of all the places we could live, why here?

Our little reindeer from Grandma is buried in the snow.

Jared survived another morning of shoveling. Thankfully he borrowed a snow blower from his sister, or he would have been at it for days!

spiders...

Does this send a chill up anyone else's spine? As I was rocking and feeding Gavin, I looked up and on his wall were two spiders. I was a little shocked, (a) in the middle of winter, and (b) why are they both in his room? So, I finished with Gavin, all the while keeping a close eye on the spiders, (Gavin looked like he was watching them too, can babies see that far?) Anyhow, after a few minutes I got the flyswatter, and mustered up the courage to try and kill them. This is usually a job I leave to Jared, but since I was the only one home, and they were in the baby's room, I had to do it myself. After a few screams, and a racing heart, they were both on their way to the ocean via our toilet. I felt proud of myself, and went on to tell Gavin how I hate spiders, and that our house must not be insulated very well. I'm sure my 4 month old agreed.

Merry Christmas!

Kate is slightly grouchy, I guess we woke her up too early.

Gavin was pretty happy though. All in all we had an enjoyable Christmas. Wishing you and yours peace this holiday season. We're hoping the colds will go away, so we can have a little peace at our house.

marathon post

I haven't posted for a while, actually I've been trying to upload pictures for a post for the last week, and just gave up trying. My kids and I borrowed a leaf blower to clean up the leaves in our back yard, and the pictures of them trying to blow each other over were hilarious, but I can't seem to convince this computer to post them, so we'll move on and update you all on the rest of our lives. Here goes...

So, our little Gavin has figured out rolling over. Here are some strange pictures, but just had to update grandmas and grandpas, and of course Uncle Reid on mister Gavin's progress.

Almost there, he still gets a little stuck on that arm.

In Gavin's words, "Mom, why is this so interesting?"

I tried to get a good picture of Kate and Gavin in their Christmas Sunday attire, but it wasn't happening, maybe this Sunday.

We have snow and yes, COLD, here in ID.

Maddie is lovin' dance, and is quite good, and cute I might add.

And lastly, this is our neighbor's frog that we're babysitting. Everytime I walk past him into the kitchen he totally swims a mile around his bowl. I'm getting a little worried, does he not like me, or is it that I'm wearing green today and he thinks I'm a ginormous frog? I'm pulling for the latter, I do feel a little like Kermie the Frog today.

All I want for Christmas...

Is this...

Just kidding, I already have it, I just want it to work! I have to dry loads two and sometimes three times! It's driving me crazy! I clean out the lint trap, and it still takes at least 80 minutes on high to dry a load. No wonder our power bill has skyrocketed! This weekend Jared and I are pulling it out to replace the dryer hose, and if it still doesn't work we might just have to head to Lowe's. Any suggestions are much appreciated.

Twilight

So, I finally got to see Twilight. It was a fun girl's night out! It would have been hard to watch with Jared, a little too cheesy for him I think. I really liked the book, and now I am moving on to New Moon. Hopefully with the many millions they made on Twilight, they'll put a little more time and money into the second movie. The special effects were a little lacking, and hair and makeup could use a complete overhaul. But other than that, I enjoyed my night out, and now have some faces to put with names as I read the other books. Thanks ladies!

dates for twilight.

So, I was thinking about the first week in December to go see Twilight. Our ward Christmas party is the 6th, so that is out. I took Maddie to see HSM 3 on a Wed. night, and the theatre was pretty empty. A weeknight might be nicer for our hubbies too, they won't be left alone on a weekend night. So how about Dec. 3rd or 4th? Let me know. I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one wanting to see it! If you haven't already, you should check out the trailer for it. Kate said it looked "scarwy!"

Sweet baby!

I can't get enough of him.

a little disappointed.

So this is what I was supposed to be doing this weekend. Jared bought me a ticket to Celine Dion's concert, and I was going to go with his mom, and sister Devanie. Celine is sick, and so she postponed the concert to February 22nd, which is a Sunday. I'm quite bummed! So, since our hotel was non-refundable, and non-transferable, we're going to Temple Square as a family instead. After cursing the Hilton staff for not giving us a refund, I decided it will be really fun to go as a family this weekend. Maddie is excited to take our picture in front of the conference center fountain, and I'm a little excited to see Gavin take his first swim in the hotel pool (not so excited to see myself in a swimsuit, but that's another matter :)

Twilight girls night out

So, I just finished reading Twilight, and wondered if anyone wanted to make it a girl's night out to go see the movie. The only problem is I'll be gone this next weekend when it hits theatre's , and the next weekend is Thanksgiving. Anyone willing to wait a couple of weeks? Let me know.

Which one do you like?

So here are the baby announcements I created on photoshop. Let me know which one you like best.

Typical Sunday Evening.

Just kidding, Jared told me to call this post "a typical Sunday evening". He can be sarcastic every once in a while. Making cookies with our kids is definately not a typical Sunday activity, but I must say I did enjoy it. I had to redeem myself after my very moody sacrament meeting with my family, so I decided to make cookies, and actually let them help.

