in the wheel barrel to be hauled away. Bentley slept through the whole thing!

(8th)Happy Mother's Day! I am so blessed to be the mom of such great kids! Chris helped me get ready for church that morning because he wanted to be sure to be on time because he sang a song with the primary and didn't want to be late. Peyton gave me the biggest hugs as I laid her down for her nap. And Bentley only spit up on my church dress once! I love being a mom and I'm so bless to have it as my full-time job!

April 25th-May 1st!

2011-05-01T20:00:00.000-07:00

(25th)Bentley is becoming such a big boy! He's sitting up with a little help, wearing 6-9 months close....at 5 months! His healthy and big and love every roll and dimple!
(26th)Peyton loves her books! She is getting so big too! She also really likes to put thing in the trunk of her trike. Today's baggage is......cereal!

(27th)I went Visiting Teaching today and this was the treat I took my ladies! Cherrio treats made into nest with malted milk ball eggs!

(28th)A lady in my ward here in Delta home-made Bentley a "wooby", I guess is what they're called. Anyway, he loves it. It's an elephant and her sucks on the nose and cuddles the blanket part to his face.

(29th)Ben's feet tend to peel when the seasons change. Peyton loves to peel the skin off for him. Make a perfect team:)

(30th)Chris get's "Bob bucks" from school if he reads 20 minutes a night for 20 nights a month. Different businesses sponser it each month. Well, it was Hogi Yogi in April and we had to redeem it before the month was up so we went to town and Peyton wanted to wear her hand picked outfit! She got so many compliments:) I had to share her cuteness with anyone who reads my blog!

(1st)My pretty girl after church! She loves church! Chris has to take her to nursery for me because she gets shy when she gets around all those kids and clings to me. As soon as she's left, she's just fine:) It's been a good week:)

April 18th-April 24th!

2011-04-24T20:00:00.001-07:00

Busy week so please bare with me. Monday, April 18th, my friend Katie and her little girl Paige came to stay with us. They had a funeral the next day in a town down the road from here so they stayed with us and visited. Here is Peyton and Paige playing. They weren't too sure how much they liked each other at first.
By the next day(19th), they were good friends! Getting into mischief together:) Here is their hug good-bye!

On Wednesday(20th) we went to Murtaugh. Chris went to his dad's house for his spring/Easter break. Here is Bentley and Isabelle. They are starting to look so much alike, it's crazy!

(21st)Here is what Peyton did every chance she got! Played in Grannie Annie's sink. She washed dishes, painted her nails with water and a paint brush, drank water, poured it over her head, washed her hands with soap.....she had a blast!

(22nd)This is Peyton's breakfast set up! She loves being at Grandma & Grandpa's and getting out of her routine!

Friday afternoon, Kristie's mom, sister, and aunt came down from Mud Lake to make homemade peanut butter Easter egg's. You can see poor Kierstley's case, but she didn't let it stop her from joining in on the fun:)

Here is Peyton brushing Bentley's hair while he played in Isabelle's sauser/entertainment center:)

Here is Peyton and Jocelynn decorating their eggs:)

Here is Peyton eating the decorations for the eggs;)

Here is Bentley getting his first taste of baby rice cereal. He wasn't real sure what he thought, but what baby does on their first try.

Here is Peyton, me, Kenny, and Keirstley getting ready for Murtaugh's Easter egg hunt on Saturday morning(23rd).

Here's is Keirstley, Jocelynn, and Peyton in front of the Easter Bunny mural after the egg hunt.

We fly kites every year for Easter. Here is the only kite that actually got up in the air! It's Peyton's, but she lost interest pretty quick so mom took over:)

Here is Ben, running with the big kite, trying to get the wind to pick it up!

Here are the girls lined up to start the home Easter egg hunt!

And GO! Peyton was having so much fun finding the eggs! Jocelynn and Keirstley were doing so well to leave some behind for her to find!

While she was hunting the eggs, daddy got her kite in the air so she dropped her basket and tried to get the kite out of the air:) Funny girl!

Here is cousin Kelby with the two "twins"!

Sunday(24th), Easter morning, the Easter bunny came! There was a little rabbit eating grass in the front yard.

Here is Peyton, Grandma, Keirstley, and Jocelynn playing Harry Potter Sunday afternoon! We had such a great time visiting family in Idaho! Hope to do it again real soon;)

April 11th-17th!

2011-04-17T20:00:00.000-07:00

I know this post is alot of pictures so I will only give a little discription as I go along.Peyton and Bentley, Monday, the 11th.
My way of keeping the kids entertained while I clean house for everyone to come, 12th.

I made cookies for the weekend and told Peyton to wait until after dinner, I turned around, and this is what I found! 13th.

Thursday night, the 14th, while waiting for Tia and Voi to get here! Not very clear, but my Bentley's sure a mover these days:)

Voi's little boy, Ashton, playing in the kids entertainment center while we cooked dinner Friday night, the 15th.

Tia, Peyton, and Ben out looking for the golf balls the hit!

Voi cooking us dutch over parmasean chicken and potatoes and cobbler.

Making Ben's home-made ice cream to go with the cobbler dessert.

First thing Saturday monring, 16th, KC, Wyatt, and Chris stayed quite entertained with their ds's. If they weren't outside digging wholes, they were inside trying to pass the ds games.

Tia asked me to do her hair to keep it out of her face and so she could trying out how she'd look with a flower in her hair. I thought it turned out really cute, but she said it wasn't her!

Grandma playing with Bentley Saturday night after her and Jaycee showed up.

Sunday, the, 17th, morning, all the kids woke up and ate cereal for breakfast, while the adults had potato/eggs/bacon dutchoven skillets! YUM!

Pardon the small pictures. Here's the beginning of the kids Easter Scavenger Hunt! The clue was:

______ are red
Violets are blue
Flowers are pretty

And so are you!

Answer: Rose Garden

Next clue:

For a good time

Kids like to play

Out back on this set

All the live long day

Answer: Swing set

Next clue:

Bills and letters
Are put in this
And the bus comes here

To pick up Chris

Answer: Mail box

Next clue:

Hamburgers, hot dogs,
Steak, chicken, pork
You check if they're done

With a knife and fork

This was too funny! This is Ben and Voi running to the next clue with their kids flug over their shoulders, racing! Chris and Wyatt tried to keep up.

Answer: Bar-B-Que

Next clue:

Carrots, pumpkins,
Beans and corn
When pulling weeds

Gloves should be worn

Answer: Garden

Next clue:

Bark, twig,
Branch, sliver
If you climb too high

Looking down might make ya quiver

Answer: Tree

Final clue:

Of this thing,
We have three
Be careful not to step
In the poop or pee!

Answer: Dog kennel

Where we had their final prizes waiting!

Then we did an Easter Egg hunt! The kids had fun collecting all the eggs:)

Then my mom rehid the empty eggs harder so the adults could come Easter egg hunt too!

Ben's so proud:)

Good hiding spot! Up in the hitch of the utility trailer! It was a great weekend, full of good food, great company, and lots of fun!

April 9th-10th!

2011-04-10T20:00:00.000-07:00

It snowed all weekend, but it never got real cold so the snow would melt off pretty quick. Well, melted snow leaves behind pretty good puddles! Ben and Peyton walked to the mail box to get the mail and so Peyton could stretch her legs. She loved the puddles! She would stop and play, Ben would walk off without her, and she'd have this torn look on her face on whether she should go with him or stay with her puddle. So she'd start running after him and see another puddle and run through it on her way to him. It was quite funny!

The kitty has decided that the window in our kitchen is her resting spot. Peyton has decided it's very interesting to sit and watch the kitty rest. What a great pair:)

Bentley is getting big enough to be a bit entertained by what's above him so we thought we'd get Peyton's old mat/arch system out for him to play with. I know, poor kids surrounded by pink. Well, Peyton was more interested in it then him so this is how they ended up playing for the Sunday afternoon. He watch her and she played:)

April 4th-8th!

2011-04-08T20:00:00.000-07:00

Monday, April 4th, Tara and her kids were still here until around noon! Peyton loved having kids to play with. Chris had to go to school that morning, but he had a chance to hang out with them a little before I took him.

April 5th, Bentley is getting so big! He's smiley most of the time. And he's getting stronger and stronger.

Here's a picture of Peyton at about the same age, doing about the same pose! I love the comparisons:)

April 6th, Peyton and Chris hanging out outside, playing with the bubbles Peyton got for her birthday:)

April 7th, Peyton wants to be just like her daddy! She took his remote and her juice and was just chilling, watching the basketball game.

April 8th, Peyton found my old dance shoes and decided to trapes around the house in them. She's a funny girl!

New Bike Jibber!

2011-04-06T14:36:00.002-07:00

April 2nd-3rd!

2011-04-03T20:00:00.000-07:00

Peyton's 2nd Birthday fell on Sunday this year so we celebrated all weekend. Saturday, we went to the Gateway mall in Salt Lake and met Ben's brother, Kyle, and his mom and dad. It was a nice day and we had great fun. To start the day out right, Peyton got her ears pierced:) I've been begging Ben to let me pierce her ears since before she was born and he wanted to wait. I finally begged enough (or her bringing him earings from my bathroom drawer convinced him) and we got them done! She thinks it's so fun and they are now another "cute" for her to show off! While waiting for our name to be called at Tucano's, Peyton got to open her presents from Grandpa Dayn and Grannie Annie! She loves presents! What kid doesn't. The stuffed dog on her back is a "leash" of sorts and it was a life-saver that day. She loved wearing it and her independance shines through more and more every day and so it was nice to have a hold of her without her having to keep ahold of us! Grannie Annie, Chris, and Peyton checking out the going's on below.

Our waitor was kind enough to take our picture. Bentley was in his car seat next to Ben. Kinda hard to get him in the picture!

I told them it was her birthday and they brought her ice cream and sang to her. She was a little scared of the drum and wouldn't shake the tamberine so Grandpa Dayn did it for her. After they left, she thought it was fun:)

Here is poor Peyton because we didn't let her play in the water. It was a nice day, but over cast and not quite warm enough to run through the water. But she sure wanted to:(

There were other kids that were playing in the water and so Peyton was intertained, but boy how she wanted to join them.

Sunday morning we woke up to this! Crazy! High on Saturday, 85 degrees!

Tara and her kids had been in St. George for spring break and stayed with us Sunday night to break up the trip home a bit. We had a great dinner and cake and ice cream.

Everyone eating their desserts:)

Peyton eating Chris's dessert too! If you notice, she still has ice cream on her plate, she'd just rather eat Chris's off his plate! She the birthday girl though!

She enjoyed her presents. She got a new Sunday shoes and Tangled!

A new bike! Which she right now rides around our kitchen:)

And a music/jewlery box from Chris! She carries this around and the key is a necklace she loves to wear now too!

Tara eluded the camera until now but here is her and Bentley!

Here is how Cody and Chris spent their time in the shower! They made do with the letters they had:)

Britnee went up in the front room to watch Tangled while Ben, Tara, Jaycee, and I played Perpetual Commotion and this is how well she took care of my boy:) He seems so stressed!

Peyton was saying "cheese" for the picture, hence the face! The weekend was great! We love spending time with family and our beautiful Peyton is now 2! We are so blessed!

March 29th-April 1st!