A few of the things I heard while baking were:

(As Kate passes gas) Maddie shouts, "Fire in the hole!"

Maddie: "Can I lick the spoon?"

Me: "No, raw eggs will give you diarrhea."

(After we catch Kate eating cookie dough) Maddie: "Colin, Kate's eating diarrhea!"

Kate: (as she points to the mixer) "Dat go joom, joom!"

Colin, Gavin, and Jared were our silent participants. All in all we had an enjoyable time making cookies.

Gavin is 2 months old!

Now that we've switched Gavin to soy, he's a much happier baby. His first two months have flown by, and we are so glad to have him in our family!

I will definately enjoy!

So, I was cleaning up my counters after Halloween, and just had to take this picture, and ponder the current meaning of "Enjoy the Journey". Will I enjoy the journey to the bottom of these candy filled buckets? Most likely yes. But for right now I think I'll just enjoy Kate laughing hysterically at the old Pink Panther cartoon that she's watching while I blog.

Halloween 2008

This Halloween, we each had important jobs. I was the photographer (I failed, I have no pictures of kids in costumes, and more pictures of the jack o' lanterns than the family carving them, and to top it off, all my pictures are a little fuzzy, such is life, my mind has been a little fuzzy too!) Jared was the carving man, Colin and Maddie were observers, and Kate was the entertainer. Gavin, well, you'll see.

Kate sang "If you're Happy and you know it"

Gavin is clearly not happy.

Jared carving with the biggest knife in the house. We're lucky we didn't go to the ER.

Maddie's pumpkin.

Kate saying, "Ew, dat's gwoss!"

Colin's pumpkin.

The pumpkins on the porch. I did the ghost.


Jared did the pirate, and the smiley face is Kate's.


All together now. Thanks to Uncle Reid, and Tammy Collins for the pumpkins. We still have a huge pumpkin from Uncle Reid that I'm going to decorate the porch with for Thanksgiving, and then carve to take a picture of a happy Gavin (hopefully) inside it.

Kate's getting demanding.

So I was looking at all of your fun blogs the other day, and Kate walked right up to the printer, and yelled in a frustrated tone (a little like I do when the computer isn't working) GO! After laughing, I reallized she wanted a coloring page. A new discovery she made a few weeks ago. So I quickly printed a page, and she was entertained for a few minutes.

A Smile!

Gavin is almost 7 weeks, and had his first smile for Grandma when he was 5 weeks. I finally captured it on camera! Well, sort of.

Almost there.

I think I got it.

There it is!

And just like that it's gone again! Until next time little man.

Gavin's blessing weekend.

Gavin was blessed this weekend by Jared. Jared gave him a really nice blessing and it was nice to have family and friends around. Thankfully Gavin didn't grow out of his outfit. I've had it for a while, and was worried (after he gained a pound and a half in his first two weeks) that he wouldn't fit in it. We don't have too many good pictures of him, he really didn't feel like posing for us on his special day!

Colin's weekend in pictures.

Colin found the camera this weekend and tried his hand at photography.

Grandma and Grandpa Lybbert's dog Gruffy

Kenzie, Allie, Maddie and Gavin

A close-up of Gavin

Gavin gave Grandma his first smile this weekend. Colin tried to get it on camera.

Maddie playing a game on the computer.

Laundry and little memories.

So Jared thought this was silly, but I had to take this picture while folding clothes. I wanted to remember just how small and sweet Gavin is right now, you know for those days in the future when he throws tantrums (Kate' current phase), pinches his siblings (an occasional move from Maddie), or says when asked to do something "and what if I don't?" (a new phrase from Colin, thanks to Grandpa!). I know all those things will come in his future, but for right now I'm going to just enjoy his little toes!

Spud Harvest and Watercolors

It is spud harvest time, and as usual my kids are bored! I really think they would rather be in school. Maddie decided to get out the good ol' Crayolas the other day, and asked if Kate could paint with her. I said she could, but to get a bib out for Kate. Well, as you can see in the picture, she found a bib, but the little newborn bib just simply won't cut it! I thought it was funny, and thought I better capture it on camera. At least she was thinking of her little sister.

AR Reading

Does anyone else struggle with the AR Reading? Last year, Colin loved to read. He started doing AR, but on his own time, as he wanted. His teacher really didn't pressure him. Now that he has to read and take the AR tests, we have to fight him to get him to read. It's no longer fun when you have to take a test afterwards! The party is no motivator either. He really could care less. So, for now we continue to fight, and every so often I catch him enjoying a book on his own time. Any ideas?

A couple pictures of Gavin, and a funny story.

Wow mom! Don't sneak up on a guy like that!

He looks like a little buddha, but its just the angle of the camera. He's really not this big yet, although in his first two weeks, he had gained a pound and a half!

So the funny story... Maddie saved some marbles from her Aunt Devanie's D.I. pile, and brought them home to play with. I was watching her, and said, "You know Mad, make sure you pick all of those up, they're choking hazards." Her reply," No Mom, they're marbles."