2011-04-01T20:00:00.001-07:00

Peyton is getting smarter and smarter every day. We were in the kitchen on Tuesday, the 29th, getting some breakfast and she wanted some of the strawberries that Grannie Annie and Grandpa Dayn brought from California. So she got my meat loaf pan out of my cupboard and used it as a stepping stool! Such craftyness:) Wednesday, the 30th, was P/T confrence for Chris, us, and his teacher. He got good grades and brought most of them up from last quarter. He's up on his test scores as well. He's quite a smart kid. His pitfall is that he enjoys talking too much. So he has set a goal to work on that. He told me just before we left for the confrence that he had snuck his DSi to school and his teacher had taken it from him. Well, it's a very strict rule in our house that his DSi doesn't go to school so he knew he was in trouble for it. So when we got home, we told him he was grounded from it until further notice. Which was a bummer because we had bought him a new DSi game to give him if he had improved his grades. Needless to say, he was very interested in ANYTHING he could do to earn the DSi back. So Ben told him if he'd weed the entire garden, he could get it back. So he got to work. On Thursday, the 31st, Bentley was still asleep so Peyton and I got up and headed outside. We took the weeds Chris had pulled the day before and hauled them over to our dump pile. Then we fed the dogs, then we weeded our flower garden. After an hour and a half, Ben finally got home from work. Peyton loved the time outside. When we came in, Peyton helped me take out the garbage. She loves to get the next bag ready to go in the trash can, as you can tell:) (You can also see her make shift stool there too!) Chris had only gotten half way done with the garden before he had to go to bed the night before. So as soon as he got home finished his homework, he headed back out to finish. He piled all the dry weeds in a pile and we burned them. TGIF! April 1! It was a good day:) It didn't start out that way. Peyton woke up at 4:00am with a bad dream. When Ben left at 5:00am she was still awake so layed down to bed with me. By 5:30am, Bentley woke up to eat so I put Peyton in her bed, still awake. I fed him and by 6:00am, all 3 of us were back in bed asleep. I woke up at 6:55am to get Chris to school. So I just stayed up and got ready. By 8:30am, Peyton was us and we went out to do the dogs again. Then Bentley woke up and we brought him outside with us. It was so beautiful! No wind and pretty, sunny, and warm. When Ben got home from work, we washed his car, which was pretty bad. Then washed the dogs, first time since last fall. After Chris got home from school, we washed the Suburban! Love warm weather and helpful kids:)

March 28th!

2011-03-28T20:00:00.000-07:00

My two younger kiddo's had their well-child checks today! They are both doing well. Growing, moving, and learning like they're supposed to be! Peyton went in for her 2 year check. She weighs 24 lbs (17 %) and is 36 1/2" tall (97%)! She didn't have her "10 minutes" to warm up to the doctor so she wasn't really liking him doing what he needed to do with her. She squeeled when he tried to do her ears and eyes. And she was still squeeling when she layed down to have her stomach and hips checks so he got a good look down her throat. They she settled down because she thought he was tickling and having fun with her. We have such a good doctor! Bentley did really good! He weighs 18 lbs 6 oz (96%) and is 27" (97%)! The dr kept saying, "Wow, storng healthy boy you got here" "Geez, he's a big boy" "He's sure going good". He even asked Ben if we'd been feeding Bentley solids yet, Ben said no, he said are you sure? But he's healthy and there's nothing wrong with him. Then we got their immunization shots. Peyton went first so she didn't have to watch Bentley cry before she got hers. She got 5, but she'll be done until Kindergarten now. She started crying a few seconds after the first one went in and she has a tendency of holding her breath instead of breathing and continuing to cry so she started turning red in the face. Ben and I have seen her do it before, and Chris used to do it too, so we didn't panic, but the nurse did, and stopped giving her the shots. I told her to just keep going and then Peyton would be fine. I hit the nail on the head. The second all the shots were done and the nurse let her legs go, she stopped, sat up, and said "owwy". Then it was Bentley's turn. He layed down for 2 shots, cried for a few second while the shots were poking him, and was fine as soon as I picked him up. I have such strong kids. I'm so glad I've been bless to have such great healthy kids!

March 25th-27th!

2011-03-27T20:00:00.000-07:00

I'm slowing down just a bit! I'm still going to blog about our daily activities, but I'm not going to be blogging them every day. I'll start combining them. Here's our weekend. Friday we ran Chris to Lagoon to meet his dad. On our way home, we stopped in Sandy and had lunch with Kyle. Further down the road we stopped in Payson for groceries. Just after we got home, Ann and Dayn showed up to stay the night on their way home from California:) It was so good to see them. Dayn's birthday is March 27th, so we made him a candy-gram! It was fun to be reminded of the simpler things of childhood. Peyton and Bentley sure loving seeing their grandparents! Saturday, we had home made pancakes, visited, and Peyton followed or lead them all over the house. Dayn and Ann were sure bumbed to miss Chris so they left him a note, a little Mickey Mouse cup from Disneyland, and an orange directly from Califonia! Chris was sad that he missed seeing them, but he was sure excited about being remembered. He played a game where he'd toss the orange up and try to catch it on the top of the cup.

March 24th!

2011-03-24T20:00:00.000-07:00

Peyton and I went and got in the shower while Ben and Bentley napped this afternoon. This is how I found Bentley laying when I came back out! How freaking cute! Oh, how I love him. But he's going to fast for my liking:(

March 23rd!

2011-03-23T20:00:00.000-07:00

My Chris has decided to be more independent in the mornings. He gets himself up about 10 minutes before my alarm even goes off and gets himself ready and watches cartoons until I come up to make sure he doesn't miss the bus. He's such a good kid!

March 22nd!

2011-03-22T20:00:00.000-07:00

Ben's Aunt Sherilee is a school teacher in Idaho. Their spring break is this week so she was kind enough to as Great Grandpa and Grandma Merrill, Ben's mom's mom and dad, if they wanted to take a short trip down through some of Utah. Well, we were lucky enough to be on their itinerary! This was Sherilee's first time seeing Bentley:)

It took about 10-20 minutes, but Peyton warmed up and by the time they all left, she had herself 3 new friends!
Grandparents Merrill have some really fun songs that play with Peyton's toes so she sat there for quite some time letting them tickle and sing to her:)
Chris loved having an audiance when he got home from school. He even had his very own "teacher" to help him with the 2 pages of phonics homework that he had. He liked having Aunt Sherilee help him. It was so good to see them and so nice of them to visit us for the afternoon.

March 21st!

2011-03-21T20:00:00.003-07:00

This is a picture of Peyton when she was 3 months old showing me her pouting face! Sorry it's blurry:(
And here's Bentley's! They are so much alike, it's crazy:) And he's not even really upset right here. Ben'll sing a song to him, he'll pucker up. Ben stops and he's done! Funniest thing to watch.

March 20th!

2011-03-20T20:00:00.001-07:00

Wonderful day today! Church was good. My kids looked cute! When we got home, Ben had a roast cooking and snickerdoodle dough chilling in the fridge. We fed Peyton and Bentley and they went down for a nap. After we had lunch, we layed down too. I had a relief society humanitarian meeting at 4:00. When I got home this is what I found. Peyton laying on the floor, saying "cucky"! Ben says she'd been laying there for 20 minutes, watching Chris play.
This is how she layed while I changed her diaper! Yeah, she's her fathers child:)

Later, we made up the snickerdoodles! Peyton sat there drinking her juice and every circle I'd make, she'd say "cookie"!

Before!

After! They were delicious! And don't let the pictures fool you, Ben did most the work. I rolled all the cookies into circles, but Ben rolled them in the cinnomon and put them on the pan and baked them and got them off the pan! I love him:)

March 19th!

2011-03-19T20:00:00.000-07:00

Sorry about the above picture. It was taken with my cell phone and isn't the clearest, but it was too cute to pass up. We'd been running our dogs so hand the lease out. Peyton decided she wanted to be on the leash, like the dogs! Funny girl.
And Chris rediscovered his Magnetix! He had a ball playing with them yesterday. He was making everything and anything he could think of.

March 18th!

2011-03-18T20:00:00.000-07:00

I had asked my mom to get me some girl scout cookies so when I saw her last Sunday, she brought me 2 boxes of Thin Mints and 2 boxes of Samoas! Needless to say, one box of the Thin Mints are gone and both boxes of the Samoas are too. This is Peyton showing off the very last Samoa and the last Thin Mint of that box!
I was on the floor playing with my kiddo's and told Chris to pop my back. Well, he doesn't quite have the balance yet to do it quite right. Needless to say, Peyton thought she needed to help too. She didn't walk at all, since she was struggling to just stand in the first place, but she felt so helpful!

March 17th!

2011-03-17T20:00:00.002-07:00

Happy St. Patricks Day!

I went to get Chris ready for school this morning and he said he didn't want to wear a green shirt because then people would pinch him on the bum. I told him if he didn't wear a green shirt, he'd get pinched all day. He agreed, but only because it was a Boston Celtics shirt! He's learned well from Ben:) Bentley is getting so big. I though I'd try on these 6 month onsies that we got from Kenny and Kristie just in case. Yeah, good thing I did. My not quite 4 month old is already fitting perfectly into 6 month clothes, really?! That's crazy.
And here's our festive hair do! She loved her "cute" (her name for hair bows)! She loves feeling pretty and I'm glad I can do something to make her feel happy!

March 16th!

2011-03-16T20:05:00.000-07:00

I got a phone call last night around 8:30pm saying that my brother, Bart, his wife, Michelle, their little girl, Brooklyn, my sister, Tia, and her boyfriend Voi needed a place to crash. They were on their way to Salt Lake and ran into a few problems along the way and didn't want to get there so late so stayed at my place, which was a little more then half way. They were only in my house for a little over 10 hours, but it sure was nice to see them and catch up. this is L to R: Peyton, Brooklyn, Voi, Tia, and Bentley.
Bart got to go to Vegas a few weeks ago to watch a Nascar race and got really close to the track. Well. my husband, having served his mission in Georgia, grew a liking for the sport so they were watching Bart's video.

Here's Peyton getting a ball fromMichelle. Michelle had just woke up and joined us and Peyton hadn't quite warmed up to her yet.

Here's Tia and I! I once heard a quote that fits quite nicely here, "I smile because you're my sister, I laugh because there's nothing you can do about it!" Sure was glad to have a little dose of family for a minute!

March 15th!

2011-03-15T20:00:00.000-07:00

Flash Back! Rewind to January 14th, 2010, you see Peyton "behind bars" because she's getting quite mobile, just like 10 months olds do.
And now, March 15th, 2011, she's now all over the place mobile, just like 23 month olds do, and she's "behind bars" again! Besides the height difference, different pajamas , and hair growth, doesn't look like much has changed!

March 14th!

2011-03-14T19:44:00.002-07:00

The baby gate returned today! Peyton got into the kitchen while "throwing something away for us" and spilt milk all over the floor this morning so up the gate went and upstairs she stayed. She didn't much care for it! But milk is expensive these days and I need my house in one piece and can't watch her 24/7, as hard as I try.Here are my wonderful kids helping me with dinner! I made chicken patty sandwiches and mac-n-cheese, but Chris said he wanted something "healthy" with his dinner, so he peeled 2 oranges:) Funny kid!
Here is Peyton helping me deep fry the patties! Her face is priceless. She was just glad to get a break from being upstairs!

Our neighbor (meaning "lives within a couple miles of us" out here) Howard is brothers with the man I bought my house from. And he has been so nice as too help us up-keep our farm land. He helps burn our ditches, water our feild, harvest our feild....okay pretty much runs our acrage! He came and burned the ditches for us last night, and they needed it so much! We have good people around us:) Peyton sure enjoyed watching him us his "wand" from the window!

March 13th!

2011-03-13T20:00:00.002-07:00

We had to go to Salt Lake and get Chris today. On our way back home, we stopped for a few minutes and met my mom, who was on her way home from Vegas and the MWC tournaments. I would have loved to get pictures of that, but ran out of the house so quick to be on time that I forgot my camera. After we got home from picking Chris up, we needed some energy spent. Peyton loves to dance! So we turned some music on on the computer and she and I danced around the living room! I'm so glad she shares in my passion, even if she's only 2 and doesn't really understand yet.
Bentley loves watching Peyton. He watches her as she moves around the front room. She is very entertaining to him.....as well as the rest of us;)

March 12th!

2011-03-12T19:28:00.000-07:00

It looks like we might be getting the baby gates back out! My dear Peyton is so quick into mischief these days and I try, but can't keep an eye on her ALL the time. Ben and I got groceries Friday and I got myself a little treat. I love Symphony's! Well, apparently my daughter likes them too because she came bringing me the candy bar from the counter in the kitchen. Crazy enough, if you notice, not one rip in the wrapping! My 2 year old opened this whole candy bar patiently enough to not tear it at all.
Then when we were about to put her in the shower and put her to bed, this is what we'd found! Not very easy to see, but there is a whole container of TOOTHPICKS all over the floor! You can see that she was very upset about getting in trouble.....she's smiling;)

March 11th!

2011-03-11T19:57:00.000-07:00

We ran to Salt Lake to take Chris to spend the weekend with his dad. Made it home by about 6:30 pm which is really good timing for us. My other kids were sure glad to be out of the car to stretch out and relax for a little while before they had to go to bed!

March 10th!

2011-03-10T19:02:00.000-07:00

It's good to know that sometimes when you buy your kids presents, they don't get played for just a few days, then the newness wears off, and they forget about them. Here is Peyton sitting in the chair we bought her for her 1st birthday playing the piano/music player we got her for Christmas!

March 9th!

2011-03-09T18:57:00.001-07:00

Bentley fell asleep in the swing like this and I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to snap a picture. Too cute:)
The first time we've used the back pack with Bentley. He liked being in it, but the wind was blowing a bit and he didn't like that. He spit up down my shirt 3 times before I decided it was enough and went inside. And you can see Peyton swinging in the back ground! She loves those swings!

And here's another picture of Chris 'jumping' his skate board. I know I have one just like it a few days ago, but he asked me if I would take a picture of it. And it wasn't quite warm enough for his outfit, but he's so excited to start wearing his shorts again that he told me "It's blazing hot outside, mom."

March 8th!

2011-03-08T19:11:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to do crafts with stuff I have at home to keep myself busy. I did pretty well until I needed buttons so I ran to town and the dollar store bargains were too good to pass up. The green flower in the middle cost me $2! The other 4 flowers I home made from an old shirt! I felt so recyle-ly and they turned out pretty cute, I think.

Here is my first step to making 'paper bag purse albums'. I saw them on the internet and thought I'd try them out. I'm not the craftiest person, but I try. I'll post another picture when I get them done!

March 7th!

2011-03-07T20:00:00.000-07:00

Monday's a about the same as any other week day when you're a stay at home mom! Today, there was lots of rain so we were stuck in the house.That didn't stop Peyton from thinking she needed to wear her jacket in the house. If you look closely, her hood says 'Peyton' and her lower back has 'Roseborough' embroidered on blue pocka dot material! So cute:) Here she is watching the kitty stay out of the rain just outside the front door. She didn't even hiss at us as we walked in the house from the car!
My poor little man was so tuckered out he fell asleep laying on the floor. But how freakin cute is this! Can't believe how big my kids are getting.

March 6th!

2011-03-06T20:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a typical Sunday so not alot went on so I thought I'd post the pictures I took of my kids from Saturday. I usually take my kids to Kiddie Kandids for pictures, but I didn't really want to spend the money this time, but still wanted them done. I may not have done as good of a job as professionals, but I think they turned out alright. Here's Chris's good one.
Some times he just tries too hard! I'm sure everyone can relate:)
Here's Peyton's good one! She may not be smiling or looking at the camera, but this is typical Peyton and that makes it great.

Ben was stilling behind me just laughing away, trying to get her to laugh so that I could at least get a picture of her smiling. Well, I got one of her laughing right along with him!

Bentley is a very smiley boy, if you catch him right after a nap or right after he eats. In this one, his face just lights up and make you smile to look at it:)

Here's Ben tring to get Bentley to grin really big. So he was going "Aah, BOO!" as he puffs a little air at him. This is how Bentley reacted!

The group pictures didn't turn out quite as well. I took a whole bunch of group pictures and if I knew how to crop the good parts of each picture into one, I'd have a really GREAT one. But you can't do better then one that shows your kids true personality.

And here's Peyton trying to hold Chris, Chris caring for Bentley, and Bentley spitting spit bubbles! What great kids I have:)

March 5th!

2011-03-05T20:00:00.000-07:00

Another warm day allowed us to go outside and spend some time. Bentley's little suit isn't as thick as it looks and it worked perfectly. Peyton enjoyed running all over the yard checking stuff out. And Chris, Ben, and I played catch, to get Chris practiced up for coach pitch baseball this summer!
Then while we were cooking dinner on the grill, Peyton had herself some fun swinging on the swings in our yard.
And Chris practiced his jumps on his skate board! He's getting the hang of it, slowly but surely:)

And Bentley was so content that he dozed right off. I absolutely love when their hands are so pudgy that their knuckles indent:) Man, you can't beat a good day with the family!

March 4th!

2011-03-04T20:00:00.000-07:00

My Peyton's hair is getting long enough that I'm able to do some fun stuff with it:) And for the most part, she does very well letting me. Here was today's invention!
To be absolutely honest, I didn't used to be a big fan of a side pony tail, but I'm warming up to them, and though I'm bias, this has got to be one of the cutest on the planet:)
At Tara, this is for you. It was warm enough today that I went out and weeded our little rose garden in front of our house. Took a hoe too it too!

Now it looks nice and is ready for spring to come:D I like winter alright, but I love spring because spring means warmer weather is on it's way and I LOVE summer!

March 3rd!

2011-03-03T19:14:00.000-07:00

My Bentley buddy is getting so big! He is smiley all the time.....when he's awake that is! He gets a little fussy around 6:00ish, but once a day's not bad.
Bentley has a bad habit of always looking over his right shoulder, ALWAYS. Whether he's sitting up or laying down. Which has brought on a flat spot on his head. It's hard to get a 2D picture of it so here were my best shots. On the picture above, you can see it a little on the left side.
And on this picture you can see the little indent on the right side of the picture. Like I said, hard to capture, but I tried.

I just can't believe how fast time is flying by. Bentley is 3 1/2 months old and weighs about half of what Chris weighs! My little Peyton turns 2 in a month from today! Chris will be baptized this summer! Everything needs to slow down a bit so I can enjoy it more!

March 2nd!

2011-03-02T07:13:00.000-07:00

We are having pretty spring-ish weather so we've been trying to get out while we can. Still a little cool and sometimes windy for Bentley, so in he stays. Here he is in Peyton's bumbo. Poor boy being born after a girl that we bought everything pink for. Bumbo, bouncer, swing! He's manages and doesn't seem to mind.....yet, until he grows up and asks why he is always in pink stuff!

One of our favorite meals in the whole world is grilled steaks! Ben is the expert grillsman and makes them to perfection. I'd rather have his steaks then a steak from ANY restraunt:)
As we were grilling steaks, the dogs were going crazy and we thought it was just because we were outside. Nope, they saw our neighbors moving cows and they weren't in on the action!
Here they are after they settled down. We bought Harley (left tan puggle) June 2008. 2 weeks later, we thought she might be lonely so we bought Lexus (right copper puggle). They are full sisters, born from the same litter on April 27th, 2008. Then a year and a half ago, a friend of mine on Facebook had found a black lab puppy and she needed a home. So she came to live with us. Cici (middle black lab) was born somewhere around June 2009, we believe.

Here's a little bit of a closer look at our "adopted" kitty. We think she's a girl and she's getting more and more friendly. She'll let me pet her, if I'm slow, and we can walk around her without her hissing....as much. Still working on a name for her. If you have any suggestions, let me know;)

And last but not least, Delta is a great place to watch out for geese this time of year. We have been amazed at how many geese fly past our house. This wasn't the biggest flock of geese there was, but I couldn't get my camera fast enough for that flock. Ben guesses there were over 1,000 in it. But this flock wasn't bad in size! And you should hear them. I love the sound of geese honking!

March 1st!

2011-03-01T19:09:00.000-07:00

Peyton has classic facial expressions. She doesn't smile unless it's her idea. Well, this time it wasn't so here she is, hair done "cute" ("tute") and wearing mom's pretty necklace that she found in my drawer. She thought she was pretty cool for a while, then wanted the necklace off.
Chris giving Bentley eskimo kisses. Bentley's not quite sure what he thinks of them yet.
I have such sweet kids. They love each other so-o-o much. What more could a mother ask for:) Maybe that they're healthy, smart, and adorable and I have that too so I'm just pleased as peaches!

February 28th!

2011-02-28T07:09:00.000-07:00

We all know how parents "bless" their kids by saying "I hope you have a kid just like you!". Well, BOTH my parents must have EACH said that to me X 100, but honestly, I don't remember being this "adventurous". Ben called and said he had a meeting so he wasn't going to be home as early as he usually is. So I got Peyton up and fed her then sat down to feed Bentley. Well, she was helping me by carrying an empty baggy to the garbage, but she never came back up. Just as soon as Bentley got done eating, I headed down to the kitchen to see what she was up to when I heard something drop on the floor. This is what I found.

She'd slipped on the first spilled spot of syrup, fell, and made the second spill spot, not to mention it splattered a little on her face. She must have gotten it in her eye a bit because it became a little red. I told her don't move as I ran to get my camera. I know, I know, but you can't blog it right if you take the pictures afterwards.
And this is how she froze while I was taking pictures! I honestly think she thinks she's helping when she does this stuff, but on the positive note, the floor got mopped again a little ahead of schedule!

February 27th!

2011-02-27T20:08:00.000-07:00

Peyter bug likes to play in her swing. If she thinks we're going to put Bentley in it, she runs and swings a few times first because she know's she won't get to for a while. So we buckled her in, set up the recliner so she was sitting, not laying, and she had a good ol' time:)

February 26th!

2011-02-26T20:03:00.000-07:00

Petyon was born to be a big sister! She is so good to Bentley. Here she is laying by (on) him, holding his hand and she was talking to him. And if you look next to him on his right, she had started his glow seahorse that plays music and layed it next to him, which she does all the time.

She is such a funny kid. Since I stepped on the tooth pick, I've been favoring the ball of my left foot when I walk. It hurts the worse when I walk across the wood floor in our kitchen. Well, I was walking through the kitchen, limping, and she thought she needed to do it too! She came limping right behind me, grinning and giggling all the while.

February 25th!

2011-02-25T20:12:00.000-07:00

We've had a cat that has recently adopted us. She/he's full grown and just showed up on the porch hungry one day. We live in a feild so we have problems with mice so cats are nice to have around. She's isn't exatcally friendly, since she hisses at you if you move too quickly and get to close. But we feed her just enough to keep her around to get rid of the mice. Well, we had some roast that was about to go bad so Ben decided to feed it to our dogs and the cat. If you look really closely a little bit to the right of where Ben's walking to, you can see the white blur that is the cat running for all she's worth. He didn't walk slow enough for her comfort:)
Peyton loves strawberry's! Which doesn't suprise me since strawberries were the main thing I craved when I was pregnant with her. I ate so many then.....and she eats them now!
I thought a few deviled eggs sounded good so I made me up some and decided to share with her. She loves scrambled eggs so I figured it was a no brainer.

She was not impressed! She sat there with her mouth open like that crying until we helped her get the eggs out of her mouth. I felt bad for her, but it was also quite humorous. She's such a character.

And to finish off the day, we sat down to a "movie night". The Friday night's we have Chris, we pick a movie and watch it before bed. This time it was "Racing Stripes", my pick:) I love my kids and had a great time!

Chatty Bentley!

2011-02-24T19:54:00.002-07:00

Bentley gets chatty about once a day when he'll just goo for a few minutes. Well, getting him to do it with a camera there to catch it is rare....until today. I figured out that it's the 'bing' sound of when the video starts recording that triggers him to stop making noises. Well, I silenced my phone and he didn't even know I was videoing. He's so cute!

February 24th!

2011-02-24T08:17:00.000-07:00

Peyton and Bentley are going to be the best of friends, just like her and Chris are, once Bentley can do more then just lay there. She loves to hold him. She loses intrest before he does, but it'll come:) Interesting how the one that isn't supposed to know what a camera is, is looking at it, and the one I'm telling to look at the camera, is looking out the window over my shoulder:D

February 23rd!

2011-02-23T19:58:00.000-07:00

Today was a good day, for the most part. My kids woke up in a good mood. Had breakfast burrito's for breakfast. The kids naps came and they went down easily enough. So Ben and I sat down with a bowl of popcorn to enjoy the Biggest Loser together. Just as I was going to go and get Peyton up from her nap, I stubbed the "palm" of my foot (for lack of a better word) with a toothpick that Peyton had accidently dropped on the carpet. It even bled, OUCH! So I limped the rest of the day. But life must go on. It was a pretty nice afternoon outside so around 5:30, we went out and cooked hamburgers on the grill. It has always been to cold so Bentley has never been outside outside of his car seat.....until today:) His Aunt Hailie and Uncle Derek made him this cute hat with his name on it for Christmas and he finally got to wear it when it would actually fulfill it's purpose.
He may not look happy, but he enjoyed himself. Even cried when we went in the house to eat. He did have to get used to the brightness of the sun.
While Ben cooked, he and Chris were playing with Chris's paintball gun. They are a little cock gun, non-toxic paint balls that he got from Kenny & Kristie's family for Christmas. Chris stood out in the yard and Ben would try and shoot him! The paint balls flew slow enough though that if it was going to hit him, Chris would jump out of the way. They still had fun and the hamburgers were really good!

February 22nd!

2011-02-22T20:08:00.000-07:00

Easter of 2008, we got a TV. When we went into get it, Ben has a specific one in mind, but unfortunatly, they didn't make that particular kind anymore. So he had to settle for the BIGGEST one they had in the store. We have loved having this big of tv, since Ben is a huge sports fan and you practically feel like you're there when watch them on our TV. Well, last week, the lamp component went oout on it. So we called our warrenty company. They gave us 3 options: 1- we could go buy one at Wilson Bates in Orem for $250 2- we could have one overnighted from them with the lamp free, but pay $35 for the overnight schipping or, 3- wait 5-7 business days and they'd ship it free of charge. Well, we picked the later and....yay, it came today.It may not seem like that big of a deal to those people that don't watch alot of tv, but we're just so used to it, it was very missed while it was gone!

February 21st!

2011-02-21T19:06:00.000-07:00

Today was a "go get Chris back" day! We met at Lagoon and were able to stop in Draper and catch Kyle as he was getting off work so we grabbed some lunch/dinner at Panda Express. You can't tell from this picture, but Peyton LOVES Uncle Kyle! She's just her daddy's girl when it comes to smiling for pictures.

Here big boy Bentley and daddy, in front of the panda's, stretching Bentley's legs so that he would be alright to endure the trip home!
Chris got a sore throat while he was at his dad's house so he's got a few days before he'll be over it. But he sure was glad to see Uncle Kyle too.
While Ben, Kyle, and I visited, Chris walked Peyton in laps around the restraunt. It was so dang cute they probably walked around 6 or 7 times:) They make a good brother/sister pair :D

February 20th!

2011-02-20T19:45:00.000-07:00

This was the worst of the walls after I rubbed them down with fingernail polish. I painted over them, but the new paint and old paint are both white, one's now just whiter then the other so we may have to repaint the WHOLE wall.
Last evening, we were watching the All-Star game and Peyton found the old hat from the hospital we used to put on her as a baby to keep her head warm. She thought it was so funny!

It was dark in the room so I had to use my flash and this is Bentley's reaction to the flash! We had a fun-stay-at-home, catch-up-on-rest day:)

February 19th!

2011-02-19T19:58:00.000-07:00

Today was eventful, to say the least. Ben works with a spanish guy that invited us to a dinner that his ward was putting on. It was all authentic mexican food so there's where we had dinner.
These are of Bentley and Peyton riding to dinner.
Here is Peyton having tamalies with Ben. She wasn't really interested in the food as much as she was in watching all the kids run around:)

But being the shy little girl that she is, she pretty much roamed between my chair, Ben's chair, and her own chair.

Here is Ben's friend, Fidel, helping his son, Adrian, into a sack for the sack race.

Here's Bentley and I after we'd finished our cinnomon roll!

When we got home, things started to get a little crazy. Our big TV up in our family room's lamp has burnt out and our new one is being shipped so in the mean time, if we have anything we want to watch, we now watch it downstairs. It also happens to help in the fact that when we put the kids down for naps, we can actually hear when they get up rather then having to us the monitors. Well, I was upstairs and Ben was down stairs and we both thought the other person had Peyton. Well, she happened to be right in the middle of us.....with a magic marker.

Here is her art work! She got in some trouble and had to help us try to clean it up.

It came off her and the tile floor alright, but the walls and her jacket are a different story. The only thing we could get to work to come close to taking it off the walls was fingernail polish remover, which also took off them paint in the process. So we'll be repainting it looks like.

As for her coat, not so much luck. NOTHING took it out. I've been trying differnt concoctions to try to get it to come off, no such luck. It is getting lighter, but it still very noticable.

While I was upstairs trying to get the stains out of the jacket, Ben was watching Bentley, and Peyton was somewhere in the middle again, trying to "help" clean up. So all my baby wipes got pulled out of their box.

The jacket may just end up going to the garbage. Which is so sad because this was her first time ever wearing it and she hadn't even grown into it:'(

Here's hoping tomorrow is a better day:)

February 18th!

2011-02-18T20:26:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a regular every other Friday for us. Chris goes to his dad's house for the weekend every other Friday so we pick him up from school, drive to Lagoon, usually, they grab groceries in Payson and some dinner and head home. Yesterday was a little bit different, for we got to go through Provo, to Heber, then to Silver Creek Junction to meet. Here is Peyton and Chris watching Secratariate in the Suburban on the way there. We bring snacks and drinks and they keep themselves busy:)
After dropping Chris off, we'd gotten groceries and we stopped at Reed's Drive-in in Nephi for dinner. They have the yummiest burgers! Peyton, as you can tell, loves their shakes:)

Not a very clear picture, at all, but this was Bentley! He is such a good traveler. He stays quiet, unless he's hungry. He sleeps most of the time, but when he's not sleeping, he's still content to just sit and watch what's going on around him!

I am so blessed to have such a great family!

Chris's accidents!

2011-02-18T07:17:00.002-07:00

Chris is 7 years old right now and such a big help around the house. He helps with Bentley and really likes to hold him. He is also really good at keeping Peyton busy so that Ben and I can get a break on occasion. He has had a rough few days though. Monday, February 14th, Chris had a box with all his Valentine's from school and was running to the house to show me when he got off the bus. Well, we have a row of rocks lining our driveway and he forgot to step over them and down he went and spilled all the Valentine's across the lawn. He was alright, not troubles. So on Wednesday, the wind was blowing so bad at our house. Ben and I are waiting for him to get home from school and he walks in crying. We asked what happened and he said the wind was blowing rocks at his face and they really stung so he was running to the house, blocking his face from the wind, and it happened to push him as he ran. Well, it pushed him right into the same line of rocks that got him two days earlier, but his time he scratched up his side(pic 2).

Well, yesterday, the 17th, we were getting ready for school and the bus had a substitute driver so she came 3 or 4 minutes early so we were scurrying to get him out of the house. Well, if you look at pic 1, you can see the sun glaring off some ice on our sidewalk. Yup, my poor boys bad luck struck again. He hit that ice patch just as he was starting to run out to the road. Out came his feet and down he went. I ran out barefooted to help him up and see if he was okay. He had broken his waffles in half and was crying. I wasn't sure what to do. The bus driver had seen us so I wasn't sure whether to take him back in the house or hustle him out to the bus. I paniced and sent him to the bus, having told him I was so sorry and asked if he was okay, he cried yeah. I wiped his cheeks and he WALKED to the end of the drive way and jogged to the bus, that was patiently waiting. I could hear the driver ask him if he was okay. When he got home, he was none worse for the wear. He was just fine, not scrap or nothing.He's a rezealant pup though. When he got home from school, I was doing dishes. Well, Peyton was in the sink next to me "helping". So Chris wanted to help too! Here he is giving himself a pedicure! I know, crazy. All he's doing is soaking his feet, but he likes it.

He got the jersey he's wearing from his Aunt Hailie and Uncle Derek for his 7th birthday! His favorite color is blue, so it's blue. Kevin Garnett is his favorite player(just like Ben) so his number is 5. And then it has his last name on it. He loves it! He is always happy and full of energy. He has an unconditional love for everyone! He is so smart and a very good reader. We love him very much!

Apparently my tub was dirty!

2011-02-17T08:13:00.002-07:00

It's routine in our house to shut most of the doors when you come out or are done with them. Bedrooms, closets, BATHROOMS! Well, on occation, we forget. And my precious Peyton has a sixth sense for knowing if the doors been left open and also knows what to get into quickly, before she gets caught. Well, Chris and I accidently left his bathroom door open while we were cooking dinner last night. Pretty soon I hear a squeal so I went searching. I stepped over a now empty bottle of Comet (that was about 1/6 of the way full last time I used it) to see Peyton in the tub standing in an inch of Comet, with Comet powder on her shirt, her fore arms, and her shins. The squeal was because she couldn't get the water on to clean the tub! I managed to get the shirt off her without getting the residue in her eyes. I then had to wash off her, the tub net support that I use for Bentley's baths, and the tub. Well, might as well clean the tub while I'm at it so we scrubbed the tub, Peyton and I. Then she got that bath, that apparently she so desprately wanted.
She proves my point from yesterday that, she does indeed, LOVE to clean!
P.S. The mark on her arm is a temporary tatoo that her brother gave to her from his Valentine's from school! It's a "cute" butterfly!

Peyton Ali

2011-02-16T14:03:00.003-07:00

Peyton is getting so big! She is 22 month and getting more and more beautiful every day. She is full of character! When she says "thank you" it comes out "taint chew". "Please" is "Peas". "Chris" is "Riss". "Bentley" is "mom-mi-a"(not sure the reasoning on that one)."Shoes" and "juice" sound the same with "chush". She's pretty good with "mom" "dad" "cheese" "granma" and her favorite "bampa". A cell phone and head phones "Ello". She says alot more, it just in her 'I'm a cute kid' dialog and we're still working on interpruting it:)

She's a great sister! As a big sister, she get's diapers, throws the dirty one's away. She likes to put his blankets on him. She loves to kiss him whenever she feels like it. She will give him toys if he's playing on the ground or swinging in his swing. And if she see's that he's spit up and we haven't noticed, she'll grab a burp cloth and wipe it up. Her newest thing is she likes to come and sit on your lap and hold Bentley on her lap. She likes to put his binkie in his mouth for him if it falls out, even if he's asleep.

As a little sister, she likes to wrestle with Chris. If he's wrestling with me and Ben, she'll take Ben's side and get whoever he's getting. Chris and Peyton play downstairs all the time. He likes to tickle her and she loves to scream like he's so scary. She watches him, mesmorized, when he's goofing around or doing his cartwheels. She's already 3/4 as tall as him so she just thinks she's a big kid too:)

Peyton loves to clean! If she gets toys out, she loves for you to sing "clean u, clean up, everybody everywhere....". She'll clean the whole room if you keep singing the song(not that she knows where everything goes, and it's usually messier then when she started if you don't guide her, but she thinks it's "cleaning"). She also loves to push around my swiffer. She wants me to take her clothes off and put her in the sink next to where I'm doing dishes. She get's the little dust pan and broom out and will push stuff around on the floor with it. She get's her wash cloth in the bathtub and rubs it up and down the walls of the shower. She'll use her hand and brush crumbs away on the table when she's sitting there. She loves to grab the dirty laundry out of the dirty clothes baskets and put them in the washer when I'm starting a batch. She also likes to sit in front of the drier and "help" me put the wet laundry in. She also loves to "help" fold laundry(by taking the stuff I've already folded and moving it to another part of the basket and setting in down.) The only cleaning she doesn't like is the vaccum! She hates it! She runs away and because she doesn't like the loud noise. She doesn't like the blow dryier either. She loves to get in the shower with her daddy....every day! She likes her hair to be done and when it is, she likes me to put in a "cute"! A cute is anything that goes in her hair, a bow, a clip, or a flower. She loves outside, though it's hard to get out there much in this cold. She loves her stroller and walks. We also have a cart behind Ben's bike that she enjoys. She likes swimming. She is almost always happy! She is so much fun to have around and loves her family. She does everything to please those around her. And if she gets a high 5 or a pound it, she's thrilled:) We love her very much and wouldn't trade her for ANYTHING!